Then she was crossing the familiar hall; lights were in the library, and Warren in the library, somebody with him, but Rachael only caught a glimpse of the old familiar attitude:  he was sitting in a straight-backed chair, his legs crossed, and one firm hand grasping a silk-clad ankle as he intently listened to whatever was being said.

“Warren!” she said in a voice that those who heard it remembered all their lives.  “It’s Derry!  He’s hurt—­he’s dying, I think!  Can you—­can you save him?” And with a great burst of tears she gave up the child.

“My God—­what is it!” said Warren Gregory on his feet, and with Derry in his arms, even as he spoke.  For a second the tableau held:  Rachael, agonized, her beautiful face colorless, and dripping with rain, her husband staring at her as if he could not credit his senses, the child’s limp body in his arms, yet not quite freed from hers.  In the background were the whitefaced servants and the gray-headed doctor upon whose conversation the newcomers had so abruptly broken.

“We’ve just brought him up from Clark’s Hills!” Rachael said.

“From Clark’s Hills—­you!”

His look, the dear familiar look of solicitude and concern, tore her to the soul.

“There was nothing else to do!” she faltered.

“But—­you drove up to-night?”

“Since seven.”

He looked at her, and Rachael felt the look sink into her soul like rain into parched land.

“And you came straight to me!” His voice sank.  “Rachael,” he said, “I will save him for you if I can!”

And instantly there began such activities in the old house as perhaps even its dignified century of living had never known.  Rachael, hungry through these terrible hours of suspense for just the wild rush and hurry, watched her husband as if she had never seen him before.  Presently lights blazed from cellar to attic, maids flew in every direction, fires were lighted, the moving of heavy furniture shook the floors.  Derry, the little unconscious cause of it all, lay quiet, with Mary watching him.

New York had been asleep; it was awakened now.  Motor cars wheeled into the Gregorys’ street; Mrs. Gregory herself answered the door.  Here was the nurse, efficient, yet sympathetic, too, with her paraphernalia and her assistants.  Yes, she had been able to get it, Doctor Gregory.  Yes, Doctor, she had that.  Here was the man from the drug store—­that was all right, Doctor, that was what he expected, being waked up in the night; thank you, Doctor.  And here was George Valentine, too much absorbed in the business in hand to say more than an affectionate “Hello” to Rachael.  But with George was Alice, white-faced but smiling, and little sleepy Jimmy, who was to be smuggled immediately into bed.

“I thought you’d rather have him here,” said Alice.

Rachael knew why.  Rachael knew what doctors said to each other, when they gathered, and used those quick, low monosyllables.  She knew why Miss Redding was speeding the arrangements for the improvised operating-room with such desperate hurry.  She knew why one of these assisting doctors was delegated to do nothing but sit beside Derry, watching the little hurt breast rise and fall, watching the bubble of blood form and break on the swollen mouth.