Reaching the sanitarium, a spacious white building in pleasant, shaded grounds, they alighted. Mostyn, with his boy in his arms, stepped out. At the door a nurse took Dick into the house and bore him to a room on the floor above. She spoke to him in a motherly way. As she vanished up the stairs Mostyn saw Dick's small limp hand hanging down her side. Was it, he asked himself, a farewell salute? "You may sit here in the waiting-room if you wish, or you may return home in my car," Loyd suggested. "I shall send it at once for the other doctors. You are really of no service here, and, of course, I can communicate with you by 'phone as to our decision." "I'll be here, or close about on the outside," Mostyn answered. "I presume it will be some time before the consultation?" "It must be within half an hour. I am not willing to wait longer." Mostyn sat alone in the sitting-room. A clock on the wall ticked sharply. He heard the wheels of the automobile grind on the pavement as it sped away under the electric lights. He went out on the lawn. He felt in his pocket for a cigar, but, finding none, he forgot it. The dew of the grass penetrated to his feet. It seemed to him that he felt Dick's fever coursing through his own veins. He was still outside half an hour later, his eyes raised to the windows of the lighted room occupied by his child, when the automobile returned. Two doctors whom he knew got out and sauntered into the house. He heard them laughing over the mistake a so-called quack had made in the case of a credulous patient, Mostyn lurked back in the shadows--he would not detain them by a useless greeting. He followed them into the house. The nurse at the foot of the stairs was beckoning them to hasten. Mostyn was again alone in the sitting-room. Presently the nurse came in, evidently looking for something. Mostyn caught her eye, and she gave him a hurried but sympathetic look. He decided that he would sound her. "Do you think an operation will be necessary?" he asked. Her glance fell. "I have only Dr. Loyd's opinion. He thinks so, and I have never known him to be wrong in diagnosing a case." "He thinks, also, I believe"--Mostyn's voice sounded as hollow as a phonograph--"that the child has hardly strength enough to resist the--the ordeal?" She raised her eyes as if doubting her right to converse on the subject. "I think he _is_ afraid of that," she admitted. "Your child is very, very sick." "And you--you, _yourself?_" Mostyn now fairly implored. "According to _your_ experience, do you think there is a chance of his living through it?" "I really can't say--I _mustn't_ say," she faltered. "I am only judging by Dr. Loyd's actions. He is very uneasy. Mr. Mostyn, I have no right to speak of it, but your wife ought to be here. The doctor says she is out of town. She ought to get here if possible; she will always regret it if she doesn't. I am a mother myself, and I know how she will feel."