p. Artemis
wouldn't have; nor Gertrude. You know that's true, Ambo. Even if I could
do nothing for her--there were others to think of. There was you. I
ought to have been helping you; not you, me." She put out her hand to
me. "You've done everything for me, always--and I make no return. Now,
when I might have, I--I've been a quitter!"

Tears of shame and self-reproach poured from her eyes. "Oh," she cried
out with a sort of fierce disgust, "how I hate a coward! How I hate
myself!"

"Come, come!" protested Doctor Askew. "This won't do, little lady!" He
laid a firm hand on her shoulder and almost roughly shook it, as if she
had been a boy. "If you're equal to it, I suggest you get up and wash
your face in good cold water. Do your hair, too--put yourself to rights!
Things never look quite normal to a woman, you know, when her hair's
tumbling!" His hand slipped from her shoulder to her upper arm; he drew
the coverlet from her, and helped her to rise. "All right? Feel your
pins under you?... Fine! Need a maid? No?... Splendid! Come along, Mr.
Hunt, we'll wait for the little lady in the drawing-room. She'll soon
pull herself together."

He joined me and walked with me to the door. Susan had not moved as yet
from the bedside.

"Ambo," she demanded unexpectedly, "does Sister know?"

"Yes, dear."

"Why isn't she with me then? Is her cold worse?"

"Rather, I'm afraid. I've sent a doctor to her, with instructions to
keep her in bed if possible. We'll go right down when you're ready and
feel up to it."

"Why didn't I stay with her, Ambo? I should have. If I had, all this
wouldn't have happened. It was pure selfishness, my coming here to see
Mrs. Arthur. I simply wanted the cheap satisfaction of telling her--oh,
no matter! I'll be ready in five minutes or less."

"Ah," laughed Doctor Askew, "then we know just what to expect! I'll
order my car round for you in half an hour."

Phil and Jimmy arrived in town that afternoon and I met them at the
Brevoort, where the three of us took rooms, with a sitting-room, for the
night. I told them everything that had occurred as fully as I could,
with one exception: I did not speak of those first three pages
automatically scribbled by Susan's hand. Nor did I mention my
impression--which was rapidly becoming a fixed idea--that my love for
her had darkened her life. This was my private problem, my private
desolation. It would be my private duty to free Susan's spirit from this
intolerab