"If you don't, it's because you won't face the facts." Dick
chuckled, and threw an arm over David's shoulder, "You old
hypocrite!" he said. "You're trying to get rid of me, for some
reason. Don't tell me you're going to get married!"

But David did not smile. Lucy, watching him from her post by the
window, saw his face and felt a spasm of fear. At the most, she
had feared a mental conflict in David. Now she saw that it might
be something infinitely worse, something impending and immediate.
She could hardly reply when Dick appealed to her.

"Are you going to let him get rid of me like this, Aunt Lucy?" he
demanded. "Sentenced to Johns Hopkins, like Napoleon to St. Helena!
Are you with me, or forninst me?"

"I don't know, Dick," she said, with her eyes on David. "If it's
for your good--"

She went out after a time, leaving them at it hammer and tongs.
David was vanquished in the end, but Dick, going down to the office
later on, was puzzled. Somehow it was borne in on him that behind
David's insistence was a reason, unspoken but urgent, and the only
reason that occurred to him as possible was that David did not,
after all, want him to marry Elizabeth Wheeler. He put the matter
to the test that night, wandering in in dressing-gown and slippers,
as was his custom before going to bed, for a brief chat. The nurse
was downstairs, and Dick moved about the room restlessly. Then he
stopped and stood by the bed, looking down.

"A few nights ago, David, I asked you if you thought it would be