ingly. "But you must
not talk of it now. I understand perfectly. Tell me all about it another
time."

"You don't think I should have--" She paused.

"Of course. I tell you I understand. Now you must be quiet. Drink this."
He got up and poured some liquid into a glass.

At that moment there was a noise below in the hall. "That's my husband,"
the girl-wife said, and the old wan captive-look came into her face.

"That's all right," replied the Young Doctor. "He'll find you better."

At that moment the half-breed woman entered the room. "He's here," she
said, and came towards the bed.

"That old woman has sense," the Young Doctor murmured to himself. "She
knows her man."

A minute later Joel Mazarine was in the room, and he saw the half-breed
woman lift his wife's head, while the Young Doctor held a glass to her
lips.

"What's all this?" Mazarine said roughly. "What?" He stopped suddenly,
for the Young Doctor faced him sharply.

"She must be left alone," he said firmly and quietly, his eyes fastening
the old man's eyes; and there was that in them which would not be
gainsaid. "I have just given her medicine. She has been in great pain.

"We are not needed here now." He motioned towards the door. "She must be
left alone."

For an instant it seemed that the old man was going to resist the
dictation; but presently, after a scrutinizing look at the still,
shrinking figure in the bed, he swung round, left the room and descended
the stairs, the Young Doctor following.

CHAPTER III. "I HAVE FOUGHT WITH BEASTS AT EPHESUS"

The old man led the way outside the house, as though to be rid of his
visitor as soon as possible. This was so obvious that, for an instant,
the Young Doctor was disposed to try conclusions with the old slaver,
and summon him back to the dining-room. The Mazarine sort of man always
roused fighting, masterful forces in him. He was never averse to a
contest of wills, and he had had much of it; it was inseparable from
his methods of healing. He knew that nine people out of ten never gave
a true history of their physical troubles, never told their whole story:
first because they had no gift for reporting, no observation; and also
because the physical ailments of many of them were aggravated or induced
by mental anxieties. Then it was that he imposed himself; as it
were, fought the deceiver and his deceit, or the ignorant one and
his ignorance; and numbers of people, under his sympathetic, wordles