s way."

He leaned forward slightly and tapped the arms of his chair
rhythmically.

"After mother left me, there wasn't much to keep going for, you see.
Then Irene, she went off, and though she was mighty kind about it, and
there'd always be a room for me, and all that, and I liked Hannibal
well enough, still, I'd never be happy in Italy. Hannibal saw it
himself. In a good many ways Hannibal used to see what I meant, now
and again--funny, wasn't it, with him so foreign? You'd have thought
Barkington, now ... but that's neither here nor there.

"Well, we stayed in the house together, Mrs. Leeth and me, and we got
on very well. She knew all mother's ways, and we used to talk about
her, evenings, and she as good as gave me her promise she'd never leave
me while I wanted her.

"Then I had pneumonia. We had three trained nurses, but I guess
there's no doubt she pulled me through. She was up all the nights.

"Irene and Hannibal came right over--it seems they cabled. Irene was
expecting to have her baby, too, and it was in March, the worst time to
cross the water. But she came. And Hannibal listened to the doctors
and the nurses and then he turned to Mrs. Leeth--'How do you find Mr.
Vail to-day?' he said.

"'He'll live, sir,' she said, and he said, 'All right,' and that was
all there was to it. There was always something about Hannibal ...

"Then _she_ came down. Pleurisy. I'd been South and got back, and I
was well enough, you understand, but when they told me that they
couldn't save her, something turned right over inside me, and I knew I
couldn't bear it. It was too much--everything just slipping away from
me, one by one, and me all alone--no, I wasn't good for it, that's all.
I suppose it sounds dreadfully weak to you, but there it is: I wasn't
good for it.

"I was sitting by her bed, looking at her, thinking of all the old days
she could remember with me, and the girls she'd seen grow up, and
mother, and all, and all of a sudden she opened her eyes and she knew
me. She was sinking fast, but she knew me for the first time in days.

"'Mrs. Leeth,' I said, 'it's no use. If you go, I'll go too. I can't
stick it out alone! Must you?' I said. 'Must you? Isn't there any
way?'

"'Wait!' she sort of whispered to me, 'wait! There'll be a way, Mr.
Vail--a way'll be found!'

"And then her eyes closed.

"I just sat there, staring ahead. I was too miserable to notice
anything different about her, th