"You took morphia——?" Her voice was dismayed.
"Yes, for nearly six months I gave myself up to it. I told myself there was no real danger for me—I knew the peril of it so well. I wasn't like the people who go in ignorantly for the thing; and find themselves bound hand and foot, their lives in ruins round them. That is what I thought, in my folly." He sighed, and his face looked careworn. "Well, I soon found out that I was just like other people after all. I went into the thing, thinking I should find a way out of my troubles. And I was wrong."
"You gave it up?" Her voice was suddenly anxious.
"Yes. In the nick of time I came across an old friend—a friend of my student days, who had been looking for me, unknown to me, for months. He wanted me to do some research work for him—work that necessitated visiting hospitals in Paris and Berlin and Vienna—and I accepted the commission only too gladly."
"And—you gave up the terrible thing?"
"Yes. The new interest saved me, you know. I came back, after some months of hard work, and found my friend on the eve of starting with an expedition for Central Africa, to study tropical diseases; and had there been a place for me I would have gone too. But there wasn't; and I was a bit fagged, so after doing locum work for another friend for some time I looked about for a practice, bought this one—and here I am."
"Dr. Anstice "—she spoke shyly, though her eyes met his bravely—"you won't ever take that dreadful stuff again, will you? I am quite sure," said Iris Wayne, "that that is not the way out."
"No," he answered steadily, "you are quite right. It isn't. But I haven't found the way out yet." He paused a moment; then held out his hand, and she put her uninjured left hand into it rather wonderingly. "Still, I will not seek that way out again. I will promise—no, I won't promise, for I'm only human and I couldn't bear to break a promise to you—but I will do my best to avoid the deadly thing for the rest of my life."
He pressed her hand gently, then dropped it as a sudden loud knock sounded on the door.
"Come in." They turned to see who the visitor might be; and to the surprise of both in walked Bruce Cheniston, an unmistakable frown on his face.