A lull following the tempest seemed an anodyne for broken rest. Philip forgot his anguish through exhaustion, while Isabel dropped into slumber, which always restored her power to hope. Perfect health sustained her. She clung to the determination to hold her dearly bought happiness despite discouraging odds. At broad daylight she lay awake and watchful by the side of her husband. Through open casements the wet sweetness of the morning recharged her nerves. Birds twittered excitedly from drenched trees. The nearby arroyo sent outward a song of drops, piling over stones. Isabel recalled a time when she had been awakened by the musical splash of Roman fountains. Then, as now, Philip Barry claimed her thoughts, set them bounding to the irresistible measure of falling water. During those days she had listened to the rhythmic call in the old palace garden, only to wonder about Philip and the possible outcome of their fresh young love. It seemed a long way back since those ideal weeks. This morning as she lay still and anxious her mind began to revert to incidental happenings which had parted a boy and a girl, but to join them later under tense conditions. She turned with caution and peered into Philip's face. His secret had touched his countenance with unconscious despair. His cheeks were growing hollow. Around his compressed mouth Isabel saw deepening lines. She felt again that her husband could be saved only with the help of a discerning specialist. Time seemed precious and she slipped softly from the sleeper's side to her own room. It was early for a bath, but her firm young flesh cried out for refreshment as she plunged into cool water. Strength came as the result of a regular habit and she dressed quickly, then went below. Only Wing, the Chinese cook, was at his post. Maids, kept awake by the storm, had overslept. Isabel wandered through a closed house to find her faithful celestial already at work. His white garments, noiseless shoes, and optimistic smile always gave her pleasure. "Good morning," she said.

Wing turned in evident dismay. "Why you up so early?" he asked with the childlike freedom of the Oriental. "Those girls heap lazy! not come down yet—house all dark." He spread his slender brown hands in feigned disgust. "I gless you not know that big tree fall over las night? Most hit my klitchen. You come see." He threw open the screen, pointing beyond. Isabel saw a Monterey pine low and done for by the storm. Heavy, drenched branches, crushed and aromatic, rose from the ground to the top of a nearby porch, which had just escaped them. Years of growth and vigor were down with a blast from the surcharged sky. She seemed to feel the human significance of the fallen pine.

"Poor thing!" she exclaimed, peering into upturned limbs of the vanquished tree. "Poor thing!"

Wing beamed. His white teeth flashed credulous interest. "You think that tree get hurt—all same me?" he demanded. Isabel saw that she was planting fresh superstition on celestial soil.

"I am not quite sure," she answered. "Still, a great tree could hardly tear away from earth without feeling it. It must have suffered," she maintained. Unconsciously she was thinking of her husband. That Philip had been uprooted, cast down like the pine filled her with dread as she went quickly from the kitchen. But the storm, which left the house in total darkness during the night had also interfered with telephone service. After vain attempts to communicate with the central office, she dashed off a note to a well-known nerve specialist. She begged him to come at once, explaining that her husband was too ill to leave his bed. From the terrace she watched the gardener depart with her note. She felt at last like one who stakes all on a final venture. Would the doctor come soon? Would Philip resent the visit? Above all, how should she break the news to the invalid, who begged to be left alone? "Don't call a doctor," he had pleaded; and again she wondered if she had been wise in a grave emergency. The house was now astir. Belated maids were at work. Soon shrill exclamations arose from the wet garden. Madame had discovered the fallen pine, to fly below with the boy. Reginald was proudly equipped with rubber boots. His red coat flashed as he outran his excited companion. Isabel translated the French woman's lament for the lost tree; then the boy cried out in distress. His mother reached his side to find him in tears, holding a dead oriole. The once gay, golden little creature lay limp in the child's hand.

"Poor birdy! See, he's all, all broken!" he bemoaned. "Can't you mend him, mother dear? Can't you make him stand up?"

"He has been hurt by the storm," Isabel explained, stroking the feathers of the little victim. "Perhaps he lived in the pine tree. We may find his nest."

Reginald began to search along the path, while Isabel found a sharpened stick. When she came to a clump of ferns she bent and quickly dug a tiny bed in the wet earth. Her son, running back, saw that the oriole was gone.

"There wasn't any nest!" he shouted, gazing incredulously at his mother's empty hand, "And I suppose the poor birdy's all mended. Why didn't you wait? I wanted—I wanted to see him fly away." Fresh tears betokened the boy's disappointment. Isabel felt justified in the deception, as she led the child indoors. He would understand soon enough.

Wing had just brought back a dainty tray, with everything on it declined by the master. The good fellow was greatly distressed. "Boss not eat—he die! Sure!" he muttered.

Isabel went above. She felt again that she had done right in calling a physician, and strove for courage to announce the approaching visit. When she entered her husband's room he seemed to be dozing. She did not rouse him. Perhaps, after all, sleep would prove to be Philip's best medicine, and something whispered that her apparent anxiety was not good for the broken man she loved. She went out, acknowledging a mistake. When Philip awoke she would tell him about the doctor, with incidental lightness. Then sooner than she expected she heard an automobile and knew that her note had been timely. The specialist was at hand—in the hall below. She could not prepare Philip for an unwelcome call. But she was eager to unburden her heart, willing to rest her fear with one who ought to assume it. And at once she told of her husband's early education, of the first success of his priesthood, of his ambition for a great Middle West cathedral, of the bishop's unjust course, of Philip's natural struggle, followed with excommunication from the Church; then all too soon—before he could readjust his life—of the public humiliation in the old mission. She kept nothing back but her own hard part as the wife of an apostate priest. The dread that she had been the sole cause of a brilliant man's undoing she bravely acknowledged. Philip could not forget, could not supplement his relinquished work with domestic happiness.

"Yet he adores me," she confessed. "It is not just that he should suffer—as he does. His heart is breaking. He feels it a sin to love me—to go on with happiness."

"And you?" said Dr. Judkin.

She tried to smile. "Women can bear more than men." Her voice broke.

The man by her side felt her charm, knew that she was valiant in love. Still he saw disappointment in her tense resistance. "I am afraid that you, too, will soon need attention," he abruptly told her. "Sometimes a wife spoils her husband without realizing it. Men who think a great deal about themselves are not considerate."

She was offended and replied coldly, "You do not know him. It is unjust to judge of a patient before you have seen him."

"I stand reproved," the doctor admitted.

Isabel forgave him. His very bluntness brought her hope. Suddenly she felt faith in the man whom she had summoned. She believed that he was masterful, and she must turn to some one.

"Please come," she invited, "you shall see my husband."

Dr. Judkin stood aside for her to pass, and she went above, choosing words which should explain his early call. Then at the top of the staircase she stopped.

"Be good enough to wait," she begged. "I must prepare him—go in first." Then she flew forward, for the smell of burning paper had caught her nostrils. The door to Philip's apartment was fastened. She had been locked out! She rushed to a balcony running before the windows of her husband's room. In an instant she stood within. And she had not come a moment too soon. A fresh tragedy faced her. She hardly breathed. Philip, on his knees in front of the fireplace, did not hear her enter. The ecstasy of delirium possessed him. His whole body trembled as he showered an igniting pile with his rejected manuscript. "The Spirit of the Cathedral" was smoking. Isabel saw rising flame desert a blackened sketch of a famous duomo but to lick a painting of great St. Peter's. Once more dominant Romish power appeared to threaten. The curse of the Church seemed about to blaze anew for Philip.

Her heart thumped as she flew to his side. "How can you?" she pleaded. "You have forgotten your friend—who trusted you. You must not spoil his beautiful pictures." Her hand reached out and coolly rescued scorching sheets of the unpublished book. "But you did not mean to hurt an artist's work," she gently added. She held a ruined sketch before the sick man's staring eyes. "You did not remember. You did not mean to be unfair to your friend." The tenderness of her frightened, loving soul broke over the shattered man, as she led him away to bed. He went like an obedient child; then she unlocked the door and summoned the doctor.