ngs moving
without life or meaning; she answered Louis every time he spoke to her,
but her mind was drawn in upon itself by a gnawing anxiety.

The next day, leaving Louis to his own resources, she and Mrs. King went
out.

He was a little inclined to chaff them about their air of mystery, but,
taking Marcella's tiredness and whiteness into account, he was expecting
them to say they had been buying baby clothes, though it was rather
unlike Marcella to keep anything secret.

Her tragic face and Mrs. King's eyes, red with weeping, froze the gay
words on his lips when they came in just before lunch, where he was
playing a slow game of nap with some of the boys in the kitchen.

They went upstairs to their old room. When the door was closed she said
to him: "Louis, I've been to a doctor. He says I'm not well."

"I knew it. I told you, didn't I? You want a change, my dear," he said
anxiously.

"I'm afraid it's rather more serious than that, Louis," she said
gravely. "He seems to think it--it may be--cancer. Oh, I wish they'd
call it something else! I hate that word. It's such a hungry word."

She was feeling stunned, and very frightened.

"But Marcella, it's ridiculous! For one thing, you're too young--"

"That's what the doctor thought. But he says it's been known--in
textbooks, you know. A girl of eighteen that he knew had it. I'm to see
two other doctors to-morrow."

He began to pace about the room. Then he laughed a little shrilly.

"Oh, it's a silly mistake. Doctors are not infallible, you know! He's
brutal to have suggested it even. Oh damn these colonials! No English
doctor would have told you."

"I insisted," she said quietly, and he guessed that the doctor was not
to be blamed.

"But," he went on, "it couldn't have happened except through an injury.
You've had no injury that I can think of--"

"No, of course I haven't," she said rapidly. "But these things seem to
happen without cause, don't they? Anyway, we won't believe it until
we've got to. I've been ill for months, and noticed things. I've been an
awful fool. But I didn't think it was dangerous, and--I don't think I'd
have cared much if I had known."

The next day confirmed the first doctor's opinion. Marcella was a little
incredulous. It did not seem to her that she was ill enough to be in
danger. It was only when the doctors advised immediate operation that
the horror and terror of it came flooding in upon her.

"Louis, we'll tell them what w