"It's not ill?" Ormiston said.
"The baby's as well as you or I—better, in fact, than I am, for I am confoundedly touched up with gout. Bear that in mind, Captain Ormiston—that the child is well, I mean, not that I am gouty. I want you to definitely remember that, you and Mr. March."
"Well, then, what on earth is the matter?" Ormiston asked sharply. "You don't mean to imply it is injured in any way, deformed?"
Dr. Knott let his hand drop on the table. He nodded his head. Ormiston perceived, and it moved him strangely, that the doctor's eyes were wet.
"Not deformed," he answered. "Technically you can hardly call it that, but maimed."
"Badly?"
"Well, that's a matter of opinion. You or I should think it bad enough, I fancy, if we found ourselves in the same boat." He settled himself back in his chair.—"You had better understand it quite clearly," he continued, "at least as clearly as I can put it to you. There comes a point where I cannot explain the facts but only state them. You have heard of spontaneous amputation?"
Across Ormiston's mind came the remembrance of a litter of puppies he had seen in the sanctum of the veterinary surgeon of his regiment. A lump rose in his throat.
"Yes, go on," he said.
"It is a thing that does not happen once in most men's experience. I have only seen one case before in all my practice and that was nothing very serious. This is an extraordinary example. I need not remind you of Sir Richard Calmady's accident and the subsequent operation?"