“Well lie down in your room, Mary,” said Claude; “it is so much nearer the bell. Do you know, I feel so dreadfully low-spirited? It is as if a terrible shadow had come over the place, and—don’t laugh at me—it seemed to grow darker when Doctor Asher came into the room.”
“What nonsense! Because he is all in black.”
“Do you think he is to be trusted, Mary?”
“I don’t know. I don’t like him, and I never did. He is so sleek and smooth, and I hate him to call us ‘my dear’ in that nasty, patronising, paternal sort of way.”
“Then let’s sit up.”
“No, no. It would be absurd. I daresay we should feel the same about any other doctor.”
“I do hope he will take great care of poor papa,” sighed Claude; and the door closed after them as they entered their room.
If Doctor Asher was not going to take great care of Norman Gartram, it was very evident that he was going to take very great care of himself, for as soon as he was alone he struck a match, lit the spirit lamp, lifted the lid of the coffee pot, and found that it was still very hot, and then, removing a stopper in the spirit stand, he poured out into a cup a goodly portion of pale brandy.
He had just restored the stopper to the spirit decanter, saying to himself, “Nice, thoughtful little girl!” when Gartram moaned and moved uneasily.
The doctor crossed to him directly, went down on one knee, and felt to see that his patient’s neck was well opened.