"

"Not since I was at school--and then--not much!"

Hallin glanced at her as she lay back in her chair. How richly human the
face had grown! It was as forcible as ever in expression and colour, but
that look which had often repelled him in his first acquaintance with
her, as of a hard speculative eagerness more like the ardent boy than
the woman, had very much disappeared. It seemed to him absorbed in
something new--something sad and yet benignant, informed with all the
pathos and the pain of growth.

"How long have you been at work to-day?" he asked her.

"I went at eleven last night. I came away at four this afternoon."

Hallin exclaimed, "You had food?"

"Do you think I should let myself starve with my work to do?" she asked
him, with a shade of scorn and her most professional air. "And don't
suppose that such a case occurs often. It is a very rare thing for us to
undertake night-nursing at all."

"Can you tell me what the case was?"

She told him vaguely, describing also in a few words her encounter with
Dr. Blank.

"I suppose he will make a fuss," she said, with a restless look, "and
that I shall be blamed."

"I should think your second doctor will take care of that!" said Hallin.

"I don't know. I couldn't help it. But it is one of our first principles
not to question a doctor. And last week too I got the Association into
trouble. A patient I had been nursing for weeks and got quite fond of
had to be removed to hospital. She asked me to cut her hair. It was
matted dreadfully, and would have been cut off directly she got to the
ward. So I cut it, left her all comfortable, and was to come back at one
to meet the doctor and help get her off. When I came, I found the whole
court in an uproar. The sister of the woman, who had been watching for
me, stood on the doorstep, and implored me to go away. The husband had
gone out of his senses with rage because I had cut his wife's hair
without his consent. 'He'll murder you, Nuss!' said the sister, 'if he
sees you! Don't come in!--he's mad--he's _been going round on 'is 'ands
and knees on the floor_!'"--Hallin interrupted with a shout of laughter.
Marcella laughed too; but to his amazement he saw that her hand shook,
and that there were tears in her eyes.

"It's all very well," she said with a sigh, "but I had to come away in
disgrace, all the street looking on. And he made such a fuss at the
office as never was. It was unfortunate--we don't want the people set