o death, a man who raved ceaselessly of the daughter of the
house. Downstairs, the daughter of the house was going her
accustomed way, with never a question in regard to the man above.
What had happened? How, if anything had happened, how did he chance
to be in that home, with Mrs. Dent as his devoted and anxious slave?
Resolutely, she fell to studying her temperature charts. Her
specialty was fever, not heart disease.

A week after the tide had turned, Carew had been allowed to spend a
short half-hour with the invalid. The next day, by advice of the
nurse, Mr. Dent telephoned to him to come again. Something, whether
in his personality or in his talk, had been of tonic power over
Weldon. It seemed wise to repeat the experiment.

Carew came on the heels of his own voice through the telephone; and
his face was smiling broadly, as he went leaping up the stairs.
After all, it had not been in vain, his quixotic lingering in Cape
Town for a weary month after receiving his discharge. Weldon and he
had been good friends through thick and thin; it would have been
beastly to leave him. And now, after all these useless weeks, he
could at least do something to lighten the convalescence. Moreover,
Carew's pocket held three letters, received that very noon; one of
grudging approval from his son-sick mother, one of chaotic, but
heartfelt thanks from Mrs. Weldon, and the third one an affirmative
answer to a telegram he had sent to Alice Mellen, only the night
before. He went into Weldon's room, looking, as he felt, the
embodiment of happiness and health.

He hailed Weldon from the threshold. Tidings like his could wait
during no interchange of mere conventional greetings. Weldon heard
him to the end, congratulated him, demanded the repetition of all
the details. Then, when Carew's excitement had quite spent itself,
Weldon drew a letter from underneath his pillow.

"It came, this morning," he added laconically.

Carew seized the letter and ran his eye down the page. Then his face
lighted.

"Nunc dimittis!" he said piously. "It's sure to be yours! Have you
told Miss Dent?"

"I've not seen Miss Dent."

Carew's face fell.

"Not yet? But you will. And then you will tell her?"

Weldon's lips straightened into a thin line. He shook his head.

"But she ought to know."

"Why?"

"It is her right."

"Why?" Weldon asked again.

"Because--it is. It might make some difference in--"

Weldon stopped him abruptly.

"It could ma