"No! no! There, there," the doctor patted her hand, "don't cry. Horran may go on living for the next twenty years--as he is only fifty-four, I don't see why he shouldn't."
"Then you can't see death?"
"I can't see death, or life, or anything, but a series of most puzzling symptoms, which neither I, nor Wentworth, nor the whole College of Surgeons can understand. However, we'll drop the subject just now, and think of tea."
"Oh, doctor, how can you think of food when--"
"When my patient is sleeping quietly. Why shouldn't I? There's nothing to be done until he awakes. Then I'll make another examination, although I don't expect I'll learn anything. I return to town," Jerce consulted a handsome gold watch, "by the seven train."
"It is very good of you to have come down so promptly."
"Not at all. I would go to the ends of the earth at a moment's notice, to attend to so interesting a case. Ha! ha! Cold-blooded science again, Clarice, you see. Come, come, let us say that I came willingly to see my old and valued friend, Henry Horran."
"Doctor, you are a great man."
"Flattering--very flattering. And why?"
"Great men, I have always read and heard, will never spare anyone in their aim to attain their ends."