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 a poor sort of a husband if you’ve allowed your wife to go through anything so crucial as the nerve strain and the physical strain of approaching maternity and delivery and given no sympathy, extended no care. It scarcely seems human.”

Jamie licked his lips and took his medicine. He could not say anything in self-extenuation that would not cast a reflection on the girl before him, and in the few minutes that he had stood staring down at her he had realized that her every breath was coming shorter. The hand he was holding was a weight in his fingers. He gripped it and began to chafe it.

“For God’s sake!” he cried, “try to do something! Forget about lecturing me now! Do something! Don’t, don’t let her slip away like this!”

The doctor looked up at Jamie and said quietly: “There is nothing known to medical science that three of the best doctors in the city have not been trying all night, and some very excellent nurses have performed their duties carefully. You might as well understand that it is very near the end. I thought possibly she might rally. I thought possibly she might have something she would want to say to you. I thought you ought to be here in the event she needed you, and I told you the truth when I said your son is a fine little fellow. He is a beautiful specimen of physical babyhood. There’s the makings of a fine man in him, and we are needing men in this country. We seem at the present minute to have an overplus of hounds.”