Through the night telephone and telegraph had been busy summoning the most skilful aid. Here at least was one blessing of wealth--that the question of expense need never be considered. This man for eyes, that man for skin, a third for shock to the nerves; the cleverest nurses, the newest appliances--the wonderful wires summoned them each in turn. Throughout the night motor-cars whirled up the drive, tall men in top coats, nurses in cloaks and bonnets, dismantled and passed into the house, mysterious cases were hurried up back stairways. Joan and her husband were banished from the sickroom, and sat in her boudoir awaiting the verdict. It was the first time they had been alone together since the accident, and when the door closed behind them Joan glanced at her husband with a quivering fear. His face was white and drawn. He looked old, and bowed, and broken, but there was no anger in his face. "Geoffrey! Will you ever forgive me?" For all answer he held out his arms. The old look of love was in his eyes, the old beautiful softness; there was no bitterness in his look, no anger, not the faintest shadow of blame. "Dearest, don't! We both suffer. We must keep strong. We must help each other." "Geoff, you warned me. You said it would be bad. It was against your wish ... It's my fault!" "Darling, darling, don't make it worse!" He pressed her head against his shoulder with tender, soothing touches. "No one could have foreseen. I feared for excitement only; there was no thought of danger. We have enough to bear, sweetheart. Don't torture yourself needlessly." "It's my doing, it's my punishment; I brought it about. I've been cold, and selfish, and ungrateful. I had so much I ought to have been so thankful, but I was discontented--I made you wretched. God gave me a chance--" she pushed him away with frenzied hands and paced wildly, up and down the room--"a chance of salvation by happiness, and I was too mean, too poor to take it. Geoff, do you remember that poem of Stevenson's, `The Celestial Surgeon'? They have been rinking in my head all night, those last lines, those dreadful lines. I _was_ `obdurate.' All the blessings which had been showered upon me left me dead; it needed this `darting pain' to `_stab my dead heart wide awake_!'" She repeated the words with an emphasis, a wildness which brought an additional furrow into Geoffrey's brow.