his hat raised silently. She waved him a mute acknowledgment, then
going into the room again, closed the door.

The firelight still leaped languidly on the hearth, and on the
half-smoked cigar and pile of ashes in the tray. The girl stood a
moment looking at these things and the chair, then walked quietly to
the piano and sat down before it. But she did not play again.

Meantime the Doctor, an erect and urgent presence in the dusk, had
driven through dim streets and climbed again the four flights of the
morning, to find the hush of heaven fallen on the house.

"I knew _you_ could save him!" said the pale mother only, lifting
blind eyes of worship from the couch.

The Doctor laughed, poured her out with his own hands a
sleeping-draught, and sat patiently beside her till she slept, then
stole away, leaving injunctions with the nurse, established in his
absence, to telephone if there came a crisis--"even," after a moment's
hesitation, "in the night."

"Home!"--he gave the order briefly. There were black circles beneath
his eyes, making him look thinner than when he left the house that
morning; he had no distinct reminiscence of lunch, and he was very
tired; but his shoulders no longer ached, his headache was gone, and
his hands were perfectly steady.

Odd bits of music hummed perversely through his head, mixing
themselves up with all things and rippling the air about him into
their own large waves, bearing now and then upon them, like the