“I say, don’t dislike me so!” he said. “I’ll make Jarvis help me. Don’t you stay! There’s a room for you next-door—my room as a matter of fact, but I’ll stay in here for to-night.” Against her will she was softened. Something about him—something which he neither uttered nor betrayed by look or gesture—appealed to her very strongly. She found herself unable to comply with his suggestion and abandon him to the mercy of the landlord who was even now lumbering heavily up the stairs. She realized clearly that whatever came of this night’s happenings, she was bound in common humanity to stand by Rotherby now. No other course of action was open to her. “I shall not leave you,” she said, “till I have done all I can to help you—unless you make that impossible for me.” “Heaven forbid!” said Rotherby, still smiling his twisted smile. “Well, I am in earnest,” she said, as she bent to help him. “I like you best that way,” said Rotherby. She felt that in some fashion he had worsted her, but she put the matter resolutely away from her. It was not the moment for close analysis of the situation. She could only go as she was driven. With the utmost care she helped him remove his coat, and was shocked to find that the shirt-sleeve was soaked with blood from shoulder to elbow. “Don’t let Jarvis see!” said Rotherby sharply, and she covered it while the man was in the room. Jarvis was too sleepy or too fuddled to be curious. He merely set down the can, wished them good night and stumped away. Then Frances bent to her work. She found a jagged wound in the shoulder, from which the blood was still oozing, and she proceeded to bathe it with a strip of linen torn from the shirt-sleeve. The means at her disposal were wholly elementary, but she performed her task with a deftness that was characteristic of her, finding with infinite relief that the wound was not vitally deep. Rotherby endured her ministrations with a stoicism that again stirred her to admiration. He seemed bent upon making the business as easy for her as possible. “Don’t mind me!” he said once. “Just go ahead! I’ll tell you if I can’t stand it.” And then when she had finished at last, he told her where to find some handkerchiefs for bandaging purposes in the room that he occupied. “You will go to a doctor in the morning, won’t you?” she said, pausing. “I have only cleansed it. There is bound to be some shot in the wound.” “Some what?” said Rotherby, and looked at her with one of his most quizzical glances though his face was still drawn with pain. “Oh, didn’t I tell you that I tore it on some barbed wire?” She felt herself colour deeply, but she did not take up the challenge. “I should go to a doctor all the same,” she said quietly. He laughed at her with a touch of impudence that she could not resent. “Very good, Sister Superior, I will. Now if you don’t mind tying me up, I shall be grateful. Where would you like me to sleep—in this room, or my own?” “In your own,” she said firmly.