oned the nurse and found out where she was and how
long she had been there; she smiled with her old touch of humour when
she was called Miss Lamb but gave thanks that she had a name not her
own!

She regarded Cameron with deep gratitude, but drove him to a corner by
insisting that he tell her how much she owed him.

Cameron, having her purse under lock and key, at home, told her she owed
the hospital fifty dollars.

At that Joan laughed, and the sound gave Cameron more hope than he had
known for some time, but it seemed to mark, also, Joan's complete
self-control.

Often she lay for hours with closed eyes and wondered with a bit of
self-pity why she had not been discovered? Had she so completely dropped
from the lives of those she loved that they had forgotten her? She did
not know, for some time to come, of the letters to her that were
returned to The Gap! She was never to know, fully, the anguish that
Doris Fletcher was enduring in her mistaken determination not to hamper
the girl who was testing her strength.

While David Martin rated her for ingratitude and carelessness; while
Nancy's face set in resentment and disapproval, Doris smiled and
insisted that she would not judge until Joan explained.

"Of course," she added, "if anything were really wrong Joan or Patricia
would write. They are probably away on business--and at the worst they
will soon let me know when to expect them. Joan was always a poor
correspondent."

"Would you like to have me go to Chicago?" Martin asked.

"David, would you go if--it were your boy?" Doris hung on his answer.

"I jolly well wouldn't! I'd let the scamp learn the whole lesson."

"Very well, then I do not want you to go to Chicago!"

Joan, slowly recovering, could hardly have explained to herself why she
was so secretive, but more and more she determined not to go to The Gap
and open her heart to Doris until she was able to command the situation.
Since she had, for some reason, dropped from their lives, she would
wait. Meanwhile, her heart ached with the pity of it all.

She wondered how the name of Lamb had ever been attached to her, and
finally she decided to ask Cameron about it.

It was Cameron's custom, now, to delay his call upon Joan until late
afternoon. When he was on his way to dinner he took a half hour or more
to sit beside her bed and indulge in various emotions.

So long as Joan had been a desperate case she had no individuality at
all, except scientific