“I saw them on a fruit stand for thirty cents, and couldn’t resist.”

“Never mind; I’ll make it up to you.”

Later, he asked for braille books, turning his sightless face toward her as he studied, trying to concentrate through the pain in his lung.

“If only you wouldn’t insist upon the books awhile yet, dear.  The doctor says it’s too soon.”

“I feel so strong, Hester, with you near, and, besides, I must start the pot boiling.”

She kissed down into the high nap of his hair, softly.

Evenings, she read to him newspaper accounts of his fellow-soldiers, and the day of the peace, for which he had paid so terribly, she rolled his bed, alone, with a great tugging and straining, to the open window, where the wind from the river could blow in against him and steamboat whistles shoot up like rockets.

She was so inexpressibly glad for the peace day.  Somehow, it seemed easier and less blackly futile to give him up.

Of Wheeler for three running weeks she had not a glimpse, and then, one day, he sent up a hamper, not a box, but an actual trunk of roses, and she, in turn, sent them up the back way to Kitty’s flat, not wanting even their fragrance released.

With Kitty there were little hurried confabs each day outside the apartment door in the hallway before the elevator shaft.  A veil of awe seemed to wrap the Drew woman.

“I can’t get it out of my head, Hester.  It’s like a fairy story, and, in another way, it’s a scream—­Wheeler standing for this.”

“Sh-h, Kitty!  His ears are so sensitive.”

“Quit shushing me every time I open my mouth.  Poor kid!  Let me have a look at him.  He wouldn’t know.”

“No!  No!”

“God! if it wasn’t so sad it would be a scream—­Wheeler footing the bills!”

“Oh—­you!  Oh—­oh—­you!”

“All right, all right!  Don’t take the measles over it.  I’m going.  Here’s some chicken broth I brought down.  Ed sent it up to me from Sherry’s.”

But Hester poured it into the sink for some nameless reason, and brewed some fresh from a fowl she tipped the hallboy a dollar to go out and purchase.

She slept on a cot at the foot of his bed, so sensitive to his waking that almost before he came up to consciousness she was at his side.  All day she wore the little white shirt waists, a starchy one fresh each morning, and at night scratchy little unlacy nightgowns with long sleeves and high yokes.  He liked to run his hand along the crispness of the fabric.

“I love you in cool stuff, Hester.  You’re so cool yourself, I always think of you in the little white waist and blue skirt.  You remember, dear—­Finleys’ annual?”

“I—­I’m going to dress like that for you always, Gerald.”

“I won’t let you be going back to work for long, sweetheart.  I’ve some plans up my sleeve, I have.”

“Yes!  Yes!”

But when the end did come, it was with as much of a shock as if she had not been for days expecting it.  The doctor had just left, puncturing his arm and squirting into his poor tired system a panacea for the pain.  But he would not react to it, fighting down the drowsiness.