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162 Elsie cautioned me. The road had been freshly oiled on the right-hand side, so I crossed over to the left. There was another car coming at the rate of forty miles an hour around a curve. I turned, but too late. It happened in a second. It was all my fault, Nan! Every bit of it."

"Is Elsie much hurt?" I asked.

"Nan, I'm afraid I've killed her," gasped Burr. "I must get to the telephone. I just had New York on the wire when they dragged me over here. I want all the best specialists in the country to come up here, and do all they can. Let me get up, Nan."

I grasped Burr's hand very tight in mine. "Had you told her, Burr, about—"

"Thank God, no, Nan," he interrupted, and fell back in a faint on the couch.

For days we didn't know whether Elsie would live or not. For weeks the first question that dozens of people in the town asked each morning at breakfast was, "What's the news about Elsie DeForrest this morning?" And each night, "Have you heard from Elsie DeForrest to-day?" The milkman, and the iceman carried reports from back door to back door. Everybody—cooks, clerks and car conductors, wanted Elsie DeForrest to live. That was the kind of popular girl she was. The mail man sent her