CHAPTER XIII.
WHITE BIRDS; WHITE SNOW; WHITE THOUGHTS.
By degrees Caius was obliged to give up his last lingering belief in the existence of the lady he loved.

It was a curious position to be in, for he loved her none the less.

Two months of work and thought for the diseased people had slipped away, and by the mere lapse of time, as well as by every other proof, he had come to know that there was no maiden in any way connected with Madame Le Maitre who answered to the visions he had seen, or who might be wooed by the man who had ceased to care for all other women for her sweet sake.
After Caius had arrived the epidemic had become worse, as it had been prophesied it would, when the people began to exclude the winter air from their houses.

In almost every family upon the little isle there was a victim, and Caius, under the compelling force of the orders which Madame Le Maitre never gave and the wishes she never expressed, became nurse as well as doctor, using what skill he had in every possible office for the sick, working early and late, and many a time the night through.

It was not a time to prattle of the sea-maid to either Madame Le Maitre or O'Shea, who both of them worked at his side in the battle against death, and were, Caius verily believed, more heroic and successful combatants than himself.