Jane Brown took a long breath.

"Doctor Willie," she said, "won't you have him operated on?"

He looked up at her over his spectacles.

"Operated on? What for?"

"Well, he's not getting any better," she managed desperately.
"I'm--sometimes I think he'll die while we're waiting for him to get
better."

He was surprised, but he was not angry.

"There's no fracture, child," he said gently. "If there is a clot
there, nature is probably better at removing it than we are. The
trouble with you," he said indulgently, "is that you have come here,
where they operate first and regret afterward. Nature is the best
surgeon, child."

She cast about her despairingly for some way to tell him the truth.
But even when she spoke she knew she was foredoomed to failure.

"But--suppose the Staff thinks that he should be?"

Doctor Willie's kindly mouth set itself into grim lines.

"The Staff!" he said, and looked at her searchingly. Then his jaws
set at an obstinate angle.