now a nightmare. If I live to be a hundred
years old, with my dying breath I shall feel the grip of his fingers on
my throat----"

She paused and closed her eyes.

"Forget it! Forget it!" the Doctor laughed. "We have more important
things to think of now."

"He wishes to see me?"

"Begs every day that I ask you."

"And you have hesitated these long weeks?"

"Your strength and peace of mind were of greater importance than his
happiness, my dear. Let him wait until you please to see him."

"He'll wait forever," was the firm answer.

Jim smiled grimly when his friend bore back the message.

"I'll never give up as long as there's breath in my body," he cried,
bringing his square jaws together with a snap.

"That's the way to talk, my boy," the Doctor responded.

"Anyhow you believe in me, Doc, don't you?"

"Yes."

"And you'll help me a little on the way if it gets dark--won't you?"

"If I can--you may always depend on me."

Jim clasped his outstretched hand gratefully.

"Well, I'm going to make good."

There was something so genuine and manly in the tones of his voice, he
compelled the Doctor's respect. A smaller man might have sneered. The
healer of souls and bodies had come to recognize with unerring instinct
the true and false note in the human voice.

His heart went out in a wave of sympathy for the lonely, miserable young
animal who stood before him now, trembling with the first sharp pains
of the immortal thing that had awaked within. He slipped his arm about
Jim's shoulders and whispered:

"I'll tell you something that may help you when the way gets dark--the
wife is going to bear you a child."

"No!"

"Yes."

"God!---- That's great, ain't it?"

Jim choked into silence and looked up at the Doctor with dimmed eyes.

"Say, Doc, you hit me hard when you brought what she said--but that's
good news! Watch me work my hands to the bone--you know it's my kid and
she can't keep me from workin' for it if she tries now can she?"

"No."

"There's just one thing that'll hang over me like a black cloud," he
mused sorrowfully.

"I know, boy--your mother's darkened mind."

Jim nodded.

"When I see that queer glitter in her eyes it goes through me like a
knife. Will she ever get over it?"

"We can't tell yet. It takes time. I believe she will."

"You'll do the best you can for her, Doc?" he pleaded pathetically. "You
won't forget her a single day? If you can't cure her, nobody can."

"I'll