His eyes dropped; then he suddenly lifted his hand to his mouth, putting it behind him again, to turn with a smile when Miss Defourchet addressed him. Dr. Bowdler started.
"Look at the blood," he whispered to Friend Turner. "He bit his finger to the bone."
"I know," said the old Quaker. "The man is quiet from inanition and nervous tension. This trial means more to him than we guess. Get him out of this crowd."
"Come, Mr. Starke," and the Doctor touched his arm, "into my library. There are some curious plates there which"—
Andy had been gulping for courage to speak for some time.
"Don't let him go without a glass of wine," he muttered to the young lady. "I give you my honor I haven't got food across his lips for"—
She started away from him, and made the machinist drink to the success of "our engine," as she called it; but he only touched the glass to his lips and smiled at her faintly: then left the room with her uncle.
The dog followed him: he had kept by Starke since the moment he came into the breakfast-room, cuddling down across his feet when he was called away. The man had only patted him absently, saying that all dogs did so with him, he didn't know why. Thor followed him now. Friend Turner beckoned the clergyman back a moment.
"Make him talk, Richard. Be rough, hurt him, if thee chooses; it will be a safety-valve. Look in his eyes! I tell thee we have no idea of all that has brought this poor creature into this state,—such rigid strain. But if it is broken in on first by the failure of his pump, if it be a pump, I will not answer for the result, Richard."
Dr. Bowdler nodded abruptly, and hurried after Starke. When he entered the cozy south room which he called the library, he found Starke standing before an oil-painting of a baby, one the Doctor had lost years ago.