ked so well."

"Surely you accord her some natural talent along those lines."

"I suspect her secret mind is refined."

"Oh, that's not fair. Vulgar is as vulgar does."

Adelaide stood up, pushing back her chair. She found them utterly
intolerable. Besides, as they talked she had suddenly seen clearly that
she must herself speak to Vincent's doctor without an instant's delay. "I
have to telephone, Minnie," she said, and swept out of the room. She
never returned.

"Not one of the perfect lady's golden days, I should say," said one of
the men, raising his eyebrows. "I wonder what's gone wrong?"

"Can Vincent have been straying from the straight and narrow?"

"Something wrong. I could tell by her looks."

"Ah, my dear, I'm afraid her looks is what's wrong."

Adelaide meantime was in her motor on her way to the doctor's office. He
had given up his sacred lunch-hour in response to her imperious demand
and to his own intense pity for her sorrow.

He did not know her, but he had had her pointed out to him, and though
he recognized the unreason of such an attitude, he was aware that her
great beauty dramatized her suffering, so that his pity for her was
uncommonly alive.

He was a young man, with a finely cut face and a blond complexion. His
pity was visible, quivering a little under his mask of impassivity.
Adelaide's first thought on seeing him was, "Good Heavens! another man to
be emotionally calmed before I can get at the truth!" She had to be
tactful, to let him see that she was not going to make a scene. She knew
that he felt it himself, but she was not grateful to him. What business
had he to feel it? His feeling was an added burden, and she felt that she
had enough to carry.

He did not make the mistake, however, of expressing his sympathy
verbally. His answers were as cold and clear as she could wish. She
questioned him on the chances of an operation. He could not reduce his
judgment to a mathematical one; he was inclined to advocate an operation
on psychological grounds, he said.

"It keeps up the patient's courage to know something is being done." He
added, "That will be your work, Mrs. Farron, to keep his courage up."

Most women like to know they had their part to play, but Adelaide shook
her head quickly.

"I would so much rather go through it myself!" she cried.

"Naturally, naturally," he agreed, without getting the full passion
of her cry.

She stood up.

"Oh," she said, "if it could only