"You could," she said, "and you ought."
"May I ask," said he, fairly carried away by curiosity, "if the disease of which you speak was of a nervous character?"
"You mean, was my mind affected?"
"Yes, if you choose to put it that way?"
"It was, but unfortunately I have not been in an asylum; even the grave that they told me was gaping for me closed of its own accord. It was the last door open to me, and it is shut now."
"But if your disease was mental, I cannot understand why we might not shake hands; why I might not shake the hand of my rescuer."
"Because she could not touch yours. It is in your hand the contamination lies."
"Poor creature!" he thought, "mad!--quite mad! To say such a thing of me, who am never ill--of the soundest man in London! I, who take such care not to be ill!" He laughed one of his short sharp laughs, and said aloud, "Contagion in my hand! And who am I?"
"I do not know who you are now." At the emphasised word he sprang into the air off the ground as though he had been shot, and then took a pace towards her, and paused and looked furtively at the door.
Was she, too, armed?