For a man with a heavy weight always upon his conscience, the excellent surgeon found himself wonderfully at peace with the world and its institutions.  There was no doubt that the hand which he had come from grafting was going to live and be of some use to its new owner.  His mail was heavy with approbation.  And it seemed to him that the path which he had discovered had no ending.

“In a hundred years, Barbara,” he said, “it will be possible to replace anything that the body has lost, or that has become diseased and useless or a menace—­not the heart, perhaps, nor the brain—­but anything else.  What I have done clumsily others will do to perfection.”

“What are the chances for Blizzard?”

“Even,” said the surgeon.  “They would be more favorable if he had not lost his legs so long ago.  At the worst the experiment wouldn’t kill him.  He would merely have undergone a useless operation.  At the best he would be able to walk, run perhaps, and look like a whole man.  If anything is to be done for him, the time has come.  He has only to tell me to go ahead.”

“I think he’ll do that,” said Barbara.  “But there’s one thing I don’t understand,” and she smiled; “who is to supply the spare legs?”

“That’s the least of all the difficulties,” said her father, “now that ways of keeping tissues alive have been discovered and proved.  In time there will be storages from which any part of the human body may be obtained on short notice and in perfect condition for grafting.  Just now the idea is horrible to ignorant people, but the faith will spread.  Only wait till we have made a few old people young—­for that will come, too, with the new surgery.”

“You will be glad,” said Barbara, “to hear that I have severed friendly relations with Mr. Blizzard.  He behaved in the end pretty much as you all feared he would.”

And she told her father, briefly, and somewhat shamefacedly, all that had happened in the studio.

“He thought I was laughing at him,” she said.  “Of course I wasn’t.  And he came at me.  Do you remember when poor old Rose went mad, and tried to get at us through the bars of the kennel?  Blizzard looked like that—­like a mad dog.”  She shuddered.

The surgeon’s high spirits were dashed as with cold water.

“He ought not to be helped,” said Barbara; “he ought to be shot, as Rose was.”

But Dr. Ferris shook his head gravely.  “If he is that sort of a man,” he said, “who made him so?  Who took the joy of life from him?  Barbara, my dear, there is nothing that man could do that I couldn’t forgive.”

“And I think that your conscience is sick,” said Barbara.  “I used to think as you think.  But if you had seen his face that day!...  The one great mistake you have made has ruined not his life, but yours.  If he had had the right stuff in him, calamity would not have broken him!  It would have made him.  Give him a new pair of legs, if you can; and forget about him, as I shall.  When you first told me about him, I thought we owed him anything he chose to ask.  At one time I thought that if he wished it, it would be right for me to marry him.”