“The most wonderful part of the case was that his appetite was not impaired, and he took nourishment regularly. Physically, he was as well as ever, except that he never afterward would, or could, walk, talk or hear.
“For two years we called into his case all the medical skill on the coast, but without a particle of success. Mr. Templin lived on, his physical form as perfect as ever, but his mental or spiritual part seemed to have died and left the body.
“At the end of these two years a Dr. Greene, who conducted a sanitarium near Oakland, devoted to mental diseases of the milder form, expressed the belief that he could restore my father to the use of all his faculties, if the afflicted man was placed in his care at his private retreat.
“I visited the sanitarium, and was shown the suite of rooms which Greene offered to set aside for my poor father’s use. He also introduced me to the two nurses and a male assistant, who would be in constant attendance.
“I saw at once that my afflicted parent would receive better attention than he had been getting, and, although Greene’s charges were excessively large, Mr. Lonsdale and I concluded to have him removed to the retreat.
“This was the more readily agreed to by me because I was going to Europe for a four years’ stay among the art studios of Italy.”
“You have been there as a student?”
“Yes. From my mother, who died when I was young, I inherited a love for painting, and it was my father’s dearest desire that when I came out of school I should go to Italy and get the benefit of the best teachers in painting. Mr. Lonsdale, therefore, urged me to place my father in this retreat, where he would have better care than we could give him, and go to Europe, as originally arranged.”
“Your father, as you supposed, died in the retreat?”
“Yes. The first news I got of it was about a year after I had been in Rome. Mr. Lonsdale cabled that papa was dead. Several weeks later I got his letter, which set forth the details.”