"Doctor, you say you are going away to-night?" This from the city
physician to Dr. Balsam.

"No, sir; I shall stay for a day or two." The fingers of the sleeper
quite closed on his hand. "I have several old friends here. In fact,
this little girl is one of them, and I want to get her up."

The look of the other changed, and he cleared his throat with a dry,
metallic cough.

"You may rest satisfied that everything has been done for the patient
that science can do," he said stiffly.

"I think so. We won't rest till we get the little girl up," said the
older doctor. "Now we will take off our coats and work."

Once more the fingers of the sleeper almost clutched his.

When the door closed, Lois turned her head and opened her eyes, and when
the wheels were heard driving away she looked at the Doctor with a wan
little smile, which he answered with a twinkle.

"When did you come?" she asked faintly. It was the first sign of
interest she had shown in anything for days.

"A young friend of mine, Gordon Keith, told me you were sick, and asked
me to come, and I have just arrived. He brought me up." He watched the
change in her face.

"I am so much obliged to you. Where is he now?"

"He is here. Now we must get well," he said encouragingly. "And to do
that we must get a little sleep."

"Very well. You are going to stay with me?"

"Yes."

"Thank you"; and she closed her eyes tranquilly and, after a little,
fell into a doze.

When the Doctor came out of the sick-room he had done what the other
physicians had not done and could not do. He had fathomed the case, and,
understanding the cause, he was able to prescribe the cure.

"With the help of God we will get your little girl well," he said to
Miss Abby.

"I begin to hope, and I had begun to despair," she said. "It was good of
you to come."

"I am glad I came, and I will come whenever you want me, Abby," replied
the old Doctor, simply.

From this time, as he promised, so he performed. He took off his coat,
and using the means which the city specialist had suggested, he studied
his patient's case and applied all his powers to the struggle.

The great city doctor recorded the case among his cures; but in his
treatment he did not reckon the sleepless hours that that country doctor
had sat by the patient's bedside, the unremitting struggle he had made,
holding Death at bay, inspiring hope, and holding desperately every
inch gained.

When the Doctor saw Keith