"No, dearest, no," said Jimmie, holding her quiet. "No, it isn't that at all. There's something we don't understand. She's in the dark and so are we. Her mind is struggling to break through, and we cannot help because we are in the dark too. Outwardly she doesn't know you. But she does know you, dear, she feels you, in another way. She knows that her little Augusta is around her, caring for her. The flesh and the senses are playing a cruel trick on her poor spirit, dear. But she does know that you are about her." "Oh, Jimmie, do you really believe it? I'm so tired trying to believe!" "Yes, dear, I'm as sure as that we are standing here that she does in some way--I don't know how--she does really feel you. But I'm afraid, dearest that there is a change coming now. You know Gardner told us to expect it. And it's going to be cruel hard upon you, dear. You must not try to do all alone. I'll see Gardner tonight and we'll get a good strong nurse." At the word he felt Augusta stiffen resistingly in his arms and he knew that a struggle was coming. "Oh, Jimmie, don't ask me to do that! I couldn't--I couldn't give up one little bit of her, not one little minute to anyone." "But, dear, you are not able. You are too little for it." "I can't help it, Jimmie. You know I can't. You know how I've waited, every hour of every day, waited and prayed, for a moment when my darling would know me--when she would know that I hadn't left her, that she hadn't been left to strange, careless people. And think, Jimmie, think what it would mean to me if the moment came, even one little flash, and I wasn't there for her to know me! Jimmie," she said quietly, turning slowly upon him with that strange, unseeing light in her eyes, "I think, if my moment should slip away from me that way--I think that I should die." And Wardwell, bewildered, silenced, half believing, knew that he was beaten. But he did go to see the doctor. Doctor Gardner's little eyes twinkled behind a cloud of smoke from a big cigar as Wardwell expounded the situation at home and told what must be done and what Augusta must not be allowed to do. When Jimmie had quite finished the doctor asked with an elaborate diffidence: "Ah--Do I understand that you are intending to do something that Augusta does not want?" "Well--of course--" Jimmie started to explain. "I was only going to remark," the doctor went on serenely, "that, to my personal knowledge, Augusta began doing things after her own plan on the day she was born. And, so far as I know, nobody has been able to change that. You see, the trouble has been that she has always turned out to be right." "Yes, of course she's always right," Wardwell hastened to agree, "but, in this--" "And, unless you have found a way," the doctor proceeded, "of changing Augusta, we'll just have to let her go her own way in this. To be sure, though, we must try to see that she does not kill herself with the hard work.