"Then you insist upon joining in to-morrow's debate?" the doctor was saying.
"I flatter myself that it is necessary!" replied Bertram.
"As a political partisan I admit it; as your medical adviser I repeat, it is impossible."
"Come, my good friend, you said just now, it is undesirable; now, from that to impossible is rather a bold step. We had better stick to the first statement."
The doctor, who had taken up his hat and stick a few minutes before, laid both down again, pushed Bertram into the chair before his writing-table, sat down again facing him, and said--
"Judging from your momentary condition it is merely desirable that you should have at present absolute repose for at least a few days. But I very much fear that to-morrow's inevitable excitement will make you worse, and then the downright necessity for rest will arise, and that not only for a few days. Let me speak quite frankly, Bertram. I know that I shall not frighten you, although I should rather like to do so. You are causing me real anxiety. I greatly regret that I kept you last autumn from your projected Italian trip, and that I pushed and urged you into the fatigues of an election campaign and into the harassing anxieties of parliamentary life. I assumed that this energetic activity would contribute to your complete restoration to health, and I find that I made a grievous mistake. And yet I am not aware where exactly the mistake was made. You mastered your parliamentary duties with such perfect ease, you entered the arena so well prepared and armed from top to toe, you used your weapons with all the skill of a past master, and you were borne along by such an ample measure of success--and that of course has its great value. Well, according to all human understanding and experience, the splendid and relatively easy discharge of duties for which you are so eminently fitted, should contribute to your well-being, and yet the very opposite is occurring. In spite of all my cogitations I can find but one theory to account for it. In spite of the admirable equanimity which you always preserve, in spite of the undimmed serenity of your disposition and appearance, by which you charm your friends, whilst you frequently disarm your foes, there must be a hidden something in your soul that gnaws away at your vitals, a deep, dark under-current of grief and pain. Am I right? You know that I am not asking the question from idle curiosity."
"I know it," replied Bertram; "and therefore I answer: you are right and yet not right, or right only if you hold me responsible for the effect of a cause I was guiltless of."
"You answer in enigmas, my friend."
"Let me try a metaphor. Say, somebody is compelled to live in a house, in which the architect made some grave mistake at the laying of the foundations, or at some important period or other of its erection. The tenant is a quiet, steady man, who keeps the house in good order; then comes a storm, and the ill-constructed building is terribly shaken and strained. The steady-going tenant repairs the damage as best he can, and things go on fairly enough for a time, a long time, until there comes another and a worse storm, which makes the whole house topple together over his head."
The doctor's dark eyes had been dwelling searchingly and sympathisingly upon the speaker. Now he said--