The professor handed me that odious menu.
‘Choose—or will you have it later?’
‘Oh, dear me, show me to my room; I forgot your hard rule.’
‘Wait just a moment before you finally decide. There is another rule. If you choose now, the order will be filled at once; but if you wait, you will have to await my pleasure. You cannot get a dish from that entire bill until I consent.’
‘All right. Show me to my room, and send the cook to bed; there is not going to be any hurry.’
The professor took me up one flight of stairs and showed me into a most inviting and comfortable apartment consisting of parlour, bedchamber, and bathroom.
The front windows looked out over a far-reaching spread of green glades and valleys, and tumbled hills clothed with forests—a noble solitude unvexed by the fussy world. In the parlour were many shelves filled with books. The professor said he would now leave me to myself; and added:
‘Smoke and read as much as you please, drink all the water you like. When you get hungry, ring and give your order, and I will decide whether it shall be filled or not. Yours is a stubborn, bad case, and I think the first fourteen dishes in the bill are each and all too delicate for its needs. I ask you as a favour to restrain yourself and not call for them.’
‘Restrain myself, is it? Give yourself no uneasiness. You are going to save money by me. The idea of coaxing a sick man’s appetite back with this buzzard-fare is clear insanity.’
I said it with bitterness, for I felt outraged by this calm, cold talk over these heartless new engines of assassination. The doctor looked grieved, but not offended. He laid the bill of fare on the commode at my bed’s head, ‘so that it would be handy,’ and said: