"There there, daughter, hush now, hush. I'll let you stay here. Though I wonder that they'd allow it."
Augusta ran out of the room and came down the long hall to the common sitting room, where she found Wardwell at the table reading. She fell into a chair at his side and dropped her head upon his arm where it lay extended on the table.
"Jimmie, Jimmie," she cried miserably, "it's no use! I've failed, failed!"
"No you haven't either," said Jimmie quickly, as he raised her head and lifted her face up to him. "Of course there's always a fly in the icebox, kid. But no one has ever failed when he's done all his part as you have. And at least you have her here where you can make her comfortable and can know what's happening to her."
"I know, Jimmie, I'm happy even for that. But I was so sure, so sure that she'd know me and be better right away."
"She is better," said Jimmie stoutly. "Her mind is at rest, except about you. She is not able to place you. There is something about you that she has never seen before. She does not know you."
He stopped short, struck by a sudden thought as he looked down with quick intensity upon the golden shot circle of Augusta's head and into the deep, pain clouded eyes.
When he spoke it was in the slow, rising voice of one who struggles toward a new and amazing conviction.
"She is right," he said in a low voice. "You are not her Augusta."
"Why Jimmie, Jimmie," the girl cried in a trembling voice. "Are you——? What can you mean?"