That night David had a caller. All evening the bell had been ringing, and the little card tray on the hatrack was filled with visiting cards. There were gifts, too, flowers and jellies and some squab from Mrs. Sayre. Lucy had seen no one, excusing herself on the ground of fatigue, but the man who came at nine o'clock was not inclined to be turned away.
“You take this card up to Doctor Livingstone, anyhow,” he said. “I'll wait.”
He wrote in pencil on the card, placing it against the door post to do so, and passed it to Minnie. She calmly read it, and rather defiantly carried it off. But she came down quickly, touched by some contagion of expectation from the room upstairs.
“Hang your hat on the rack and go on up.”
So it was that David and the reporter met, for the first time, in David's old fashioned chamber, with its walnut bed and the dresser with the marble top, and Dick's picture in his uniform on the mantle.
Bassett was shocked at the sight of David, shocked and alarmed. He was uncertain at first as to the wisdom of telling his startling story to an obviously sick man, but David's first words reassured him.
“Come in,” he said. “You are the Bassett who was with Doctor Livingstone at Norada?”
“Yes. I see you know about it.”
“We know something, not everything.” Suddenly David's pose deserted him. He got up and stood very straight, searching eyes on his visitor. “Is he living?” he asked, in a low voice.
“I think so. I'm not certain.”