Again there was a pause. George could hardly bring himself to ask the next question. Try as he would, he could not keep his voice from weakening. "Well, now, what is her trouble?"

The mother did not answer. She stood staring before her. At last she said, faintly, "I don't know."

"You didn't ask?"

"I asked. But it was not to our own doctor that I went."

"Ah!" whispered George. For nearly a minute neither one of them spoke. "Why?" he inquired at last.

"Because—he—the nurse's doctor—had frightened me so—"

"Truly?"

"Yes. It is a disease—" again she stopped.

George cried, in a voice of agony, "and then?"

"Then I asked him if the matter was so grave that I could not be satisfied with our ordinary doctor."

"And what did he answer?"

"He said that if we had the means it would really be better to consult a specialist."

George looked at his mother again. He was able to do it, because she was not looking at him. He clenched his hands and got himself together. "And—where did he send you?"

His mother fumbled in her hand bag and drew out a visiting card. "Here," she said.

And George looked at the card. It was all he could do to keep himself from tottering. It was the card of the doctor whom he had first consulted about his trouble! The specialist in venereal diseases!

Chapter IV

*

It was all George could do to control his voice. "You—you went to see him?" he stammered.

"Yes," said his mother. "You know him?"

"No, no," he answered. "Or—that is—I have met him, I think. I don't know." And then to himself, "My God!"

There was a silence. "He is coming to talk to you," said the mother, at last.

George was hardly able to speak. "Then he is very much disturbed?"

"No, but he wants to talk to you."

"To me?"

"Yes. When the doctor saw the nurse, he said, 'Madame, it is impossible for me to continue to attend this child unless I have had this very day a conversation with the father.' So I said 'Very well,' and he said he would come at once."

George turned away, and put his hands to his forehead. "My poor little daughter!" he whispered to himself.

"Yes," said the mother, her voice breaking, "she is, indeed, a poor little daughter!"

A silence fell; for what could words avail in such a situation? Hearing the door open, Madame Dupont started, for her nerves were all a-quiver with the strain she had been under. A servant came in and spoke to her, and she said to George, "It is the doctor. If you need me, I shall be in the next room."