"It's after nine," protested Ed mildly. "If I don't start early, I never
get through."

Max yawned.

"Better come with me," he said. "If things go on as they've been doing,
I'll have to have an assistant. I'd rather have you than anybody, of
course." He put his lithe surgeon's hand on his brother's shoulder.
"Where would I be if it hadn't been for you? All the fellows know what
you've done."

In spite of himself, Ed winced. It was one thing to work hard that there
might be one success instead of two half successes. It was a different
thing to advertise one's mediocrity to the world. His sphere of the Street
and the neighborhood was his own. To give it all up and become his younger
brother's assistant--even if it meant, as it would, better hours and more
money--would be to submerge his identity. He could not bring himself to
it.

"I guess I'll stay where I am," he said. "They know me around here, and I
know them. By the way, will you leave this envelope at Mrs. McKee's?
Maggie Rosenfeld is ironing there to-day. It's for her."

Max took the envelope absently.

"You'll go on here to the end of your days, working for a pittance," he
objected. "Inside of ten years there'll be no general practitioners; then
where will you be?"

"I'll manage somehow," said his brother placidly. "I guess there will