"That's the house that Hake described," he said, "but whether my customer of the other day lives there or not, I cannot tell. And what is worse, I don't know how to find out."
While he was devising some method of ascertaining this, to him, important point, fortune favored him. Mr. Paul Morton himself appeared at the door, accompanied by the physician. As the distance was only across the street, James Cromwell had no difficulty in hearing the conversation that passed between them.
"What do you think of him, doctor?" asked Paul Morton, in accents of pretended anxiety. "Don't you think there is any help for him?"
"No; I regret to say that I think there is none whatever. From the first I considered it a critical case, but within two or three days the symptoms have become more unfavorable, and his bodily strength, of which, at least, he had but little, has so sensibly declined, that I fear there is no help whatever for him."
"How long do you think he will last, doctor?" was the next inquiry.
"He cannot last a week, in my judgment. If he does it will surprise me very much. He is wealthy, is he not?"
"Yes; he has been a successful man of business."
"Where has he passed his life?"
"In China. That is, he has lived there for a considerable time."