Elizabeth G. Jordan

“ When the human soul was taxed beyond its powers something divine entered in and helped it. She was no mere atom whirling through space, to exist for a little time and perish. Behind the mystery of life was some benign power—she did not know what, but she was satisfied. In these dark hours of her life it had given her this proof that it existed. She could safely trust herself to it. She looked up into Effingham's eyes with a sudden light in hers which gladdened him.
"Your friend can help me," she said, "and he shall—more than any one else in the whole world. ”

“ She recalled the firm conviction in which she had come back to life after her operation. "There is a soul, there is a soul," she had told the doctors, with her mind full of that experience in the upper world, her ears still hearing the tones of that marvellous voice. ”

“ He has made her feel as if the world were slipping under her feet. The only thing that may save her—the knife. My work must stop, my friends must stand by helplessly. Even Jack can do nothing for me —dear Jack, who would do anything. ..."
The objects in the room grew suddenly dim. She sank deeper into the big chair that held her, while despair, sudden and unreasoning, filled her soul. The question which has so often come to men and women in agony, through all time, rose in her. ”

“ As her eyes grew accustomed to the brightness around her, she saw that the light came not from a sun, but from a brilliant dome arching over the field, and from which radiated myriads of golden wires converging to a vast instrument in the centre. These wires threw out blinding and many-coloured lights. At the instrument sat a woman of heroic size, in flowing white robes that melted into the brilliance around her. Her great face was calm, beautiful, benign. On the greensward in front of her were thousands of men, women and little children. ”

“ It could not be easy, she reflected, to tell a young woman for whom life held as much as it did for her that a mortal disease had fastened on her. She, who had always analysed herself and others, discovered that even at this crisis she was dreamily trying to follow the mental process of the famous surgeon, who had begun to roam restlessly about the room. ”

“ The tone and her expression made Effingham unusually persistent.
"Come," he urged; "we'll sit at the back of the church, and nobody will see us. You need not see Livingston afterwards unless you wish, although I fancy you will want to talk to him when you have heard him. People usually do."
She allowed herself to be persuaded, and they drove up town together to the little church, tucked modestly out of the way in an unfashionable side street. The winter day was drawing to a close, and the church was but dimly lighted. ”

“ She asked that the operation might be performed three days later, and found them thoroughly in accord with her wish to have the matter hastened. Every detail was arranged; the strain was lightened to the extent of a mild professional jest or two, dropped with the friendly wish to convince her that the situation was not hopelessly tragic. Then she went to her carriage, while three pairs of eyes looked after her, and then at each other, with an expression it was well she did not see. She directed the coachman to drive home, and, drawing her furs around her, gave herself again to reflection. ”

“ He is giving me time to pull myself together. I can, but I do need the time. He needs it too. He has had to tell a woman who is young and rich, one who is ambitious and in love, something that may mean the loss of all these things. ”

“ His cousin, the Honourable Cuthbert Effingham, yawned widely. He had not met Mrs. Imboden, and the subject did not especially interest him.
"The germ of an idea," evolved during the dinner that evening, developed well, by taking Jack's partner into her confidence, a rapid change of telegrams between the East and West made Mrs, Imboden's plan succeed so well that she drove with her husband to the station the day before the operation, and saw him whirled away in a Westward-bound train. ”

“ I turn to him not only with my own troubles, but with those of my friends. I hope you won't mind my telling you," he went on, a little diffidently, "that I took yours to him. When I learned of your—your illness, I went to him the day before sailing and asked him to pray for you during the operation, which was to be performed that afternoon at two. ”