Slowly the images began to give way, their assaults becoming each time more brief, less violent.

His face was so transfigured in this mystic tension of the soul, that Mayda, watching him, was as one turned to stone, and forgot to look at his watch, until the features, which had been contracted in that anxious prayer, finally began to relax into a peaceful composure.

Then he remembered, and removed the thermometer.

The sister, standing behind him, held up the electric lamp, trying to see also.

He could not at first distinguish the points, and during those few seconds of fixed attention neither of them noticed that the invalid had turned upon his side, and was looking at the Professor.