Doctor Hillhouse had to decide quickly, and his decision was on the side where pressure was strongest.  He could not deny Mr. Voss.

He found the poor distressed mother in a condition of utter prostration.  For a little while after coming out of the swoon into which her first wild fears had thrown her, she had been able to maintain a tolerably calm exterior.  But the very effort to do this was a draught on her strength, and in a few hours, under the continued suspense of waiting and hearing nothing from her boy, the overstrained nerves broke down again, and she sunk into a condition of half-conscious suffering that was painful to see.

For such conditions medicine can do but little.  All that Doctor Hillhouse ventured to prescribe was a quieting draught.  It was after eleven o’clock when he got back to his office, where he found Mr. Ridley waiting for him with a note from Doctor Ainsworth.

“Come for just a single moment,” the note said.  “There are marked changes in her condition.”

“I cannot!  It is impossible!” exclaimed Doctor Hillhouse, with an excitement of manner he could not repress.  Doctor Ainsworth can do all that it is in the power of medical skill to accomplish.  It will not help her for me to go again now, and another life is in my hands.  I am sorry, Mr. Ridley, but I cannot see your wife again until this afternoon.

“Oh, doctor, doctor, don’t say that!” cried the poor, distressed husband, clasping his hands and looking at Doctor Hillhouse with a pale, imploring face.  “Just for single moment, doctor.  Postpone your operation.  Ten minutes, or even an hour, can be of no consequence.  But life or death may depend on your seeing my wife at once.  Come, doctor!  Come, for God’s sake!”

Doctor Hillhouse looked at his watch again, stood in a bewildered, uncertain way for a few moments, and then turned quickly toward the door and went out, Mr. Ridley following.

“Get in,” he said, waving his hand in the direction of his carriage, which still remained in front of his office.  Mr. Ridley obeyed.  Doctor Hillhouse gave the driver a hurried direction, and sprang in after him.  They rode in silence for the whole distance to Mr. Ridley’s dwelling.

One glance at the face of the sick woman was enough to show Doctor Hillhouse that she was beyond the reach of professional skill.  Her disease, as he had before seen, had taken on its worst form, and was running its fatal course with a malignant impetuosity it was impossible to arrest.  The wild fever of anxiety occasioned by her husband’s absence during that dreadful night, the cold to which, in her delirium of fear, she had exposed herself, the great shock her delicate organism had sustained at a time when even the slightest disturbance might lead to serious consequences,—­all these causes combined had so broken down her vitality and poisoned her blood that nature had no force strong enough to rally against the enemies of her life.