, the heavy lids lifted and the
weazen face lighted with the ghost of a tired little smile. Then the
lids fell heavily once more; but once more, also, there was the faintly
nestling motion of the wee, weary body against the strong, kind arm.
And, above the little body, the doctor's face, intently bent over the
child, was lighted with a swift reflection from the greater light of
the All-Father, yet above.

"Poor little kiddie!" he said slowly. "It's a close shave for him,
Brenton; but, if you'll stand by and help, please God, we'll save him
yet."

And Brenton did stand by, all evening long and all the night. The nurse
was with him, watching. Katharine, furious beneath her scientific calm,
came and went at intervals; but the doctor's bottle and spoon were in
the breast pocket of Brenton's clerical coat, the doctor's written
schedule was set down in duplicate on Brenton's cuff. And Brenton, too
tired to be really weary, never once left his chair beside the frilly
crib.

Later on, he never could remember what were his thoughts, that night.
Being human and very wide awake, he must have thought something; but,
ransack his mind as he would, nothing coherent ever came back to him
out of the half-forgotten chaos. Indeed, it was as if his whole nature,
body, mind, and spirit, were focussing itself upon one passionate
desire that his child might live. Not that he consciously prayed. What
was there that he could pray to, or for? Laws did not stop their
working, to prolong one baby life. Useless to ask for mere futilities.
Useless and totally irreverent to insult the Deity by suggesting to
Him, however prayerfully, that He had made a bad mistake; that, were
His attention only called to the mistake, doubtless He would be glad to
set it right while time still remained to Him. And, if the mistake were
not set right? If--well--if the child did--die, what then? Did that
weazen little body, that mind as yet unopened to any but the simplest
of sensations: did these hold within themselves the germs of conscious
immortality? Or would the tiny flake of snow upon the desert's dusty
waste vanish within its hour or two, be gone? The bud, cut from the
rose, may open a bit, when placed in water; then it fades, and dies,
and leaves no seed behind. In the same way, the budding life, cut from
the parent stem--Who had cut it, though: God, or Katharine, or merely
inexorable law? Brenton smothered a groan. Then, because law was
inexorable, he cast a