Later, she could not force her troubled brain to sleep. Félicie of the unforgettable loveliness—with her face puckered into scars—How would a love that had been sorely tried already receive this hideousness? And how—how to tell Madame Durant. . . . When the yellow rays of a spotless morning scoured clean by yesterday’s rainfall embraced her room, she rose and whipped up her flagging nerves with a cold sponge. Before the world-conquering exhilaration of the plunge could wear off, she poured a concise account of the accident into the ear-trumpet, minimizing it to such an extent that Madame Durant demanded why they hadn’t brought Félicie straight home. “Her cuts are too many,” Joy explained, “but the important thing is there are no bones broken, no serious injuries.” The two reached the hospital at nine o’clock and waited an hour before Madame Durant was allowed to go in and sit by Félicie’s bed for five minutes. The old lady came down rather shaken. “She’s all bandaged up,” she said, “and of course she can’t talk loud enough for me to hear.” “But she’s doing splendidly,” amended the nurse who had accompanied her. “May—may I go on now?” asked Joy. The nurse hesitated. “I really wouldn’t—so soon after this call——” “Then I’ll wait, if you’ll let me know when I can come.” So Joy waited alone in the ante room, and answered Hal Jennings’ anxious inquiries over the phone. . . . Finally the nurse who smiled like an automaton came to the door and beckoned. Joy looked at her watch. It was half past twelve; she had been in the anteroom over three hours. A long white bed with a long, white figure, the white coverlet lapping itself around the gracious lines. Félicie’s hair in a loose, thick braid, her tendrils sketching dark fancies over the pillow. A mass of bandages, from which Félicie’s perfect lips escaped, unharmed. Félicie’s brown velvet eyes peering oddly from recesses in the bandaging. “Joy” —said the lips and her voice carried high lights scarcely dimmed by pain—“you are a darling. Miss Clark, I _must_ have a glass of water!” As the nurse vanished—“That was just to get her out. She’s always here. She drives me wild!” A little pause; and the figure stirred. “Joy—you’ll tell me, won’t you? My face—what’s going to come of it? It’s so cut—and no one will tell me—how it’s going to look.” “How can anyone know so soon?” said Joy with taut lips. The brown eyes looked at her for a steadfast minute, over their horizon of bandaging. “Never mind, Joy—I know. My face—oh, I can’t say it! But I know. I can feel there isn’t even much of it left.” “Cuts always feel worse than they are——” “I could tell. By the way they looked when I said anything. My eyes—were left whole.” Her voice was conversational. “Why wasn’t I—cut _all_ to pieces while I was about it? I might just as well be dead.” “Félicie, you mustn’t say such things!” Joy said weakly.