ined, "and you came to see me. I shall
say exactly what I like to you, and if you don't like it you can get
out. If it weren't for Lady Dominey's sake, you shouldn't have passed
this threshold."

"Then for her sake," Dominey suggested in a softer tone, "can't you
forget how thoroughly you disapprove of me? I am here now with only
one object: I want you to point out to me any way in which we can work
together for the improvement of my wife's health."

"There can be no question of a partnership between us."

"You refuse to help?"

"My help isn't worth a snap of the fingers. I have done all I can for
her physically. She is a perfectly sound woman. The rest depends upon
you, and you alone, and I am not very hopeful about it."

"Upon me?" Dominey repeated, a little taken aback.

"Fidelity," the doctor grunted, "is second nature with all good women.
Lady Dominey is a good woman, and she is no exception to the rule. Her
brain is starved because her heart is aching for love. If she could
believe in your repentance and reform, if any atonement for the past
were possible and were generously offered, I cannot tell what the result
might be. They tell me that you are a rich man now, although heaven
knows, when one considers what a lazy, selfish fellow you were, that
sounds like a miracle. You could have the great specialists down. They
couldn't help, but it might salve your conscience to pay them a few
hundred guineas."

"Would you meet them?" Dominey asked anxiously. "Tell me whom to send
for?"

"Pooh! Those days are finished with me," was the curt reply. "I would
meet none of them. I am a doctor no longer. I have become a villager. I
go to see Lady Dominey as an old friend."

"Give me your advice," Dominey begged. "Is it of any use sending for
specialists?"

"Just for the present, none at all."

"And what about that horrible woman, Mrs. Unthank?"

"Part of your task, if you are really going to take it up. She stands
between your wife and the sun."

"Then why have you suffered her to remain there all those years?"
Dominey demanded.

"For one thing, because there has been no one to replace her," the
doctor replied, "and for another, because Lady Dominey, believing that
you slew her son, has some fantastic idea of giving her a home and
shelter as a kind of expiation."

"You think there is no affection between the two?" Dominey asked.

"Not a scrap," was the blunt reply, "except that Lady Dominey is of so
sweet a