Of any real talk about their personal relations to each other, of any but the most trivial reference to the great responsibility which now loomed close ahead of them: of this, there was nothing, nothing at all. Brenton would have loved to talk about it, to discuss it with his wife in perfect frankness, to show out to her in some small measure the overwhelming happiness that the outlook brought him, the wonderful and awful increase of personal responsibility. It would have given him untold pleasure to have gathered his wife into his arms, tight, tight, and held her there while, cheek pressed to cheek, they talked about the little stranger coming to their home, about the way they best could welcome him, and make him happy, and bring out all the best in him until his tiny person should become a hallowing influence within the home, a strengthening bond between them, man and wife. Just once he had tried it, never afterwards. Kathryn had laughed self-consciously, had bade him _Sh-h-h-h_! Then she had given him a pecking sort of kiss, and had wriggled out of his arms. While she had rearranged her dismantled pompadour, suspiciously awry since her husband's unwonted caress, she had explained quite carelessly that he need not worry. Doctor Keltridge was looking out for her, and people said he was wonderful in cases of that kind, even if he was a gruff old thing. The nurse was all engaged. She was very old, too; but people said that she was the best in town. But, of course, a woman in her position would have everything possible done. Really, he need not worry in the least. Brenton took the lesson to his heart; but he took it hard. It seemed to him a pity that all share in the great anticipation, full as it was of mingled fear and rapture and vast, vast responsibility, should be denied him. At the first, even knowing Kathryn as he did, he had looked for something else, had hoped that their loosening ties would tighten under the stress of the coming crisis. For Scott, beneath his proud reticence, his seeming blindness to the situation, was painfully aware of the gradual severance of interests between himself and Kathryn. This final lesson, though, rendered it unmistakable. Under its blow, his lined, lean cheeks whitened, his shoulders stooped a little more than usual when, after gently letting his wife go from his impetuous embrace, he turned away and sought his study. There, alone among the working tools of his profession, Scott Brenton first faced the realization that the extremest sort of separation is the one that goes on within the same four walls.