His voice was agitated, his step uneven as he crossed the room and passed into the hall.
Molyneaux followed him with a conventional glance of sympathy; then his eyes turned again to the pictures with the gratified glance of a dilettante.
"Do you happen to know if this is a Reynolds?" he said to Gallagher, rising and crossing the room.
CHAPTER IV
To the last day of his life, that evening, with its horde of harassing and unfamiliar sensations, remained stamped upon Milbanke's mind; and not least among the unpleasant recollections was the visit of Molyneaux, and the dinner at which he himself unwillingly played host.
It may have been that his usually placid susceptibilities had undergone a strain that rendered him over sensitive; but whatever the cause, the atmosphere diffused by the great man jarred upon him. In his eyes, it seemed little short of callous that one who had just passed sentence of death upon his patient could so far remain unmoved as to partake with relish of the dinner set before him, and comment with affable appreciation upon the quality of the patient's wines.
Milbanke spoke little during the course of that meal. Try as he might to enact the part entrusted to him, his thoughts persistently wandered to the room upstairs, with its doomed sufferer and its anxious watchers, as yet mercifully ignorant of the verdict that had been pronounced. But if the host was silent, the guests made conversation. Gallagher was assiduous in his attentions to the man who, in his eyes, stood for the attainment of all ambition; and Molyneaux—under the unlooked-for stimulus of good, if homely food and wines that even as an epicure he admitted to be remarkable—was graciously pleased to accept the homage of his humble colleague, and to display a suave glimpse of the polished wit for which he was noted in society.
His expressions of regret were perfectly genuine when at last the sound of wheels on the gravel of the drive broke in upon his discourse, and Gallagher deprecatingly drew out his watch.
"The way of the world, Mr. Milbanke!" he murmured as he rose. "Our pleasantest acquaintances end the soonest. I must wish you good-bye—with many thanks for your delightful hospitality. So far as our poor friend is concerned," he added, in a correctly altered tone, "Doctor Gallagher may be relied upon to do everything. In a case like this, where physical pain is recurrent and violent, we can only have recourse to narcotics. We have already allayed the suffering consequent on my examination and you may rely upon some hours of calm; for any subsequent contingency Doctor Gallagher has my instructions. Of course, if you wish me to have one more glimpse at him before I go——"
But Milbanke, who had also risen, held out his hand mechanically.