le black bag and leave the house
quietly, before any one was up. That was not a very dreadful thought,
of course, but it seemed terrible to her, whose first duty in life was
to help sufferers and soothe those who were in pain. It seemed to her
almost as bad as if a soldier in battle were suddenly tempted to turn
his back on his comrades, throw down his rifle, and run away.

She felt it each time that she had to rise and go round the screen,
and when she saw the flushed face on the pillow in the shadow, the
longing to be gone was almost greater than she could resist. She had
not understood before what it meant to loathe any living thing, but
she knew it now, and if she did her duty conscientiously that night,
easy and simple though it was, she deserved more credit than many of
the Sisters who had gone so bravely to nurse the lepers in far
Rangoon.

She did not feel the smallest wish to hurt the woman who had injured
her, let that be said in her praise; for though vengeance be the
Lord's, to long for it is human. She only desired to be out of the
house, and out of sight of the face that lay where her father's had
lain, and beyond reach of the voice that had told her what she wished
she had never known.

But there was no escape and she had to bear it; and when the night
wore away at last, it had been the longest she remembered in all her
life. Her face was as white as the Mother Superior's and her dark blue
eyes looked almost black; even Madame Bernard would not have
recognised the bright-haired Angela of other days in the weary and
sad-faced nun who met the doctor outside the door of the sick-room
when he came at eight o'clock.

She told him that the patient had been delirious about midnight, but
had rested tolerably ever since. He glanced at the temperature chart
she brought him and then looked keenly at her face and frowned.

'What is the matter with all of you White Sisters?' he growled
discontentedly. 'First they send me one who cannot stay over night,
and then they send me one who has not been to bed for a week and ought
to stay there for a month! When did you leave your last case?'

'Yesterday morning,' answered Sister Giovanna submissively. 'I slept
most of the afternoon. I am not tired and can do my work very well, I
assure you.'

'Oh, you can, can you?' The excellent man glared at her savagely
through his spectacles. 'You cannot say anything yourself, of course,
but I shall go to your hospital to-day and