“Nothing,” he answered. “I was only thinking I’d heard that a good many young ladies were anxious to make his acquaintance. I imagine you’ll be the first, my dear.” “Well, oughtn’t I to be?” she demanded. “If you’d done as terrible a thing as that to anybody, wouldn’t you think you were entitled to ask his pardon about as soon as he was able to listen?” “Without doubt. In the meantime I think you’d better go home and to bed again.” She protested, but proved meeker under advice than she had the night before. She went home, though not directly, for she stopped half an hour at some greenhouses that were a mile out of her way. She sent to Mr. James Herbert McArdle at the hospital a prodigious sheaf of flowers—enough to cripple her rather moderate monthly allowance from her father—and the following morning, since the allowance was already so far gone, she did the same thing. Having thus fallen into the habit, she was as lavish upon the third morning after the accident, so that at three o’clock of this same day, when Doctor Waite took her into his patient’s room, he seemed to be conducting her into a conservatory. Like fair Elaine, James Herbert McArdle in a silken gown lay white and motionless, embowered among blooms; but his eyes glimmered in surprised appreciation when they beheld his serious visitor. Gray was becoming to the fair and slim Lily—her clothes didn’t depend upon her allowance—and she was never more charming than when she was serious. “My goodness!” said the frank convalescent, with a feeble kind of forcefulness. “I didn’t expect anybody like _you_! I was sure it would turn out to be some old hag.” Lily was a little given to the theatrical, though only when occasion warranted it, as this one did if any occasion could. She swept forward softly, her sensitive face all compassion and remorse. She knelt beside the iron bed. “Some day you may forgive me,” she said, tremulously, and her voice was always stirringly lovely when it trembled. “Some day you may be able even to forget what I’ve done to you—but I want you to be sure that I shall never forget it or forgive myself.” “Here!” he said. “There’s nothing to that. They tell me you came in the ambulance with me and hung around and did all sorts of things. And look at all these greenhouses you must have bought out! A person’s liable to get a clip on the head almost anywhere these days. Let’s shake hands—but not forget it.” “You can’t——” “I haven’t got anything to forgive you for, of course,” he said. “You don’t forgive accidents; you just forget ’em. What I mean is, I don’t want to forget this one—now I’ve seen you, I don’t.” “Well——” Lily said, vaguely. “But I’d like you just to _say_ you forgive me. Won’t you?” “All right.” He moved his hand toward her and she took it for a moment. “I forgive you—but I think you ought to do something for me.” “What?” “How long did the doctor say you can stay here?” “Five or ten minutes.”