Dr. Ed had sent for Sidney. Max was still unconscious. Ed remembered about her when, tracing his brother's career from his babyhood to man's estate and to what seemed now to be its ending, he had remembered that Max was very fond of Sidney. He had hoped that Sidney would take him and do for him what he, Ed, had failed to do.
So Sidney was summoned.
She thought it was another operation, and her spirit was just a little weary. But her courage was indomitable. She forced her shoes on her tired feet, and bathed her face in cold water to rouse herself.
The night watchman was in the hall. He was fond of Sidney; she always smiled at him; and, on his morning rounds at six o'clock to waken the nurses, her voice was always amiable. So she found him in the hall, holding a cup of tepid coffee. He was old and bleary, unmistakably dirty too—but he had divined Sidney's romance.
“Coffee! For me?” She was astonished.
“Drink it. You haven't had much sleep.”
She took it obediently, but over the cup her eyes searched his.
“There is something wrong, daddy.”
That was his name, among the nurses. He had had another name, but it was lost in the mists of years.
“Get it down.”