gy, gasped at the last word.

"Mercy!" she said. "Do you mean to say he's got that awful drug habit!"

Down the clean steps went Dr. Max that morning, a big man, almost as
tall as K. Le Moyne, eager of life, strong and a bit reckless, not fine,
perhaps, but not evil. He had the same zest of living as Sidney, but
with this difference--the girl stood ready to give herself to life: he
knew that life would come to him. All-dominating male was Dr. Max, that
morning, as he drew on his gloves before stepping into his car. It was
after nine o'clock. K. Le Moyne had been an hour at his desk. The McKee
napkins lay ironed in orderly piles.

Nevertheless, Dr. Max was suffering under a sense of defeat as he rode
downtown. The night before, he had proposed to a girl and had been
rejected. He was not in love with the girl,--she would have been a
suitable wife, and a surgeon ought to be married; it gives people
confidence,--but his pride was hurt. He recalled the exact words of the
rejection.

"You're too good-looking, Max," she had said, "and that's the truth. Now
that operations are as popular as fancy dancing, and much less bother,
half the women I know are crazy about their surgeons. I'm too fond of my
peace of mind."

"But, good Heavens! haven't you any confidence in me?" he had demanded.

"None whatever, Max dear." She had looked at him with level,
understanding eyes.

He put the disagreeable recollection out of his mind as he parked his
car and made his way to his office. Here would be people who believed
in him, from the middle-aged nurse in her prim uniform to the row of
patients sitting stiffly around the walls of the waiting-room. Dr. Max,
pausing in the hall outside the door of his private office, drew a long
breath. This was the real thing--work and plenty of it, a chance to show
the other men what he could do, a battle to win! No humanitarian was he,
but a fighter: each day he came to his office with the same battle lust.

The office nurse had her back to him. When she turned, he faced an
agreeable surprise. Instead of Miss Simpson, he faced a young and
attractive girl, faintly familiar.

"We tried to get you by telephone," she explained. "I am from the
hospital. Miss Simpson's father died this morning, and she knew you
would have to have some one. I was just starting for my vacation, so
they sent me."

"Rather a poor substitute for a vacation," he commented.

She was a very pretty girl. He had seen her befor