ed directly beneath the arc-light at the entrance.
"If I don't call up or show up--you needn't say anything about this
deal to him--but you can tell him he's got a friend on the job."

The doctor nodded and walked briskly back to the superintendent's
office, where he waited until the secretary appeared, when he turned
over the money that had been paid to him for the operation and a
private room, which The Spider had engaged for two weeks. He told the
secretary to make out a receipt in Peter Annersley's name. "A friend
is handling this for him," he explained.

Then he sent for the head-nurse. "I would like to have Miss Gray and
Miss Barlow help me," he told her, in speaking of the proposed
operation.

"Miss Gray is on duty to-night," said the head-nurse.

"Then if you will arrange to have her get a rest, please. And--oh,
yes, we'll probably need the oxygen. And you might tell Dr. Gleason
that this is a special case and I'd like to have him administer the
anaesthetic."

Andover strode briskly to the surgical ward and stopped at Pete's
couch. As he stooped and listened to Pete's breathing, the packet of
crisp bills slipped from his inside pocket, and dropped to the floor.

He was in the lobby, on his way to his car, when Doris came running
after him. "Dr. Andover," she called. "I think you dropped
this,"--and she gave him the packet of bills.

"Mighty careless of me," he said, feeling in his inside pocket.
"Handkerchief--slipped them in on top of it. Thank you."

Doris gazed at him curiously. His eyes wavered. "We're going to do
our best to pull him through," he said with forced sprightliness.

Doris smiled and nodded. But her expression changed as she again
entered the long, dim aisle between the double row of cots. Only that
evening, just before she had talked with Andover about Pete, she had
heard the surgeon tell the house-physician jokingly that all that stood
between him and absolute destitution was a very thin and exceedingly
popular check-book--and Andover had written his personal check for ten
dollars which he had cashed at the office. Doris wondered who the
strange man was that had come in with Andover, an hour ago, and how Dr.
Andover had so suddenly become possessed of a thousand dollars.

CHAPTER XXXV

"CAUGHT IT JUST IN TIME"

At exactly ten-thirty the next morning The Spider was at the
information desk of the General Hospital, inquiring for Andover.

"He's in the operating