ecuperative to stand
either constant nerve strain or nagging worries."

"I don't know," interposed Luke stiffly, "that my uncle has had either
nerve strain or worry to put up with."

"Oh," rejoined the doctor, whose gruff familiarity seemed to Luke's
sensitive ear to be tainted with the least possible note of
impertinence, "I am an old friend of your uncle, you know, and of all
your family; there isn't much that has escaped my observation during
the past year."

"You have not yet told me, doctor," said Luke, a shade more stiffly
than before, "what is the matter with Lord Radclyffe."

There was distinct emphasis on the last two words.

Doctor Newington shrugged his shoulders good-humouredly.

"Your uncle has had something in the nature of a stroke," he said
bluntly, and he fixed keen light-coloured eyes on those of Luke,
watching the effect which the news--baldly and crudely put--would have
on the young man's nerves. He was a man with what is known as a
fashionable practice. He lived in Hertford Street and his rounds were
encircled by the same boundaries as those of the rest of Mayfair. He
had had plenty of opportunity of studying those men and women who
compose the upper grades of English society. They and their perfect
_sang-froid_, their well-drilled calm under the most dire calamities,
or most unexpected blows had often caused him astonishment when he was
a younger man, fresh from hospital work, and from the haunts of
humbler folk, who had no cause or desire to hide the depth of their
feelings. Now he was used to his fashionable patients and had ceased
to wonder, and Luke's impassiveness on hearing of his uncle's sudden
illness did not necessarily strike him as indifference.

"Is it serious?" asked Luke.

"Serious. Of course," assented the doctor.

"Do you mean that Lord Radclyffe's life is in danger?"

"At sixty years of age, life is always in danger."

"I don't mean that," rejoined Luke with a slight show of impatience.
"Is Lord Radclyffe in immediate danger?"

"No. With great care and constant nursing, he may soon rally, though I
doubt if he will ever be as strong and hearty as he was this time last
year."

"Then what about a nurse?"

"I'll send one down to-day, but----"

"Yes?"

"Lord Radclyffe's present household is--well, hardly adequate to the
exigencies of a long and serious illness--he ought to have a day and a
night nurse. I can send both, but they will want some waiting on and
of cour