It was the only reference that he had made to the father's asking for her, and she was sensible of inquiry in his tone. She nodded. And, alone together for the first time since her appointment, they stood looking at Carew's child. She had no wish to speak. On him the situation imposed restraint. But to be with her thus had a charm, for all that. It was not to be uttered, not to be dwelt on, but, due in part to the prevailing silence of the house, there was an illusion of confidential intercourse that he had not felt with her here before. While they looked, the boy gave a quick gasp. The tube had become clogged. She started and threw out her hand towards the feathers. But Kincaid had picked one up already, favoured by his position. "All right!" he said; "I'll free it." He leant over the pillow, feather in hand. She watched him with eyes widening in terror, for she saw that his endeavours were futile and he could not free it. The waxen placidity of the upturned face vanished as she watched. It regained the signs of life to struggle with the gripe of death--distorted in an instant, and distorted frightfully. The average woman would have wept aloud. The nurse, to all intents and purposes, preserved her calmness still. It was Kincaid who gave the first token of despondence. "The thing's blocked!" he exclaimed; "I can't clear it!" His voice had the repressed despair of a surgeon, who is an enthusiast, too, opposed by a higher force. Under the test of his defeat her composure broke down. Confronted by a danger in which her interest was vivid and personal she--as the father had done before her--became agitated and unstrung. "You must," she said. "Doctor, for Heaven's sake!" He was trying still, but with scant success. "I'm doing my best; it seems no good." "You must save this life," she repeated. "You will?" "I tell you I can't do any more." "You will--you shall!" she persisted wildly. The very passion of motherhood suffused her features. "Doctor, it is _his_ child!" He looked at her--their gaze met, even then. It was only in a flash. Abruptly the gasps of the dying baby became horrible to witness. The eyeballs rolled hideously, and seemed as if they would spring from their sockets. The tiny chest heaved and fell in agonising efforts to gain air, while in its convulsive battle against suffocation the frail body almost lifted itself from the mattress. "Go away," said the man; "there's nothing you can do." She refused to stir. She appealed to him frantically. "Help him!" she stammered. "There's no way." "You, the doctor, tell me there's no way?" "None." "But _I_ know there _is_ a way," she cried; "I can suck that tube!" "Mary! My God! it might kill you!" She flung forward, but the conflict ceased as he pulled her back. A small quantity of the mucus had been dislodged by the paroxysm that it had produced. Nature had done--imperfectly, but still done--what science had failed to effect. The boy breathed.