“O, nothing!” I mumbled awkwardly; “except that you made me almost jump out of my skin.”
It was characteristic of him, and a further puzzle, that in spite of his self-suggested consciousness of superiority he was easily depressed by a snub. We sat for a little in a glowering silence, and perhaps with a mutual sense of injury.
“Yes, an interesting case,” he said at length with an effort. “A trance, isn’t it?”
“Something of the sort,” I replied. “I saw the girl yesterday.”
He looked up interested.
“Yes?”
“She is in a private ward of B—— Hospital. I know the house surgeon. He took me to see her.”
“Well! How does she look?”
“Seen the St. Amaranthe at Tussaud’s—the one whom, as children, we used to call the Sleeping Beauty? Not unlike her: as pretty as wax and as stiff: just breathing, with pale cheeks and her mouth a little open.”
“The fit—I seem to remember—was brought on by some shock, wasn’t it?”