Having arrived at the Zoo, she went straight to the house of the resident curator, and was just in time to see Mr. Cromartie being carried in on a stretcher, but before she could come up to it the door was shut in her face. She rang, but it was almost five minutes before the door was opened by a maidservant who took her card in, with the request that she might see the curator as she was a friend of Mr. Cromartie’s. Before the maid came back, however, the curator came out, and Josephine explained her visit without any embarrassment. She was invited in, and found herself in a fine well-lit dining-room in the presence of two gentlemen in morning dress, and both with bushy eyebrows. The curator introduced her as a friend of Mr. Cromartie’s, and they both gave her a very keen look and bowed.
Sir Walter Tintzel, the elder of the two, was a short man with a rather round red face; Mr. Ogilvie, a taller, youngish man, with a skin like parchment, and a glass eye into which she found herself staring. “How is the patient?” asked Josephine, falling at once into that state of mind which is produced by the presence of distinguished medical men, and particularly surgeons, a state of mind, that is, of almost complete blankness, when however upset one may have been the moment before, one finds all emotion suspended, or swallowed up in fog. All the faculties at such a moment are concentrated on behaving with an absurd decorum.
“It is a little too early to say, Miss Lackett,” replied Sir Walter Tintzel, who was filled with curiosity to find out more about her.
“My friend Mr. Ogilvie has just amputated a finger; in my opinion it would have been running an unjustifiable risk not to have done so. There were several minor injuries, but happily they did not require such drastic measures. May I ask, Miss Lackett, without impertinence, if you have known Mr. Cromartie long? You are, I understand, a personal friend, a close and dear friend of Mr. Cromartie’s.”
Miss Lackett opened her eyes rather wide at this remark, and replied:
“I was naturally anxious.... Yes, I am an old friend of Mr. Cromartie’s—and, if you like, a close friend.” She laughed. “Is there danger of blood-poisoning?”
“There is a risk of it, but we have taken every precaution.”
“The King of Greece died of being bitten by a monkey,” cried Josephine suddenly.
“That’s rubbish,” interrupted the curator, coming forward. “Why everybody in the Gardens has been more or less seriously bitten by monkeys at some time or other. It is always happening. It’s dreadful to think that the poor fellow should have lost a finger, but there’s no danger.”
“You are sure there’s no danger?” asked Josephine.