"Two months ago, a month," he thought, as he listened and listened for a
sound of hope that might come to his ear through Jenny's wasted
side,--"even a month, and I could have saved her." And yet as he talked
to her he was not so sure, after all. He missed something in her voice.
It was the will to live.

"Have you had a shock at any time?" he said.

Jenny was taken by surprise for a moment,--the other doctor had asked
her that, too,--and she did not deny it so convincingly as she tried to.

"O, that's all right," said the doctor aloud to Jenny and her mother,
who stood by, though inwardly he said, "I see. That's the reason;" and
again he said, "I'm afraid you mustn't get up just yet. That chest of
yours has to be taken care of, but you needn't be anxious. In a month or
six weeks you'll be all right again."

"Only a month or six weeks," said Jenny, with a sinking voice. She
meant--was that all that was left to her of life and love?

Downstairs Theophil stood waiting with a beating heart. He sprang to the
door and drew the doctor into his room. The doctor laid a kind hand upon
his arm, and there was a look in his face that made Theophil's heart die
within him.

"You mean she is going to die?" he said with fearful calmness. "_You
mean that?_"

"My poor fellow, God knows what I would give to deny it."