They talked of the wounded boy and of the needed treatment and what part each should take in the operation; of some new cases in the hospital and the remedies suggested for their comfort; of Archie’s life on the beach and how ruddy and handsome he was growing, and of his tender, loving nature; and of the thousand and one other things that two people who know every pulsation of each other’s hearts are apt to discuss—­of everything, in fact, but the letter in her pocket.  “It is a serious case,” she said to herself—­“this to which we are hurrying—­and nothing must disturb the sureness of his sensitive hand.”

Now and then, as he spoke, the two would turn their heads and look into each other’s eyes.

When a man’s face lacks the lines and modellings that stand for beauty the woman who loves him is apt to omit in her eager glance every feature but his eyes.  His eyes are the open doors to his soul; in these she finds her ideals, and in these she revels.  But with Jane every feature was a joy—­the way the smoothly cut hair was trimmed about his white temples; the small, well-turned ears lying flat to his head; the lines of his eyebrows; the wide, sensitive nostrils and the gleam of the even teeth flashing from between well-drawn, mobile lips; the white, smooth, polished skin.  Not all faces could boast this beauty; but then not all souls shone as clearly as did Doctor John’s through the thin veil of his face.

And she was equally young and beautiful to him.  Her figure was still that of her youth; her face had not changed—­he still caught the smile of the girl he loved.  Often, when they had been driving along the coast, the salt wind in their faces, and he had looked at her suddenly, a thrill of delight had swept through him as he noted how rosy were her cheeks and how ruddy the wrists above the gloves, hiding the dear hands he loved so well, the tapering fingers tipped with delicate pink nails.  He could, if he sought them, find many telltale wrinkles about the corners of the mouth and under the eyelids (he knew and loved them all), showing where the acid of anxiety had bitten deep into the plate on which the record of her life was being daily etched, but her beautiful gray eyes still shone with the same true, kindly light, and always flashed the brighter when they looked into his own.  No, she was ever young and ever beautiful to him!

To-day, however, there was a strange tremor in her voice and an anxious, troubled expression in her face—­one that he had not seen for years.  Nor had she once looked into his eyes in the old way.

“Something worries you, Jane,” he said, his voice echoing his thoughts.  “Tell me about it.”

“No—­not now—­it is nothing,” she answered quickly.

“Yes, tell me.  Don’t keep any troubles from me.  I have nothing else to do in life but smooth them out.  Come, what is it?”

“Wait until we get through with Burton’s boy.  He may be hurt worse than you think.”