And then the struggle ended. With Doctor Grover it had been arranged that
Sue should be taken to the hospital for the great event, and they drove
there hurriedly one night through the quiet streets, the recurring pains
gripping Sue and her hands clutching his. An exalted cheerfulness had hold
of them. Face to face with the actual struggle for the new life Sue was
transfigured. Her voice rang with triumph and her eyes glistened.
"I am going to do it," she cried; "my black fear is gone. I shall give you
a child--a man child. I shall succeed, my man Sam. You shall see. It will
be beautiful."
When the pain gripped she gripped at his hand, and a spasm of physical
sympathy ran through him. He felt helpless and ashamed of his
helplessness.
At the entrance to the hospital grounds she put her face down upon his
knees so that the hot tears ran through his hands.
"Poor, poor old Sam, it has been horrible for you."
At the hospital Sam walked up and down in the corridor through the
swinging doors at the end of which she had been taken. Every vestige of
regret for the trying months now lying behind had passed, and he paced up
and down the corridor feeling that he had come to one of those huge
moments when a man's brain, his grasp of affairs, his hopes and plans for
the future, all of the little details and trivialities of his life, halt,
and he waits anxious, breathless, expectant.
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