'My lord?' Hancock interposed.
'I beg, my lord, that you will not excite yourself.'
'Excite myself! What in thunder do you mean? I'll do--what I please--with myself.' He was illumined by a sudden burst of really vigorous passion; actually raising himself in bed to give it tongue. He spoke with an amount of fluency which after the recent struggle he had made to utter disconnected words was surprising. 'I'm not dead yet, so don't let any one order me about as if I were--curse you, you bald-headed old fool!' This was to Hancock; the top of whose scalp is smooth. 'I'm not going to have my brother mixed up with a bold-faced judy; he's not going to make a girl of whom I disapprove the Marchioness of Twickenham. I tell you, Foster, that if Reggie marries that jade--if he marries--if he----'
He stopped as if at a loss for a word. Then a shudder passed all over him; his whole frame became perceptibly rigid; he dropped back, still. Hancock turned to us.
'I think if one of you gentlemen were to take the ladies out. I'm afraid this may be serious.'
As we were going, the door opened to admit Dr. Robert White. I welcomed him.
'Dr. White, you are just in time. I don't know if you are known to Sir Gregory Hancock. Your patient has just had a relapse.'
The two doctors bent together in consultation over the bed. Edith touched me on the arm.
'Let us wait,' she whispered.
Presently Hancock spoke to Reggie.