prairie for twenty-four hours. He said that Meydon's only got twenty-
four hours, if the trick isn't done! Well--"

He took a penny from his pocket. "I'll toss for it. Heads he does it,
and tails he doesn't."

He tossed. It came down heads. "Well, there's one more fool in the
world than I thought," he said philosophically, as though he had settled
the question; as though the man riding away into the prairie with a dark
problem to be solved had told the penny what he meant to do.

Mrs. Meydon, Father Bourassa, and Finden stood in the little waiting-room
of the hospital at Jansen, one at each window, and watched the wild
thunderstorm which had broken over the prairie. The white heliographs of
the elements flashed their warnings across the black sky, and the roaring
artillery of the thunder came after, making the circle of prairie and
tree and stream a theatre of anger and conflict. The streets of Jansen
were washed with flood, and the green and gold things of garden and field
and harvest crumbled beneath the sheets of rain.

The faces at the window of the little room of the hospital, however, were
but half-conscious of the storm; it seemed only an accompaniment of their
thoughts, to typify the elements of tragedy surrounding them.

For Varley there had been but one thing to do. A life might be saved,
and it was his duty to save it. He had ridden back from the prairie as
the sun was setting the night before, and had made all arrangements at
the hospital, giving orders that Meydon should have no food whatever till
the operation was performed the next afternoon, and nothing to drink
except a little brandy-and-water.