ight be keeping me
here away from my work."

"I'm glad. It's very good to have a friend by one, but I should have
worried at keeping you from your work. Now I'm relieved.... Is the
laboratory here well equipped?"

"Quite sufficiently for my purposes. Of course I'm sending to Paris for
my own microscope--it's a Zeiss, with a one-twelfth oil immersion--and
I'll have my own rocker microtome sent over also. There's a microtome
in the laboratory here, but I might take weeks to get on terms with it.
If you'd ever worked with the instrument, you'd know how curiously human
it is in its moods and whims. If a microtome takes a liking to you,
she'll work herself to the bone while you merely rest your hand on the
lever. But if she has some secret objection to you, she'll pout and
sulk, and jib and rear, and generally try to drive you distracted."

Elaine smiled. "I notice that man always applies the feminine gender to
anything unreliable in the way of machinery. If it's sober and
steady-going, you label it masculine, like Big Ben. But if it's
uncertain in action, like a motor-boat, you call it Fifi or Lolo or
Vivienne."

"That's a true bill," confessed Riviere. "Henceforth I'll keep to the
strictly neutral 'it' when I mention a microtome."

"I want to know the nature of your research work. You've never yet told
me except in vague, general terms."

Riviere hesitated. It seemed to him scarcely a subject to discuss with
one who herself was in the hands of the surgeon.

"Wouldn't you prefer a more cheerful topic?" he ventured.

Elaine appreciated the reason for his hesitation, and answered: "I want
to hear of the spirit behind your technicalities. It won't depress me in
the least. Please go on."

Riviere began to explain to her the big idea which he was hoping to
develop in the coming years. He avoided any details that might seem to
have even a remote personal bearing. He spoke with enthusiasm--his
voice became aglow with inner fire. And it was clear from her attitude
and from the questions she interjected from time to time that she
realized the value of his idea, appreciated his motives, and was
whole-heartedly interested in what he was telling her.

As Elaine listened, a tiny voice within her was whispering: "Here is
your rival." And she felt glad that her rival was one of high purpose.
The call of science and a high, impersonal aim, touched her as something
sacred.

Riviere had brought with him a daily paper--the Frank