"There was a story I always liked about a Vienna doctor," he continued; he was anxious to guide the stories, for Karl had seemed suddenly to sink within himself. He understood why--he might have foreseen where this would lead. For there were other stories of medical men, stories which fitted a little too closely just now; he was especially sorry he had mentioned Bilroth. "This shows another side of the doctor," he went on, after a minute, "and as you are going to give good as well as bad, this may help out on the good side--there's where you will be short. A woman came to see this doctor regarding her consumptive son. He told her there was nothing he could do for him, adding: 'If you want him to live, you must take him to Italy.' The woman broke down and told him she could not do that, that she had no money. The doctor sat there thinking a moment, and then sent over to the bank and got her a letter of credit covering the amount involved. Another doctor, who happened to be near, asked why he did that. 'You can't possibly support all your needy patients,' he said; 'why did you choose this particular case? Of course,' he added, 'it was very good of you.' 'No,' said the doctor, 'it was not good of me. There was nothing good about it. But I was guilty of proposing to her something I knew she could not do. After opening up that possibility it was my obligation to see that she could fulfill it. I suggested what I knew to be the impossible; after I suggested it, it was my business to make it possible.' Don't you think that a pretty good sense of justice?" he asked of Ernestine. "What might be called an inner squareness," said Georgia, as Ernestine responded only with the fine lights the story had brought to her eyes. Karl did not seem to have heard the story. Ernestine looked toward him anxiously. "Now I'm going to tell a story," she said, with a gaiety thrown out for rousing him, "a very fine story;--every one must listen." He looked over at her and smiled at that, listening for her story.