He stood awhile turned from her, his face to the window, though the sun-blind was all that could have met his view; finally, with grave kindness, he spoke.

“I think I had better leave you to prepare for the journey.  There is not much time at your disposal, and you will probably need it all.  It is settled that Noel is to go with us?”

“You won’t mind?” she whispered.

“I think it a very good plan,” he answered.

He turned round and came back to her.  She had commanded herself to a certain extent, but still she could not raise her face.  She waited tensely as he approached, possessed by a sudden, almost delirious longing to feel the touch of his lips.

Her desire surged into leaping hope as he stopped beside her.  Would he—­could he?  But he did not stoop.  He only laid his hand for a moment upon her head.

“Chris,” he said, “try to think of me as a friend—­and don’t be afraid.”

She thrilled at the low-spoken words.  In another moment she would have conquered all hesitation and sprung up to feel his arms about her, to hide her face against him, to open to him all her quivering heart.  But for that moment he did not wait.

With the utterance of the words his hand fell, and he moved away.

The opening and the closing of the door told her he had gone.

CHAPTER VIII

ARREST

“Ah, but what a night for dreams!”

The cool salt air came in from the sea like a benediction, blowing softly about the sick man by the window, sending a gleam of life into eyes grown weary with long suffering.  He leaned back upon his pillows for the first time in many hours.

“It is as if the door of heaven had opened,” he said.

“You’re not going yet, old chap!” Max answered, a curious blending of grimness and tenderness in his voice.

“But no—­not yet—­not yet.”  Softly Bertrand made answer, but resolution throbbed in his words also.  “I must not fail her—­my little pal—­my bird of Paradise.  But the night is very long, Max, mon ami.  And the darkness—­the darkness—­”

Max’s hand came quietly down and closed upon his wrist.  “I’ll see you through,” he said.

“Yes—­yes.  You will help me.  You are one of those created to help.  That is why you will be great.  The great men are always—­those who help.”

The words came slowly, sometimes with difficulty, but the young medical student made no attempt to check them.  He only sat with shrewd eyes upon the sick man’s face and alert finger on his wrist, marking the waning strength while he listened.  For he knew that the night was long.

Years afterwards it came to be said of him that his patients never died until his back was turned.  It was not strictly true, but it conveyed something of the magnetism with which he wrought upon them.  He knew the crucial moment by instinct, when to grapple and when to slacken his hold, and he never went by rule.