“Try it, for Heaven's sake,” he said. “I'm all in.”
The apparatus was not in the house—must be extemporized, indeed, at last, of odds and ends from the operating-room. K. did the work, his long fingers deft and skillful—while Mrs. Rosenfeld knelt by the bed with her face buried; while Sidney sat, dazed and bewildered, on her little chair inside the door; while night nurses tiptoed along the corridor, and the night watchman stared incredulous from outside the door.
When the two great rectangles that were the emergency ward windows had turned from mirrors reflecting the room to gray rectangles in the morning light; Johnny Rosenfeld opened his eyes and spoke the first words that marked his return from the dark valley.
“Gee, this is the life!” he said, and smiled into K.'s watchful face.
When it was clear that the boy would live, K. rose stiffly from the bedside and went over to Sidney's chair.
“He's all right now,” he said—“as all right as he can be, poor lad!”
“You did it—you! How strange that you should know such a thing. How am I to thank you?”
The internes, talking among themselves, had wandered down to their dining-room for early coffee. Wilson was giving a few last instructions as to the boy's care. Quite unexpectedly, Sidney caught K.'s hand and held it to her lips. The iron repression of the night, of months indeed, fell away before her simple caress.
“My dear, my dear,” he said huskily. “Anything that I can do—for you—at any time—”
It was after Sidney had crept like a broken thing to her room that Carlotta Harrison and K. came face to face. Johnny was quite conscious by that time, a little blue around the lips, but valiantly cheerful.