eagerly. "Let
us print a statement from you, from her--"

"In your sheet? If you so much as publish her name again--By Heavens, I
wish it were the old days, I'd call you out and kill you."

"Dr. Elliot," said Hal quietly, "did you think I wanted to print that
about Esme?"

"Wanted to? Of course you wanted to. You didn't have to, did you?"

"Yes."

"What compelled you?" demanded the other.

"You won't understand, but I'll tell you. The 'Clarion' compelled me. It
was news."

"News! To blackguard a young girl, ignorant of the very thing you've
held her up to shame for! The power of the press! A power to smirch the
names of decent people. And do you know where my girl is now, on this
day when your sheet is smearing her name all over the town?" demanded
the physician, his voice shaking with wrath and grief. "Do you know
that--you who know everybody's business?"

Chill fear took hold upon Hal. "No," he said.

"In quarantine for typhus. Here! Keep off me!"

For Hal, stricken with his first experience of that black, descending
mist which is just short of unconsciousness, had clutched at the other's
shoulder to steady himself.

"Where?" he gasped.

"I won't tell you," retorted the Doctor viciously. "You might make
another article out of that, of the kind you enjoy so much."

But this was too ghastly a joke. Hal straightened, and lifted his head
to an eye-level with his denouncer. "Enjoy!" he said, in a low tone.
"You may guess how much when I tell you that I've loved Esme with every
drop of my blood since the first time I ever spoke with her."

The Doctor's grim regard softened a little. "If I tell you, you won't
publish it? Or give it away? Or try to communicate with her? I won't
have her pestered."

"My word of honor."

"She's at the typhus hospital."

"And she's got typhus?" groaned Hal.

"No. Who said she had it? She's been exposed to it."

Hardly was the last word out of his mouth when he was alone. Hal had
made a dash for a taxi. "Health Bureau," he cried.

By good fortune he found Dr. Merritt in.

"You've got Esme Elliot at the typhus hospital," he said breathlessly.

"Yes. In the isolation ward."

"Why?"

"She's been exposed. She carried a child, in convulsions, into the
hospital. The child developed typhus late Saturday night; must have been
infected at the time. As soon as I knew, I sent for her, and she came
like the brave girl she is, yesterday morning."

"Will she get the fever?"