Then she begged her friends to go and let her rest and sleep if possible; they knew just how serious that consultation with her lawyer must be. When she was alone, however, she picked up the telephone, which stood on a side table, and called up the office of Dr. Anna Steuer. Ever since her arrest she had been dully conscious of her need of this oldest and truest of her friends. It came to her with something of a shock as she sat waiting for Central to connect, that she had leaned upon this strong and unpretentious woman far more than her calm self-satisfied mind had ever admitted. Dr. Anna's assistant answered the call, and when she heard Mrs. Balfame's voice broke down and wept loudly. "Oh, do be quiet," said Mrs. Balfame impatiently. "I am in no danger whatever. Connect me with the Doctor." "Oh, it ain't only that. Poor--poor Doctor! She's been all in for days, and this morning she just collapsed, and I sent for Dr. Lequeur, and he pronounced it typhoid and sent for the ambulance and had her taken out to Brabant Hospital. The last thing she said--whispered--was to be sure not to bother you, that you would hear it soon enough--" Mrs. Balfame hung up the receiver, which had almost fallen from her shaking hand. She turned cold with terror. Anna ill! And when she most wanted her! A little window in her brain opened reluctantly, and superstition crept in. Beyond that open window she seemed to hear the surge of a furious and irresistible tide. Had it been waiting all these years to overleap the barriers about her well ordered life and sweep her into chaos? She frowned and put her thoughts more colloquially. Had her luck changed? Was Fate against her? When she thought of Dwight Rush, it was only to shrink again. If anything happened to him--and why not? Men were killed every day by automobiles, and he had an absentminded way of walking-- She sprang to her feet and paced up and down the two rooms of the suite, determined upon composure, and angry with herself. She recovered her mental balance (so rarely disturbed by imaginative flights), but her spirits were at zero; and she was sitting with her elbows on her knees, her hands pressed to her face when Rush entered promptly at four o'clock. He was startled at the face she lifted. It looked older but indefinably more attractive. Her inviolable serenity had irritated even him at times, although she was his innocent ideal of a great lady. The Warden, who had unlocked the door, left them alone, and Rush sat down and took both her hands in his warm reassuring grasp. "You are not to be the least bit frightened," he said. "The great thing for you to remember is that your husband's political crowd rules, and simply laughs at your arrest. They are more positive than ever that some political enemy did it. Balfame's temper was growing shorter and shorter, and he had many enemies, even in his own party. But the crowd will pull every wire to get you off, and they can pull wires, all right--"