ps Dr. Floddin is a brave man to stay now. Perhaps he would be
brave to go.

"Well, Mr. Surgeon, look at that child."

"Your boy is dying," says the surgeon, as the men retire to a back room.

"What is to be done?" asks the father, resolutely.

"We can insert a tube in his throat."

"Will that save his life?"

"It will prolong his life if the shock do not result fatally."

"If it were your own child would you do this operation?"

"Yes, I think so."

"Would you do it, certainly?"

"Yes, sir."

"Let us go in."

"Esther, we shall have to give him air through his throat."

"No, no!" shrieks the woman. "No, no!"

The child's eyes, almost filmy before, are lifted in beautiful appeal
to the mother. "No, Davy. It shall not be!"

"It must be," says Lockwin.

"I have not brought my instruments," says the surgeon. "It is now very
late in the case, anyway."

"Thank God!" is the thought of the father.

The child smiles upon his mother. He smiles upon Richard Tarbelle.

"How can he smile on papa, when papa was to cut that white and narrow
throat?" It is David Lockwin putting his unhappy cheek beside the
little face.

Now, if all these flaxseed rags and this stramonium sprayer and pan
could be cleared out! If it were only daylight, so we could see Davy
plainer!

Then comes a low cry from the kitchen. It is the forlorn mother,
detailing the treacherous siege of membraneous croup.

David Lockwin can only think of the hours last night, while Davy was in
Gethsemane. The cradle song was the death song. The doctors sit in
the back room. Esther holds the little hands and talks to the ears
that have gone past hearing. "There is a sublime patience in women,"
thinks Lockwin, for he cannot wait.

"Inconceivable! Inconceivable! Davy never at the window again! Take
away my miserable life, oh, just nature! Just God!"

The white lips are moving:

"Books, papa! J-o-s-e-p--"

"Yes, Davy. Josephus. Papa knows. Thank you, Davy. I can't say
good-bye, Davy, for I hope I can go with you!"

The man's head is in the pillow. "Oh, to take a little child like
this, and send him out ahead of us--ahead of the strong man. Is it not
hard, Richard Tarbelle?"

"Mr. Lockwin, as I said, I am not a rich man, but I would give a
thousand dollars--a thousand dollars--I guess you had better look at
him, Mr. Lockwin."

Davy is dead.

Never yet has that father showered on the child such a wealth of love
as lies