news Alan Massey's card
was brought to her. She went down to the reception room, gave him a limp
cold little hand in greeting and asked if he minded going out with her.
She had to talk with him. She couldn't talk here.

Alan did not mind. A little later they were walking riverward toward a
brilliant orange sky, against which the Soldiers' and Sailors' Monument
loomed gray and majestic. It was bitter cold. A stinging wind lashed the
girl's skirts around her and bit into her cheeks. But somehow she
welcomed the physical discomfort. It matched her mood.

Then the story came out. Dick was sick, very sick, going to die maybe and
she, Tony Holiday couldn't stand it.

Alan listened in tense silence. So Dick Carson might be going to be so
unexpectedly obliging as to die after all. If he had known how to pray he
would have done it, beseeched whatever gods there were to let the thing
come to an end at last, offered any bribe within his power if they would
set him free from his bondage by disposing of his cousin.

But there beside him clinging to his arm was Tony Holiday aquiver with
grief for this same cousin. He saw that there were tears on her cheeks,
tears that the icy wind turned instantly to frosted silver. And suddenly
a new power was invoked--the power of love.

"Tony, darling, don't cry," he beseeched. "I--can't stand it. He--he
won't die."

And then and there a miracle took place. Alan Massey who had never
prayed in his life was praying to some God, somewhere to save John Massey
for Tony because she loved him and his dying would hurt her. Tony must
not be hurt. Any God could see that. It must not be permitted.

Tony put up her hand and brushed away the frosted silver drops.

"No, he isn't going to die. I'm not going to let him. I'm going to Mexico
to save him."

Alan stopped short, pulling her to a halt beside him.

"Tony, you can't," he gasped, too astonished for a moment even to be
angry.

"I can and I am going to," she defied him.

"But my dear, I tell you, you can't. It would be madness. Your uncle
wouldn't let you. I won't let you."

"You can't stop me. Nobody can stop me. I'm going. Dick shan't die alone.
He shan't."

"Tony, do you love him?"

"I don't know. I don't want to talk about love--your kind. I do love him
one way with all my heart. I wish it were the way I love you. I'd go down
and marry him if I did. Maybe I'll marry him anyway. I would in a minute
if it would save him."

"Tony!" Al