Mount
Dunstan."

"No doubt you are right," said Sir Nigel suavely. "He looked ill,
notwithstanding."

"As to looking ill," remarked Lady Alanby to Lord Dunholm, who sat
near her, "that man looks as if he was going to pieces pretty rapidly
himself, and unprejudiced inquiry would not prove that his past had
nothing to do with it."

Betty wondered if her brother-in-law were lying. It was generally safest
to argue that he was. But the fever burned high at Mount Dunstan, and
she knew by instinct what its owner was giving of the strength of his
body and brain. A young, unmarried woman cannot go about, however,
making anxious inquiries concerning the welfare of a man who has made no
advance towards her. She must wait for the chance which brings news.

. . . . .

The fever, having ill-cared for and habitually ill fed bodies to work
upon, wrought fiercely, despite the energy of the two young doctors and
the trained nurses. There were many dark hours in the ballroom ward,
hours filled with groans and wild ravings. The floating Terpsichorean
goddesses upon the lofty ceiling gazed down with wondering eyes at
haggard faces and plucking hands which sometimes, behind the screen
drawn round their beds, ceased to look feverish, and grew paler and
stiller, until they moved no more. But, at least, none had died through
want of shelter and care. The supplies needed came from London each day.
Lord Dunholm had sent a generous cheque to the aid of the sufferers, and
so, also, had old Lady Alanby, but Miss Vanderpoel, consulting medical
authorities and hospitals, learned exactly what was required, and
necessities were forwarded daily in their most easily utilisable form.

"You generously told me to ask you for anything we found we required,"
Mr. Penzance wrote to her in his note of thanks. "My dear and kind
young lady, you leave nothing to ask for. Our doctors, who are young
and enthusiastic, are filled with delight in the completeness of the
resources placed in their hands."

She had, in fact, gone to London to consult an eminent physician, who
was an authority of world-wide reputation. Like the head of the legal
firm of Townlinson & Sheppard, he had experienced a new sensation in
the visit paid him by an indubitably modern young beauty, who wasted no
word, and whose eyes, while he answered her amazingly clear questions,
were as intelligently intent as those of an ardent and serious young
medical student. What a surgical nurse she w