Impatient and self-reproachful, Herriard went into the Park. He was in no mood to go home or to the House of Commons, he would wait about near at hand for an hour or so until he could see Gastineau. The news he had to tell him was momentous, and then he was resolved to broach the subject of the Austrian specialist without further delay. He could not bear to think of his friend lying there helpless in paroxysms of agony while he, who owed him everything, was inhuman enough to withhold the healing hand.
As he paced up and down the stretches of path, chafing and remorseful, it occurred to him that just across the way was Green Street, where he could get Dr. Hallamar’s address and so save time, for he was determined that, with Gastineau’s consent, not an hour more should be lost in calling in the great surgeon. As he waited to cross the drive, whom should he see coming towards him but the very man who was in his mind.
“Ah, Doctor, well met!” he greeted him. “I was just on my way to our friends the von Rohnburgs to ask for your address.”
Hallamar bowed. “For the few days longer I remain in England I am staying at the Hotel Britannia. Can I be of service to you? You are interested in my work, yes?”
“You are very good, Doctor. I was going to propose that you should visit a dear friend of mine. I only wish that I had known of your work sooner.”
The Doctor bowed again. “Your friend suffers from a spinal affection?”
“Yes. The result of a railway accident. He is, poor fellow, a helpless cripple. I should almost fear beyond even your powers of healing. He was terribly hurt, and for days after the accident it was thought he could not possibly live.”
Hallamar, beneath his professional reticence, was evidently interested.
“A bad case, doubtless,” he observed. “But bad cases are not necessarily the least curable. It may seem brutal to a layman, but we rather rejoice in bad cases.”
“Then I think this one ought to delight you,” Herriard suggested with a laugh. “It seems to me as bad a case as you could have in a patient who continues to live. And it must be a bad symptom, at least for him, poor fellow, that he suffers at times a martyrdom of pain.”