The Death-Doctor/15
CHAPTER XV
IN WHICH I MAKE A LITTLE PRESENT
ONE afternoon, at the feast in honour of the wedding of Shiela Warren, a patient of mine who lived with her parents in Longridge Road, Earl's Court, I was introduced to Mr. James Farnell.
A stout, red-faced, pompous old gentleman, he greeted me affably, and we had a long chat in the corner of the crowded drawing-room.
Only recently I had pulled the bride through a very severe attack of scarlet-fever, and the thanks of the family, and of the young man who was that day the bridegroom, had been showered upon me. The girl now standing, handsome and radiant, in her bridal gown, had very nearly gone under. Indeed, one night I had left that house, feeling that I should not see her again alive. Yet, with that perversity which Nature so often asserts, she had taken a sudden turn, and had grown rapidly well.
Her parents had been anxious to give her a change, therefore, disregarding infection, I sent her down to an hotel at Eastbourne, and I was not really surprised when, two or three weeks afterwards, there had been a mysterious out-break of the same disease in that establishment.
But I said nothing, neither did any of the Warren family.
James Farnell, who was father of the bride-groom, invited me to visit him in Fitzjohn's Avenue, Hampstead, where he lived.
Later on, while chatting with the bride's father after the pair had left for their honeymoon, I learnt that Farnell senior was a wealthy man who dabbled in the City, and was director of two important companies, and chairman of a big shipbuilding firm at Gates-head.
Strange, Brown, what an attractive scent money always has for me.
As soon as I knew that he was really wealthy—and not one of those useless ones who live up to every penny of their income—I resolved to cultivate his acquaintance. Hence, three days later, I called at the big, red-brick, detached house half-way up the hill from Swiss Cottage, and took tea with his dark-haired wife and his daughter Edith, a tall, fair girl of about seventeen.
Upon that, my first visit to that artistic, well-appointed house, I detected that Farnell was a faddist—one of those men of middle age who are ever anxious about their health and weight, and ever suspicious that there may be something the matter with their heart.
Such men are constant sources of income to the medical man. The family-practitioner always cultivates their acquaintance, for they mean nice little quarterly accounts. The faddist will not repulse his doctor from looking in "just to see that he's all right," even though he may be passing on his way to another patient. And as "every picture tells a story," so does "every visit mean a fee."
Well, I soon began to know all about Farnell's complaints, both real and imaginary.
He let fall that he had had several bad "goes" of fever in the tropics; therefore I attributed all his ailments to the weakness left by malaria, and advised him to be most careful.
I smiled when he explained to me how his rheumatism had been treated by a man whom I knew to be a charlatan, and though I pretended to agree that such treatment might be beneficial, I added:
"The relief can only be temporary, and if you were to ask me candidly, Mr. Farnell, I should say that you have not been in the best of hands. This exercise and golf, and such like can do you no good. You are not strong enough for it."
"Don't you think so?" he asked, looking at me in alarm.
"No, I don't."
"Examine my heart. Dr. d'Escombe. I wish you would—and tell me your candid opinion."
Unfortunately, I had not my stethoscope with me, but I promised that I would make a professional visit next morning, if he wished it.
He was eager and anxious. Smiling within myself I saw that I had landed another fish into my net.
Well, the outcome of my visit next day was to alarm him slightly, and at the same time promise him a complete cure.
"If you carry out my treatment you'll be a new man in six months," I assured him. "You're run down. You've not been treated as you should have been. I don't like your heart at all. But we can soon have it right aeain. No exercise, remember. Don't walk up-hill or upstairs too quickly. Save yourself all the exertion you can. And as for your rheumatism, it can be quite cured by judicious application of electricity. I know a most excellent man. I'll see him myself, and if you go down to him twice or three times a week for a month or two, you'll be able to move your hands as well as I can."
"Do you really think so, Dr. d'Escombe?" asked the old chap, his face brightening.
Though he did not drink port himself, he kept a splendid cellar, and the glass of wine he ordered for me was perfect.
From that day forward, for five whole months I saw him twice a week. Sometimes he would motor down to Cromwell Road to see me. You met him once in my smoking-room, I remember.
The summer days were stifling in London, and he longed to get to Vichy. But I kept him carefully at home, for did not every visit mean a fee?
He was a cute old man. But my professional patter and my air of deep concern deceived him, as it had deceived many a cleverer man. Fortunately, he had a slight affection of the heart, and this, I, of course, magnified until at the end of five months he felt himself liable to expire suddenly at any moment.
Mrs. Farnell was a mere cipher in the house. He was devoted to his daughter Edith, and, by Jove! I never knew a smarter or cleverer girl. She had been to school in Dresden, and was saturated with German philosophy, which ill became her, pretty and "fluffy" as she was.
Once, when I had paid a visit to her father, I found her alone in the morning-room, standing by the window.
She turned upon me like a young tigress, and with flashing eyes exclaimed:
"Look here, Dr. d'Escombe, I don't think you are treating Dad fairly. You are making him believe he's horribly ill, and I'm sure he isn't!"
I looked the girl straight in the face, much surprised.
"I have no knowledge of treating your father unfairly. Miss Farnell," I replied. "Indeed, I don't follow you."
"You are making him believe he's really ill, and I, for one, don't believe it," she declared angrily. "He could walk, shoot, play golf, and take exercise before he consulted you, and now—why, he's a perfect invalid."
The girl saw through me. In an instant I realized how shrewd she was, even though she might be one of those flighty ones who, in the afternoon, wander across the Heath from "Jack Straw's Castle" towards the "Spaniards," and sit upon the seats, displaying neat ankles, and eyeing the men who chance to pass by.
"I fear you are mistaken," I laughed. "Your father has been much worse than he imagined. He has been keeping himself very quiet, it is true; but he'll find the benefit of it next year."
I had known all along that she disliked me. Why, I could not tell. Her brother's wife had sung my praises many times, for to my efforts she certainly owed her life. And yet this girl suspected my treatment of her silly old father.
How she had so completely read me, was a perfect mystery.
I pretended to treat her hostility with utter unconcern, and laughingly declared that she would very soon discern an improvement in her father's general health.
For another month I continued to give him innocuous tonics, while the electrical expert gave him light baths and other treatments of his own invention. So, between us, we were making a very good thing out of him. His cheques came in very useful, I can tell you, my boy. But I was in sore want of a few hundreds just then, and was carefully scheming how I could get them.
That infernal rubber boom caused me to rush into speculation, like it did so many others, and now the day of reckoning was, alas! fast approaching.
I found myself once again in desperate straits. I was hard-worked, too, for just at that time another epidemic of influenza had broken out.
Old Farnell was a very hard nut as regards money matters, or I would have asked him point-blank for a loan. But I saw it was useless. He had given his son a handsome present on his marriage, and was for ever referring to it, declaring that he could ill-afford it.
Many men who are rich, plead poverty. Therefore I only smiled.
One autumn morning, however, when I called to visit him, the maid told me that he was in the small room at the end of the passage, an apartment which he called his business-room. Being so constantly in the house I walked along, and was about to push open the door when I was startled to hear within men's voices raised in anger.
I listened and overheard a stranger exclaim in a hard tone, but quite audibly:
"Well, Farnell, I've put the truth quite plainly before you, much as I regret it. You'll have to pay, or else face prosecution. You are my friend, and I alone know the truth. You put things square, then I'll remain silent, and nobody will know."
"Yes, and you might blackmail me later on, eh?"
"I think you know me well enough, after ten years, to be certain that I should never do that!" snapped the other.
"What I know of you, Davies, is nothing much to your credit," replied my patient in a low voice. "But I may as well admit the truth of all you've said, and be perfectly frank."
"And how do you propose squaring it up? Your defalcations amount, roughly, I think, to nearly eleven thousand pounds."
"I haven't got the money," declared old Farnell.
"But you've had it and thrown it away on the Stock Exchange."
"Who knows that I've had it beside yourself?"
"Nobody. Who can know?" replied the man addressed as Davies, while I listened to the conversation with breathless interest.
There was a long pause, during which I heard a match being struck.
"And what is the latest time before the money need be paid?"
"A month—not a day later."
"And nobody knows that I have had the money, except yourself, eh? Are you quite certain of that?" Farnell repeated.
"Positive. I alone hold the proof, my dear sir.
"I know. And without that proof nothing could possibly be brought against me," my patient said.
"You are not treating me quite fairly, Farnell," the other complained. "I came here in your own interests—in order to give you an opportunity of putting matters straight before the truth leaks out."
"I know. But I can't find eleven thousand in an hour."
"You can in a month."
"Yes—I suppose I must. Well, have a drink," and the master of the house rang the bell.
I stepped back along the hall, and entered the morning-room to wait until his visitor departed.
He emerged soon, a thin, pale-faced, rather round-shouldered man of forty-five, wearing gold pince-nez. I was careful he should not see me, though I got a good glance at his face, both as he crossed the hall and again as he passed the window on his way out.
Instantly I came forth from the room, and meeting Farnell, said:
"I heard you were engaged, so thought I'd wait."
"Yes, doctor, come in," he snapped, and led the way back to his den. He was quite unlike his usual self, and treated me with considerable abruptness.
We were seated together with the door closed when I suddenly looked him straight in the face, and said:
"You are not quite yourself this morning, Mr. Farnell. This excitement is not good for you."
"Excitement! What do you mean?"
"Well, the excitement of having such a visitor," I replied meaningly and rather slowly.
He started up, staring at me in blank astonishment.
"What do you mean, d'Escombe? What—what do you know?"
"I know that man's name, and the reason of his visit," was my cool reply. "The fact is, I heard your voices raised and I was compelled to listen—to hear those allegations he made against you."
"By Heaven!" he gasped, sinking back in his chair. "Then—then you know!"
I nodded in the affirmative.
"But you can surely trust me with your secret, Mr. Farnell?" I exclaimed. "Indeed, if I can be of any service I will act most willingly. You may rely upon my entire discretion."
He looked straight at me for some moments without replying. His face had grown pale, and a curious, haggard expression showed in his eyes.
"Ah!" he sighed at last. "If you only could help me. My poor wife—and poor Edith! The blow will be terrible to them, if I stand in the dock at the Old Bailey."
"But you won't; you'll pay."
"I've promised to pay, but the worst of it is. I can't. Lately I've been very hard hit, and I've only about five thousand at the bank. That's useless."
"Then how do you propose to act?" I inquired in a low voice.
"Heaven alone knows! Face the music, I suppose."
"Bosh!" I laughed. "You're surely not going to act the fool?"
"I don't quite follow you, d'Escombe," he said. "Can you see any way out of it?"
"Well," I replied with some hesitation. "There is—one way."
"How?" he cried eagerly, rising and facing me earnestly. I was silent for a few moments, carefully examining my well-manicured finger-nails.
"This man Davies is not a very reliable person, is he? From what I gathered, he possesses certain proofs of your dishonesty, and he alone knows how much you've had—and how you have had it. Am I correct?"
"Yes. He knows everything. He's learnt it in a most artful way."
"Probably in order to bleed you. He believes you to be well off."
"In all probability."
"Well," I said; "you have only to reckon with him. You are certain of that?"
"Yes, at present nobody else knows. And he will tell nobody, otherwise he couldn't blackmail me afterwards."
"Good. Then he is your sole enemy," I said. "And—well, I put it to you, for example, supposing that his mouth were closed there would be no fear. Nobody would know into whose pockets the money had gone!"
He nodded, his countenance full of despair.
"It might be believed to have gone into his," he said.
Apparently he did not grasp my true meaning. He, of course, believed me to be the very soul of honour, and the perfect pink of respectability.
"We may suppose many things, d'Escombe," he said, a hard expression showing in the corners of his mouth. "But we can hardly suppose that his lips will be closed," and he sighed, his eyes downcast to the carpet. "No, for three weeks I'll live and enjoy life—and then, well, probably I shall find an easy way out," he added meaningly.
"You can," I said very seriously. "It only wants a little courage."
"Suicide, eh?" he murmured.
"Not at all," I said, and then after a pause, my eyes fixed upon his, I added: "There is a way by which his mouth may be closed."
He looked very keenly at me for a few seconds. His grey brows knit slowly, as though the drift of my argument was slowly filtering through his brain.
"Phew!" he gasped. "I see! You are a doctor d'Escombe. You could help me—if you only dared!"
I nodded in the affirmative.
"A risky business! You'd want a big price, and—well, I can't pay very much, though to me it means life or death!"
"A thousand," I said. "I'll manage it for that, and free you."
"And take all risks?" he whispered.
"On two conditions. That you pay me a couple of hundred now—as a retainer, as it were—and that you are for ever silent."
I saw in an instant that he swallowed the bait. He was just a little frightened at the suggestion, but ten minutes later, in the broad, open light of day with the sunshine streaming into that little room, he purchased the life of his enemy. He wrote me a cheque for two hundred pounds.
Then, fearing that one day or other he might condemn me, I compelled him to scribble a few lines to the effect that the sum was paid to me "for private services rendered."
That, my dear fellow, together with the existence of the cheque, would be evidence too strong to permit of any double-dealing on his part.
I placed the cheque in my pocket, highly satisfied with my morning's work. I was to release a patient, and a good fellow, from an ugly situation, and rid society of a person who was extremely undesirable—a man who had blackmailed many of his City friends on previous occasions.
Strange, my dear friend, how money tumbles unexpectedly into my hands just at the very moment that I require it! But there, I suppose if one is unscrupulous, and not cursed by too delicate a conscience, one can always earn a decent income in my profession.
Outside Swiss Cottage station I took a taxi across to Kensington, and on arriving home had a quiet cigar. Over it I tried to formulate a plan. That same afternoon I put an inquiry through to the Information Bureau which I sometimes patronized, and three days later learned that Llewellyn Henson Davies was a well-known City man who had dabbled in finance for years, and who lived in chambers in King Street, St. James'. He was a bachelor, very quiet, staid, and highly respectable—a member of Brooks's, and on Sundays he attended St. James', Piccadilly, regularly. His ménage was not an extensive one, consisting only of an elderly Italian valet.
When I called at Fitzjohn's Avenue and told Farnell what I knew, he was amazed.
"My dear d'Escombe, how did you learn all this?" he asked.
But I only assumed a sphinx-like expression, and smiled, asking him to supply any further details he could regarding his enemy's habits or his haunts.
"I really don't know. Sometimes he lunches at Birch's, in Cornhill," he said; "and he's a member of the City Carlton. You know his office in the Poultry, at the corner of Bucklersbury?"
"Yes," I said. "I suppose I must now make his acquaintance."
But scarcely had I uttered this sentence when his daughter Edith entered the room.
"Whose acquaintance. Dad?" she asked.
"We are talking business, dearie," he replied. "And I wish that when I'm engaged with Dr. d'Escombe you would knock before you come in. It is hardly lady-like to burst into a man's room like this!"
"But, Dad, how was I to know?" she protested with a pout. "I didn't hear you talking at first. I thought you were alone," and she glanced at me with an expression of annoyance.
"You must not think, my dear; you must always make certain," he said.
Then after another covert, and not altogether pleasant glance at me, she turned reluctantly and left.
"I hope your daughter does not suspect anything?" I asked, glancing at the closed door.
"What can she suspect?" queried my patient. "No, my dear fellow, don't have any such misgivings. You are quite safe. I leave the whole matter entirely to you. He must be silenced, and you alone can do it. But what means do you intend to employ?"
"Ah! You must leave all details to me, Mr. Farnell," I said firmly. "In such a difficult and serious case one must provide for every contingency, however remote. Davies means mischief, hence he is just as wary as ourselves."
"Well, act entirely as you think fit, and there are eight hundred pounds for you on the day that he—the day that he is incompetent to trouble me further," he said.
And with that, I left and returned to Cromwell Road.
That afternoon I called on a man whom I sometimes employed to make private inquiries for me, and I instructed him to find out something further regarding Davies. Two days later I had a report in my hands which showed that the person in question was well-known in a certain circle in the City, but he had the reputation of being addicted to sharp practice. He was a director of two distinctly shady concerns. The whole report, indeed, went to show that, while posing as an influential man, he was, on the contrary, little better than an adventurer. He had led an eventful life in South Africa before the war, and had made several remarkable coups in finance in consequence.
For a long while I pondered over what I read.
Then, passing into that bare upstairs room which I used as a laboratory, and to which nobody was ever admitted, I went to the window and examined my tiny tubes of various cultures in the small, square incubator. They were innocent-looking little tubes, in all conscience, but contained in them were sufficient germs of deadly diseases to decimate a town.
The particular tube to which I turned my attention was one in which I was making a rather difficult cultivation of certain bacteria which, on the day before, I had received from Paris. I placed a little of it beneath my microscope and on magnifying it a thousand times watched those minute micro-organisms, the exact nature of which science has not, up to the present, determined.
Still, the culture had commenced, and I raised my eye from the microscope, perfectly satisfied. The organism resembled a kind of yeast which bacteriologists have placed among the blastomycetes, yet more than that we know but little. Nevertheless, the tiniest particle of that virus introduced beneath the skin, either by injection or by abrasion, would certainly result in one of the most horrible and fatal diseases to which man is subject.
The media I was using contained brain substance, and, delighted with the entire success of my experiment, I left the room, carefully re-locking the door behind me.
That evening, anyone passing down King Street, St. James', about eight o'clock would, perhaps, have noticed a taxi draw up at the kerb at the corner of Bury Street. In it someone sat back in the darkness, and the driver smoked a cigarette while seated at the wheel.
The man inside the cab was myself, and I was watching for the man Davies to emerge from his chambers, which were, over a hat shop.
I was in evening-dress, and I suppose I presented as respectable an appearance as he did, when, after three-quarters of an hour, he came forth in black overcoat and crush-hat, and strolled up Duke Street into Jermyn Street, entering the Maison Jules for dinner.
Hence, I was compelled to follow up in the taxi, and again wait without my own dinner, till an hour later he emerged and took a taxi to the Palace Theatre.
There he seated himself in a stall, while I watched him from the promenade. Then, during the entr'acte, he came forth and descended to the bar. I allowed him to order a whisky-and-soda, when, suddenly seizing my opportunity, I came up beside him, and reaching over to give the barmaid my money, accidentally upset his drink.
"Do forgive me, my dear sir," I said in my best professional manner of apology. "It was horribly clumsy of me!" And I at once ordered another whisky-and-soda.
I noted his annoyance, but the profuseness of my apology melted him, and when I expressed hope that none of it had gone upon his clothes, he said with a laugh:
"Oh, no! It's really nothing—a mere accident."
So we drank together, chatted for a few moments, discussed the programme, and agreed that it was not up to the usual standard of the house.
Ten minutes later he had accepted one of my cigarettes, and had paid for a drink for me.
Knowing that Farnell had never mentioned me, I told him my real name. Indeed, I gave him my card, which showed that I was a medical man, while he gave me one of his.
Presently I went back with my new acquaintance to witness the latest dance. But we voted it poor, and before we parted we went again to the bar.
I was much gratified to find that he seemed to have taken quite a fancy to me. Why, I cannot tell. Perhaps it was because I had been telling him some funny hospital stories, which he declared were quite fresh to him, and certainly they caused him to laugh heartily.
"I wonder that you smoke cigarettes without a mouthpiece!" I suddenly exclaimed. "We doctors never do. It is not healthy to allow your lungs to do the same work as a plug of cotton-wool can do. See mine," and I exhibited my amber mouthpiece, which, miscrewing in the centre, contained a plug of wool.
"By Jove! An excellent idea. Where do you get them?" he inquired.
"I'll send you one," I said, laughing, "as souvenir of this meeting. And we shall meet again, I hope."
"Certainly. I'll be most pleased. But, I say," he added, "it's awfully good of you."
"Not at all," I declared, and, then the show being over, we strolled together down Shaftesbury Avenue as far as Piccadilly Circus, where we parted.
Next day I sent him the cigarette-tube by post, and three days afterwards called at his chambers, having previously rung him up on the telephone.
The instant I entered his cosy sitting-room in the twilight of the wintry afternoon, I saw that at least I had successfully accomplished one point.
But I remained silent, took the cigarette he offered me, and sank into the big arm-chair beside the fire.
For some time we chatted merrily, the room lit by the leaping flames of the fire, and I proposed dinner the next evening and a theatre afterwards, to which he raised no objection.
I could read in his face the word "adventurer." And further, I had no great liking for the thin, sallow-faced foreign valet who attended him.
Presently I remarked casually:
"I suppose you got the cigarette-tube all right?"
"Oh, yes, d'Escombe. So many thanks for it," he replied. "How very foolish of me. I quite forgot to thank you for it. I've smoked it every day since. See, I have it now," and he removed it from his lips. "I find it most pleasant smoking, so cool and different altogether from the usual mode."
"Yes, I see. But" I exclaimed, scrutinizing his lips. "You were only just in time, Mr. Davies."
"Why, what do you mean?" he asked in surprise.
"Oh, nothing very much," I replied, in an endeavour to treat the matter with unconcern. "Only—well, I see you have a significant sore upon your lower lip."
"It came yesterday," he said. "I've never had one before. You're a doctor, d'Escombe; surely it's nothing serious? I'll switch on the light."
He did so, and as he stood beneath it I carefully examined his mouth and the small open sore which, truth to tell, had been purposely set up by sucking the prepared holder I had sent him.
He saw that I did not like the look of it.
"What is it?" he demanded. "It's uncommonly sore."
"Well, there's of course nothing to be really alarmed at—not blood-poisoning or anything of that sort. Still, it should be attended to. If it spreads, it may disfigure your whole chin. I've known such cases. So, if you'll allow me, I'll send you over a little ointment. Rub it well in with the fore-finger both night and morning."
"Thanks, d'Escombe; that will be awfully good of you," the man declared.
"Not at all," I laughed. "I always believe in taking things of that sort in time. When once such a thing spreads one never knows how it will end."
"You alarm me!"
"Oh, my dear fellow, don't be alarmed. Simply use the remedy regularly, and in a day or two it will entirely disappear."
We smoked on for an hour, and when I rose to leave I promised I would send him over the ointment that same evening by district messenger.
This I did, and as you may surmise, dear boy, when I mixed the ointment I emptied into it the whole of the little tubeful of that culture which I had so carefully incubated.
Next night we dined together in the grill-room at the Carlton, and as I sat opposite him I inquired after the little sore upon his lip.
"Oh, it's very much better." he declared.
"I used what you sent me last night, and again this morning. It is rapidly healing."
I expressed pleasure, but somehow that tiny sore fascinated me, as, ever and anon, I looked into the face of the doomed man. We went to the Gaiety together and sat in the stalls, watching a musical comedy. But, by Jove! I was hardly at my ease.
The trick had been done. I had only now to await results.
Next evening I visited old Mr. Farnell, and almost his first question when we were alone was:
"Well, what has happened?"
"Nothing," I said. "Nothing at least to cause you a moment's worry. Only, on next Thursday week, I shall call here for my cheque."
He stared at me with a mixed expression of amazement and pleasure.
"Then you have been successful!" he gasped. "How?"
"The matter concerns myself," I replied with a smile. "To-day is Friday; on Thursday week, or at latest on Friday, I shall ask you for the cheque—that's all."
"And it will be ready for you, d'Escombe, with a hundred added to it," was the old fellow's reply. "By Jove! when I pay you I really believe my rheumatism will be cured. I shall enter upon a new lease of life."
"Of course you will," I said cheerfully.
"Didn't I tell you there was no reason whatever to worry?"
"Ah, yes. But I didn't know that you were so plucky," was his reply. "Most doctors wear a mask of respectability, and would be horrified at any suggestion of the kind. Yet you made it yourself."
"As a matter of business, purely," I declared. "By releasing you from a difficulty I shall also be benefiting myself."
"I like you, d'Escombe," he said, his big face broadening into a laugh. "You're such a philosopher."
"People who knew the truth would perhaps call me something else," I remarked with a grin.
"But tell me, what have you done?" he said. "Davies called upon me in the City this morning and expressed a hope that I should not fail to put matters right by the day named. He seemed quite in his usual health."
"He is," I replied. "Probably he never felt better in all his life. But why is he so anxious that you should pay back the money?" I queried. "It surely doesn't affect him. He wants to profit by your defalcations, but I can't exactly see how he would, if you raised the money and repaid it."
"Well, he is jointly responsible with myself," Farnell replied.
"But if he could show that he had no knowledge that you had withdrawn the money, there surely could be no charge against him," I exclaimed. "No, Mr. Farnell, the fellow's game was purely one of blackmail. He intended that you should give him five hundred, or perhaps a thousand, to allow matters to drift along for a few weeks longer. Then another demand—and so on."
"You think so?" asked my patient.
"I'm sure of it. But if my diagnosis be correct, he will not have an opportunity. I shall not call here again till the day I have named—and then it will be to receive my fee of eight hundred pounds," I added with a laugh.
"And it will afford me the greatest pleasure to hand it to you, Dr. d'Escombe," he answered. "Only my curiosity is aroused. Do tell me what means you are employing to bring matters to a successful issue."
"No, Mr. Farnell," I responded. "You must forgive me if I refuse to expose to you the cause. Your only interest is in the effect. Remember, you left it entirely to my discretion."
"Ah, I see!" he said. "By Jove! d'Escombe, you're a wary bird. You'd make a fortune in the City. I quite discern your point. If I knew your method, I might talk, eh?"
I smiled again in the affirmative. Afterwards we played a game of billiards, and I left just before eleven o'clock.
On the following Saturday evening I met Davies by appointment at the "Berkeley," and we dined together, and afterwards went to the Alhambra. He complained of bad pains in his head.
"My nerves seem all unstrung," he said. "I don't know what's been the matter with me for the past couple of days. I'm entirely out of sorts."
"Ah! I expect you want a change. Too much City. Why don't you go to Brighton, or somewhere, for a few days?"
"Because, just now, d'Escombe, I'm very busy," he declared. "I have to attend to several important and private matters—business that nobody can conduct for me."
"But I don't like your symptoms," I said. "One should never neglect a nervous attack."
"You'll have to prescribe for me, d'Escombe," he said with a laugh, as we leaned over the back of the grand circle of the theatre. "That sore on my lip has completely healed."
"I told you it would, if you persevered with the ointment," was my reply.
"Well, you'll now have to cure my nerves," he declared.
"I'll call to-morrow, if you really wish it," I said. "But, I somehow hate treating personal friends. I wish you'd call in a local man. There's Spencer, in Jermyn Street—a most excellent man, who has, I believe, a very large practice about here. Why not consult him? I'll also look in, but only as a consultant."
"Why don't you like to treat me?" he asked quickly.
"Because I always think it best for my friends to be treated by other practitioners. I've found it so all through my career," I said, perhaps lamely.
"I had Spencer once—about a year ago."
"Then have him again. There's nothing to be alarmed at, as far as I can see. Only, if I were you, I would let him see you. There can be no harm in it."
"None. You are quite right, d'Escombe. I shall call on him to-morrow."
It was long past midnight when we parted. I was quite willing for Spencer to see the man, for I knew that, on discovering the true nature of the disease, he would never suspect its real cause, and moreover, whatever efforts he might make with the serum treatment, all would be without avail. The period of inculcation had been too long. No power on earth could now save him.
Well, my dear fellow, my surmise proved correct.
When I called two days later I found Spencer with him. The patient was in bed suffering from spasms, especially of the muscles of deglutition and respiration, with excitement evidenced by delirium.
"This is a curious case," the smart, elderly practitioner declared, as we both stood beside the unconscious man. "At present, I've not been able to diagnose it properly."
I pretended to make an effort to diagnose it, but without avail.
Next day I called before Spencer arrived, and found Davies conscious again.
"By Jove, d'Escombe," he exclaimed. "I'm having a bad time. But you'll pull me through, won't you, old chap?" he implored me.
"Of course we'll get you right again," I assured him. Then, with a few comforting words, I left.
Really, I felt rather sorry for him, because I knew of the agony that must ensue.
On Wednesday, when I called at eleven, Spencer was again with him, but he was again unconscious.
"Rabies," declared the doctor. "Yesterday, he told me that he had been bitten by a farmer's dog while out shooting, nine months ago. I at once obtained some Pasteur serum, but, as you see, the case is rapid and hopeless."
On Thursday morning, when I asked Spencer over the telephone of his patient, I was scarcely surprised to learn that he had expired in terrible agony soon after two o'clock that morning.
So, at noon, I kept my appointment with old Farnell, and received the eight-hundred-pound fee for my little account—with the extra hundred added.
And that same evening, after a visit to the dead man's chambers to take a last look at him, Mr. Farnell carried away with him certain proofs of his own defalcations which, if not destroyed, might have been attended with rather unpleasant results.