me.... Dead, of course! Nothing
else was possible."

I laughed a quick little laugh of triumph. "No, sir; NOT dead.
Recovering! She has fallen just now into a normal sleep; her breathing
is natural."

He wheeled his revolving chair away from the germs and fixed me with his
keen eyes. "Recovering?" he echoed. "Impossible! Rallying, you mean. A
mere flicker. I know my trade. She MUST die this evening."

"Forgive my persistence," I replied; "but--her temperature has gone down
to ninety-nine and a trifle."

He pushed away the bacilli in the nearest watch-glass quite angrily. "To
ninety-nine!" he exclaimed, knitting his brows. "Cumberledge, this is
disgraceful! A most disappointing case! A most provoking patient!"

"But surely, sir--" I cried.

"Don't talk to ME, boy! Don't attempt to apologise for her. Such conduct
is unpardonable. She OUGHT to have died. It was her clear duty. I SAID
she would die, and she should have known better than to fly in the face
of the faculty. Her recovery is an insult to medical science. What is
the staff about? Nurse Wade should have prevented it."

"Still, sir," I exclaimed, trying to touch him on a tender spot, "the
anaesthetic, you know! Such a triumph for lethodyne! This case shows
clearly that on certain constitutions it may be used with advantage
under certain conditions."

He snapped his fingers. "Lethodyne! pooh! I have lost interest in it.
Impracticable! It is not fitted for the human species."

"Why so? Number Fourteen proves--"

He interrupted me with an impatient wave of his hand; then he rose and
paced up and down the room testily. After a pause, he spoke again. "The
weak point of lethodyne is this: nobody can be trusted to say WHEN it
may be used--except Nurse Wade,--which is NOT science."

For the first time in my life, I had a glimmering idea that I distrusted
Sebastian. Hilda Wade was right--the man was cruel. But I had never
observed his cruelty before--because his devotion to science had blinded
me to it.

CHAPTER II

THE EPISODE OF THE GENTLEMAN WHO HAD FAILED FOR EVERYTHING

One day, about those times, I went round to call on my aunt, Lady
Tepping. And lest you accuse me of the vulgar desire to flaunt my fine
relations in your face, I hasten to add that my poor dear old aunt is
a very ordinary specimen of the common Army widow. Her husband, Sir
Malcolm, a crusty old gentleman of the ancient school, was knighted
in Burma, or thereabouts, for a success