face was quite calm now and his voice, when he spoke
again, was firm and vibrating.

"I have some work that I should wish to finish. How long can you give
me?"

"Three months."

"One will do if my strength keeps up at all. Good-bye."

There was a thin chink of coins grating one against the other. The
specialist said:--

"I will call on you to-morrow, between four and five. I have more
directions to give you. To-day my time is so much taken up. Good-bye."

The door closed.

In the waiting-room, a moment later, Brune was gathering up his coat and
hat.

The two ladies eyed him curiously as he took them and passed out.

"He does look a little pale, after all," whispered one of them. A
moment later he was in the street.

From the window of his consulting-room, Gerard Fane watched the tall
figure striding down the pavement.

"I am sorry that man is going to die," he said to himself.

And then he turned gravely to greet a new patient.

II

Gerard Fane's victoria drew up at the iron gate of No. 5 Ilbury Road,
Kensington, at a quarter past four the following afternoon. A narrow
strip of garden divided the sculptor's big red house from the road.
Ornamental ironwork on a brick foundation closed it in. The great
studio, with its huge windows and its fluted pillars, was built out at
one end. The failing sunlight glittered on its glass, and the dingy
sparrows perched upon the roof to catch the parting radiance as the
twilight fell. The doctor glanced round him and thought, "How hard this
man must have worked! In London this is a little palace."

"Will you come into the studio, sir, please?" said the footman in answer
to his summons. "Mr Brune is there at present."

"Surely he cannot be working," thought the doctor, as he followed the
man down a glass-covered paved passage, and through a high doorway
across which a heavy curtain fell. "If so, he must possess resolution
almost more than mortal."

He passed beyond the curtain, and looked round him curiously.

The studio was only dimly lit now, for daylight was fast fading. On a
great open hearth, with dogs, a log-fire was burning; and beside it, on
an old-fashioned oaken settle, sat a woman in a loose cream-coloured
tea-gown. She was half turning round to speak to Reginald Brune, who
stood a little to her left, clad in a long blouse, fastened round his
waist with a band. He had evidently recently finished working, for his
hands still bore evident traces of lab