Then, turning, I asked a servant, who stood near, to tell the patients waiting for me that I had been unexpectedly called out to an urgent case, and would return in an hour.
“Good!” her ladyship exclaimed. “Let us not lose an instant.”
Instinctively I placed my instrument case in my pocket, and took down my hat.
“Tell me the nature of the illness,” I urged. “How did it occur? Who is the patient?”
“How it occurred nobody knows. It is a mystery, as I tell you. My cousin Feo, to whom I think I introduced you, is dying!”
“Dying!” I gasped, staring at her amazed. “Here in London?”
“Yes, at my house. I have called you because you are a doctor, and I can rely upon your secrecy.”