Jacques continued to drink, holding the bottle in his left hand;
suddenly, he closed and tightened the fingers of his right hand with a convulsive movement; his hair clung to his icy forehead, and his countenance revealed an agony of pain.Yet he continued to drink; only, without removing his lips from the neck of the bottle, he lowered it for an instant, as if to recover breath.Just then, Jacques met the sardonic look of Morok, who continued to drink with his accustomed impassibility.
Thinking that he saw the expression of insulting triumph in Morok's glance, Jacques raised his elbow abruptly, and drank with avidity a few drops more.But his strength was exhausted.A quenchless fire devoured his vitals.His sufferings were too intense, and he could no longer bear up against them.His head fell backwards, his jaws closed convulsively, he crushed the neck of the bottle between his teeth, his neck grew rigid, his limbs writhed with spasmodic action, and he became almost senseless.
"Jacques, my good fellow! it is nothing," cried Morok, whose ferocious glance now sparkled with diabolical joy.Then, replacing his bottle on the table, he rose to go to the aid of Ninny Moulin, who was vainly endeavoring to hold Sleepinbuff.
This sudden attack had none of the symptoms of cholera.Yet terror seized upon all present; one of the women was taken with hysterics, and another uttered piercing cries and fainted away.Ninny Moulin, leaving Jacques in the hands of Morok, ran towards the door to seek for help,--
when that door was suddenly opened, and the religious writer drew back in alarm, at the sight of the unexpected personage who appeared on the threshold.