for a leather writing case on the table at his elbow, took
out a pile of sheets, and began to hand them over one by one to Burns.

"What's this? Hullo! Do you mean to say she did this? Well, I like her
impudence!"

"So do I," laughed King, looking past Burns's shoulder at a saucy sketch
of the big Doctor himself evidently laying down the law about something,
by every vigorous line of protest in his attitude and the thrust of his
chin. Underneath was written: "Absolutely not! Haven't I said so a
thousand times?"

"'Wad some power--'" murmured Burns. "Well, she seems to have the
'power.' I am rather a thunderer, I suppose. What's this next? My wife!
Jolly! that's splendid. Hasn't she caught a graceful pose though?
Ellen's to the life. Selina Arden? That's good--that's very good.
There's your conscientious nurse for you. And this, of herself? Ha! She
hasn't flattered herself any. She may have looked like that at one time,
but not now--hardly."

"She's looking pretty well again, is she?"

"Both pretty and well. We don't starve our patients on an exclusively
liquid diet the way we used to, and they don't come out of typhoid
looking half so badly in consequence. And she's been rounding out every
day for the last two weeks in fine shape. She's a great little girl, and
as full of spirit as a gray squirrel. I'm beginning to believe she's a
bit older than I would believe at first; that mind of hers is no
schoolgirl's; it's pretty mature. She says frankly she's twenty-four,
though she doesn't look over nineteen."

"Is there any reason why I can't see her for a bit of a visit if she
goes Saturday?" asked King straightforwardly. It was always a
characteristic of his to go straight to a point in any matter; intrigue
and diplomacy were not for him in affairs which concerned a girl any
more than in those which pertained to his profession. "You see we've
been entertaining each other with letters and things, and it would seem
a pity not to meet--especially if she'll be leaving town before I'm
about."

There was a curiously wistful look in his face as he said this, which
Burns understood. All along King had said almost nothing about the
torture his present helplessness was to him, but his friend knew.

"Of course she'll come; we'll see to that. She's walking about a little
now, and by Saturday she can come down this corridor on her two small
feet."

"See here--couldn't I sit up a bit to meet her?"

"Not a sixteenth of a degre