"Why not? I came here from the other side of the world alone. I have to see a doctor about my eyes. No, there is no hope that I can ever recover my sight again; but it is possible to allay the pain they give me."
Ralph departed. A dogcart deposited him at Biston Junction, and then the servant saw him safely into the London train. But presently Ralph alighted and a porter guided him to a cab. A little later and the blind man was knocking at the door of a cottage in the poorer portion of the town.
A short, stocky man, with a seafaring air, opened the door.
"Is it you, Elphick?" Ralph asked.
The short man with the resolute face and keen, gray eyes exclaimed with pleasure:
"So you've got back at last, sir. Come in, sir. I am alone here as you know. I knew you'd want me before long."
Ralph Ravenspur felt his way to a chair. James Elphick stood watching him with something more than pleasure in his eyes.
"We have no time to spare," Ralph exclaimed. "We must be in London to-night, James. I am going up to see Dr. Tchigorsky."
"Dr. Tchigorsky!" Elphick exclaimed. "Didn't I always say as how he'd get through? The man who'd get the best of him ain't born yet. But it means danger, sir. Nothing we ever carried out with the doctor was anything else."