she--hasn't!"

"No."

Then Weldon waited for Carew to speak; but Carew merely sat and
stared at his friend in speechless stupefaction.

"Oh, Lord!" he blurted out at last. "Then you haven't made it up?"

"There was nothing to make up," Weldon said drearily.

Again Carew's elbows came down on his knees with a bump.

"There was, too!" he contradicted, with an explosiveness which
irresistibly reminded Weldon of their kindergarten days.

"What makes you think so?"

"I don't think. I know."

"How do you know?" Weldon asked listlessly.

"Alice Mellen told me," Carew replied conclusively.

"Told you what?"

"That Cooee Dent is in love with you."

From his superior knowledge, Weldon stared disdainfully up at him.

"Then there is one thing that Alice Mellen doesn't know."

"She does, then. She told me about it, when you went off on your
feed, up at Lindley," Carew explained hurriedly. "I was worried
about you, and she was worried about Miss Dent, and we compared
notes. You hadn't said a word of any kind; we could only guess at
things, so we wrote to each other about it. She told me then about
Miss Dent's dashing up to Johannesburg after Vlaakfontein."

"She went to see her cousin."

"She also went to see you."

Carew's emphatic pause was broken by the coming of the nurse, who
bent over the bed, raising her brows inquiringly, as she laid two
fingers on Weldon's wrist. Carew took the obvious hint.

"I hope I've not stopped too long," he said, as he rose. "It has
been good to see Mr. Weldon. May I come again?"

The nurse was a true woman. Therefore she smiled back into his
happy, handsome face.

"I think you may," she answered. "Mr. Weldon is tired now, but you
evidently have done him good."

Carew meditated aloud, as he went away down the walk.

"Out of every five women, three are cats," he observed tranquilly to
himself. "I've cornered the fourth. It remains to be seen whether
Weldon is cornered by the fifth, or only the third. Hasn't been to
see him! Little beast! But I'll bet any amount of gold money that
she has done endless messing for him on the sly."

Carew's words showed that it is usually not the man in love with a
woman who is the shrewdest judge of the hidden recesses of that
woman's nature. The fact was, Ethel had slaved unceasingly, but
unseen, for the patient above stairs. See him she would not. Day
after day, she invented fresh excuses to ward off her mother's
suggestions of a call on