Gradually the heart history of the last six months was revealed to the good physician, who, half sitting, half kneeling, by the narrow bed, hands clasped before him, eyes half closed as if to shut away outside things, might easily have passed for a purely spiritual confessor. Yet in the fact of closing his eyes lay his only power to keep back tears. Twice he essayed to speak and stopped, and then said gently, “A year ago you said that you would willingly give the rest of life if you could only feel and care once more. At least that wish has been granted.” “Yes, and I rejoice in it, even now,” Stead answered slowly and painfully. “What now lies before me is to take the means and give, as far as it will do so, all that I have to secure the rest and comfort of the woman who gave me the power to care, but could not grant me more. There is paper in the desk, good friend, so now sit and write as I dictate. Black Hannah and the doctor outside shall be the witnesses.” Then came to Dr. Russell the hardest task of all, to argue with one dying, but he did not flinch. “Stop for a moment, Robert, and think, led by your new power of caring. If Brooke could not take your love, do you think that she would take your money? Would not the idea hurt that same brave tenderness that kindled you to life? Think of some other way.” “She said that there was ‘some one else,’ but that ‘he did not know.’ Some day his eyes will open, for God will not allow a steadfast heart like Brooke’s to be shut out of life.” A struggle seemed to pass over Stead’s face that left a blueness about the lips and the eyes, that quivered and closed. Dr. Russell gave him a stimulant and waited in silence. Presently the eyes opened and he spoke deliberately, as one reciting a hard lesson. “Then let me leave all in trust to you for the man Brooke Lawton marries, not to be known or given until their wedding day, when you must tell him all, and if he is struggling with life,—as I have a feeling that he is, for nothing else could keep him from such a woman,—for her sake he will take the gift as from man to man.” “And if the day does not come, or he refuses?” asked Dr. Russell, joy at the man’s final unselfishness beaming from his face. “After ten years, then let it become a part of the endowment of your hospital, in memory of the two Helens, my daughter and her mother.” Thus the will was made with due regard to formality, making the doctor holder of a trust, the details of which were contained in sealed instructions to keep privacy; a certain sum being set aside to furnish the faithful José with an annuity; Stead’s lodge, guns, fishing rods, books, and furniture to Dr. Russell for his convenience as a shooting-box; his saddle-horse to Adam; and his pictures and his two dogs to Brooke herself, for these last were really the possessions he most prized. Then Dr. Love and Hannah Morley signed as witnesses, they having, as is needful, no part in the will.