se arm is ready to
sustain me, whose heart is bursting for love of me, and yet be always
held apart by a spectre which I dare not face."

With this came the resolve to prevent the marriage at all hazards, even
to leaving Yardley and taking the first steamer to Europe, that she
might plead with Lucy in person.

While she sat searching her brain for some way out of the threatened
calamity, the rapid rumbling of the doctor's gig was heard on the
gravel road outside her open window. She knew from the speed with which
he drove that something out of the common had happened. The gig stopped
and the doctor's voice rang out:

"Come as quick as you can, Jane, please. I've got a bad case some miles
out of Warehold, and I need you; it's a compound fracture, and I want
you to help with the chloroform."

All her indecision vanished and all her doubts were swept away as she
caught the tones of his voice. Who else in the wide world understood
her as he did, and who but he should guide her now? Had he ever failed
her? When was his hand withheld or his lips silent? How long would her
pride shut out his sympathy? If he could help in the smaller things of
life why not trust him in this larger sorrow?--one that threatened to
overwhelm her, she whose heart ached for tenderness and wise counsel.
Perhaps she could lean upon him without betraying her trust. After all,
the question of Archie's birth--the one secret between them--need not
come up. It was Lucy's future happiness which was at stake. This must
be made safe at any cost short of exposure.

"Better put a few things in a bag," Doctor John continued. "It may be a
case of hours or days--I can't tell till I see him. The boy fell from
the roof of the stable and is pretty badly hurt; both legs are broken,
I hear; the right one in two places."

She was upstairs in a moment, into her nursing dress, always hanging
ready in case the doctor called for her, and down again, standing
beside the gig, her bag in her hand, before he had time to turn his
horse and arrange the seat and robes for her comfort.

"Who is it?" she asked hurriedly, resting her hand in his as he helped
her into the seat and took the one beside her, Martha and Archie
assisting with her bag and big driving cloak.

"Burton's boy. His father was coming for me and met me on the road. I
have everything with me, so we will not lose any time. Good-by, my
boy," he called to Archie. "One day I'll make a doctor of you, and then