"That's good, but what's the matter? I can't get my breath."
"It's the ether, childie. You will be all right soon, but you must not talk now. Just rest. Sleep if you can, so you can visit with Grandfather and Grandmother Campbell. They are anxious to see you."
Meanwhile, downstairs in the office of the great hospital, the President and his wife had sat like statues through all those interminable minutes which were to tell the story of whether the little life was to be spared or sacrificed. Vaguely they heard the bustle of busy nurses, vaguely they saw the doctors hurrying in and out about their duties; but not once did either man or woman move from the great chairs in which they sat. Sometimes it seemed to the matron and head-nurse, who occasionally passed that way, as if both had been turned to stone, so fixed was their gaze, so rigid their bodies. But in reality neither had ever been more keenly alive. Each heart was reviewing with painful accuracy the two short years that had gone since the little band of orphans had come to live with them. How much had happened in that time, and how dearly they had come to love each one of the sisters!
"I could not care more for them if they were my own," whispered Mrs. Campbell to herself.
"They are like my own flesh and blood," thought the President.
"I know a mother is not supposed to have favorites among her children," mused Mrs. Campbell, half guiltily, "but there is something about Peace which makes her seem just a little the dearest to me."
"They are all such lovable girls," the President told himself, "but somehow I can't help liking Peace a little the best. Everyone does. I wonder why."
So they sat there side by side in the great hospital and pondered, waiting for the verdict from the white room above them.
Suddenly Dr. Shumway stood before them. "It is all over," he began, smiling cheerfully. "She will—"
"All over," whispered Mrs. Campbell, and fainted quite away.