"Quack remedies!" cried Sypher.
"Of course. They're all pestilential, and if I had my way I'd have them stacked in the market place and burned by the common hangman. But the most pestilential of the lot is Sypher's Cure. You ought never to have used it."
Sypher had the sensation of the hotel walls crashing down upon his head, falling across his throat and weighing upon his chest. For a few instants he suffered a nightmare paralysis. Then he gasped for breath. At last he said very quietly:
"Do you know who I am?"
"I have not the pleasure," said the doctor. "They only gave me your room number."
"I am Clem Sypher, the proprietor of Sypher's Cure."
The two men stared at one another, Sypher in a blue-striped pyjama jacket, supporting himself by one elbow on the bed, the doctor at the foot. The doctor spread out his hands.
"It's the most horrible moment of my life. I am at your mercy. I only gave you my honest opinion, the result of my experience. If I had known your name—naturally—"
"You had better go," said Sypher in a queer voice, digging the nails into the palms of his hands. "Your fee—?"
"There is no question of it. I am only grieved to the heart at having wounded you. Good morning."