there in his little apartment about a year after his wedding in Elsie's room—that queer, rainy morning when we all stood about Elsie's bed and smiled metallicly—I do remember one talk. It was when I was down there in New York acting as sort of trained nurse for Elsie. Elsie's progress was hopelessly slow just then, and Burr's financial prospects anything but bright.
"I talk a lot of nonsense to Elsie, Nan," he said, "about courage, and nerve, and playing her game, and all that, but it's really to myself I'm preaching. It doesn't seem as if I were making progress toward success of any kind. The doctors are more and more doubtful about Elsie. I've not been able to put by anything this year. Not a cent. I try to remember what the coach used to tell us fellows. He used to make us feel that it was up to us to win, even with the score against us 20 to 0. Well, the score's against me, Nan, now. It's against Elsie. We need to use all the fight that is in us."
It has been fifteen years since Elsie's accident. Burr did not attain the goal he tried so hard to reach: I mean, Elsie will always be lame; she will always be frail and delicate; the fine lines traced on her forehead, left there by her months of pain, will never disappear, and there are no curves or soft corners in her thin face, for dimples to hide
