He moved impatiently as the door
opened, and then recognising Giovanni, he hailed him in a voice
much more lively and sonorous than might have been expected.
"You, prince!" he cried, in evident delight. "What saint has
brought you?"
"I heard of your accident, and so I came to see if I could do
anything for you. How are you?"
"As you see," replied Gouache. "In a hospitable tomb, with my head
tied up like an imperfectly-resurrected Lazarus. For the rest
there is nothing the matter with me, except that they have taken
away my clothes, which is something of an obstacle to my leaving
the house at once. I feel as if I had been in a revolution and had
found myself on the wrong side of the barricade--nothing worse
than that."
"You are in good spirits, at all events. But are you not seriously
hurt?"
"Oh, nothing--a broken collar-bone somewhere, I believe, and some
part of my head gone--I am not quite sure which, and a bad
headache, and nothing to eat, and a general sensation as though
somebody had made an ineffectual effort to turn me into a
sausage."
"What does the doctor say?"
"Nothing. He is a man of action. He bled me because I had not the
strength to strangle him, and poured decoctions of boiled grass
down my throat because I could not speak.
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