A little later the doctors filed in noiselessly and stood about the bed gazing down upon the sleeper with awe, listening to her breathing, feeling lightly the fluttering pulse. Then they left the quiet house of suffering, marvelling at the miracle just accomplished in their presence. Livingston lingered with Briggs after the other physicians were gone.
“This is a great day for you, Reuel,” he said, as he laid a light caressing hand upon the other’s shoulder.
Reuel seized the hand in a quick convulsive clasp. “True and tried friend, do not credit me more than I deserve. No praise is due me. I am an instrument—how I know not—a child of circumstances. Do you not perceive something strange in this case? Can you not deduce conclusions from your own intimate knowledge of this science?”
“What can you mean, Reuel?”
“I mean—it is a dual mesmeric trance! The girl is only partly normal now. Binet speaks at length of this possibility in his treatise. We have stumbled upon an extraordinary case. It will take a year to restore her to perfect health.”
“In the meantime we ought to search out her friends.”
“Is there any hurry, Aubrey?” pleaded Reuel, anxiously.
“Why not wait until her memory returns; it will not be long, I believe, although she may still be liable to the trances.”
“We’ll put off the evil day to any date you may name, Briggs; for my part, I would preserve her incognito indefinitely.”
Reuel made no reply. Livingston was not sure that he heard him.