“Higginson, is that his name?” Louise asked.  “Well, he is a good man.  When he started the engineer using the chloroform and me arranging things, he was swallowing hard.  I saw he was terribly nervous and keyed up.  But he went right at the operation without faltering and with a sort of doggedness.  As if nothing should stop him.  I myself was doing rather mistily what he wanted.  The chloroform, the smell of antiseptics, the shiny instruments, the cutting, the nipping of blood-vessels with forceps and tying them, the clipping with scissors, the sewing—­all went to my head.  And I constantly had to tell myself, ’Don’t be silly!  You’re not going to faint.  He might fail if you did.  That tray, those forceps, those sponges, that thread, that’s what he wants now.  Keep your head.  Don’t be a quitter.’  And so on through eternity—­it seemed an eternity, anyway.  I think the young engineer with me thought so, too.  He turned quite green once or twice.  But then I must have looked that way throughout.  All at once it was over, suddenly.  Quite unexpectedly, too.  I had come to believe that it would go on and on forever.  But, as I say, all at once it was done and the men were wheeling the bandaged fellow into the other room.  Then the doctor called over his shoulder at me, ’Open the door, girl; let in some air.’  So I opened it as he wanted, and came out.”

Bryant was greatly affected by that simple recital.  He began to walk back and forth beside Louise, restlessly thrusting his hands in his coat pockets but immediately pulling them out as if there were no satisfaction in the action, and casting troubled glances at her from under close-drawn brows.  His disquietude moved her to speak.

“You’re worrying about me, Mr. Bryant; you mustn’t do that.  In a few minutes more I’ll be entirely recovered.  I should be foolish to pretend that the happening wasn’t a shock to me, but I’m not a weakling—­I’ve health and strength.  I’ll not permit the thought of the operation to depress my spirits.  Indeed, I know I’ll be very proud of what I did this afternoon, for it was a chance to do a real, disinterested service.  And I can guess what father will say when he learns of it—­’Louise, you did just right.  Exactly what you should do under the circumstances.’”

Already the colour had reappeared in her cheeks.  A resilience of nature was indeed hers, he perceived, that enabled her to undergo ordeals that would prostrate many women.  It came, undoubtedly, from the same springs out of which rose her splendid courage, her fine sympathy.  Ah, that golden quality of sympathy!  Because of it her duty that day had seemed plain and clear.

“Louise—­may I not use that name, for we’re friends?—­Louise, you’re the bravest, kindest girl I have ever known.  I mean it, really.  I’ve never forgotten your generous act that day when someone so brutally killed my dog Mike, how you tried to save him.  I didn’t know you then, but that made no difference to you.  And now when you find an opportunity to help save a man’s life, you never flinch.”