Dawn—cold, grey, chilling. The stir and bustle of servants’ steps; low voices. The household at Chester Street had been hurrying to and fro sending telegrams and dispatches and messages ever since Evelyn had arrived at twelve o’clock on the previous day. While the Leader of the Opposition was preparing his vote of censure on the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, and such members as were in the country were hurriedly returning to town in order to be present at one of the most dramatic debates of the century, the fate of Farquharson’s child hung in the balance between life and death. Lady Wereminster was right; when Evelyn entered the house she saw at once how matters stood and sent for the doctor. She had found Dora in a state bordering on frenzy, bitter, reproachful, incoherent. The torrent of words with which she was met dazed Evelyn so that she could scarcely take in their full force; Farquharson, very still and pale, was standing upright by the fire-place in the dining-room, listening with a face that might have been carved in marble, so still was it, so utterly expressionless. But Evelyn, entering, saw the deep lines cut obliquely from nostril to lip; saw the furrows in the brow, cut as if by a chisel—those lines of ineradicable pain which the years deepen instead of smoothing. She swept across the room, and, catching Dora’s trembling figure in her arms, put her hand above the girl’s mouth and checked the hideous torrent of words. "You must come up-stairs at once to your room," she said sharply. "You’ve sent for the nurse, of course, Mr. Farquharson? Then please do so at once. Come up with me, Dora—or, better still, let your husband carry you. No, I’m not going to listen to a word now; you’re better for the moment, and this sort of scene does you no good at all. You may think I’m speaking harshly, but I’m not. Send for Felice, Mr. Farquharson, will you? Or, if she’s hysterical, the head housemaid, please; she’s a sensible woman." "It’s awful, it’s ghastly," said Dora, fighting them both, as they tried to carry her up-stairs, between spasms of pain. "It’s unendurable, and I won’t bear it. Doctors are beasts; I know this man won’t give me chloroform until the very end. I won’t bear it till the end, do you hear? Why should I be tortured so for a man I loathe? I won’t have it, I tell you; I won’t have it!" Her voice rose to a shriek. "Make the doctor come, Evelyn; make him give me something. I won’t stand it, I tell you; I won’t stand—oh, God——" This was the prelude of hours of revolt and rebellion. It seemed to Evelyn that for a lifetime she had listened to Dora’s ravings. She tried to excuse them on the score of delirium, and failed. In some ways Dora was a typical modern woman, eager to take all that life offered her and pay no penalty; rebellious at the gift of a new responsibility which compelled her to take life from another point of view.