The scene he had left lately was burning before his tired eyes; the sounds he had lately heard were beating in his brain. For a week he had been putting every power he possessed into the attaining of an end for which it had more than once seemed to him that he would be willing to sacrifice his own life. He had dared everything, fought every one, had his own way in spite of every obstacle, believing to the last that he could win, as he had so often won before, by sheer contempt of danger. But this time he had failed. That was all there was of it--he had failed, failed so absolutely, so humiliatingly, so publicly--this was the way he put it to himself--that he was in disgrace. He had operated when others advised against operation and had seemed to succeed, brilliantly and incredibly. Then the case had begun to go wrong. He had operated a second time--against all precedent, taking tremendous risks--and had lost. But this was not the worst. He had lost cases before and had suffered keenly over them, but not as he was suffering now. In a world of death some cases must be lost, even by the most successful of all of his profession. But this was an unusual case. This was--O God--how could he bear losing this one? He had known her from a little girl of eight till now, when at sixteen, bright, beautiful, winsome sixteen, he had... what had he done? She might have had a chance for life--without operation. He had taken that chance away. And she had trusted him--how she had trusted him! Ah, there was the bitter drop in the cup the turn of the knife in the raw wound. When the others had opposed, she had looked up at him with that smile of hers--how could she smile when she was in such pain?--and whispered: “Please do whatever you want to, Doctor Burns.” And he had answered confidently: “Good for you, Lucile--if only they'd all trust me like that I'd show them what I could do!” Vain boast--wild boast! He had been a fool--twice a fool--thrice a fool! He was a fool clear through--that was the matter with him--a proud fool who had thought that with a thrust of his keen-edged tools he could turn Death himself aside. And when he had tried his hand a second time, in the last futile effort to avert the impending disaster, she had trusted him just the same. When he had said to her, speaking close to her dull ear: “Dear little girl, I'm going to ask you to go to sleep again for me,” she had turned her head upon the pillow, that tortured young head--he would not have thought she could move it at all--and had smiled at him again... for the last time... He would remember that smile while he lived.