"Some years ago," he switched off the tap, "I went to a public dinner of agriculturists. Found to my surprise I was sitting next Oscar Wilde—one doesn't somehow associate him with such a function! On my left was a farmer of the good old-fashioned type, silent, aggressive, absorbed in his food. I happened to remark that the flowers were all withered; the heat of the room had been too much for them.
"'Not withered'—Wilde corrected me—'but merely weary...'
"The farmer turned his head, and gave him one glance.
"'Silly Ass!' he said explosively and returned to his dinner. It was his single contribution to the evening's conversation. I've never forgotten it, nor the look on Wilde's face."
McTaggart laughed. He felt oddly at ease.
The doctor glanced at his nails and came back into the room.
He pushed an easy-chair toward his patient and leaning against the mantelpiece with his hands in his pocket:
"Now, tell me all the trouble," he suggested quietly.
A slight flush crept up under the olive skin. McTaggart was suddenly immensely ashamed.
"I don't believe really ... there's anything ... wrong..." He gave an apologetic, husky little laugh ... "but the fact is, a friend of mine—he's a medical student—ran over me the other day, and, well—he said—there was something odd—that he couldn't understand—something about the beat of my heart. I'd fainted, you know—awfully inconvenient—at a supper party, too ... I'd been feeling pretty cheap..." He broke off, confused, as for the first time the older man deliberately fixed his eyes upon him. Hazel eyes they were with curious flecks of yellow, bright and hard beneath his pince-nez.