But Burns, his laugh over, was sober again and his voice was earnest. “Arthur Chester, don't make Him responsible for your 'wrecked nerves.' They weren't wrecked when you were furnished with them. You've done the wrecking yourself by breaking pretty nearly every law that governs the workings of the human machine. You're paying the penalty. But you're going to get the upper hand. From now on, in spite of your office life, you're going to get good red blood in your veins--and your brains. The worst is over now--the second week will be easier. But what I'm trying to tell you is that you'll get that upper hand a lot quicker if”--his cheek grew hot with this strange, unaccustomed effort at putting things he had never spoken of before into words--“if you'll just reach up and take hold of that 'Upper Hand' that, according to my new belief and experience, is ready to reach down to you. It's stronger than yours: you'll feel the upward pull.” He broke off and got to his feet. The two had been sitting on a fallen log, looking off over the hills toward a distant river winding its blue length through fields of living green. “I wasn't exactly cut out for a preacher, Ches,” he added after a minute. “I hope my talk doesn't sound to you like 'cant.' I'm a pretty poor specimen of a chap to be setting up my own example for anybody to follow.” “I don't think you've been setting up your own example,” Chester replied. He pulled himself up limply from the log, yet out of his face had gone the black look which had been there when he came up the hill. “And what you've said doesn't sound like 'cant' to me, Red. It sounds more like 'can.'” Red Pepper Burns held out his hand. His big; warm fingers closed hard over the thin; cold ones which met them. Then the two men, without more words, went away down the hill. From this hour Arthur Chester afterward dated the beginning of the end of the fight. CHAPTER VI. IN WHICH HE PRESCRIBES FOR HIMSELF “Red,” observed James Macauley, junior, “this place of yours looks like a drunkard's home.” He glanced around him as he spoke. The criticism certainly found justification in every corner. No more neglected office could have been discovered belonging to any practitioner within an area of many miles. “I suppose it does,” rejoined Burns from the depths of a big, dusty leather chair where he sat stretched in an attitude expressing extreme fatigue. “But I don't care a hang.” Macauley looked at him. His eyes were closed. His arms lay upon the chair arms, relaxed and limp. For the first time his friend observed what might have been noted by a critical eye on any day during the last fortnight. The lines on the ordinarily strong, health-tinted face were deeper than he had ever seen them; the cheeks were thinner; there were even shadows under the thick eyelashes which outlined the lids of the closed eyes.