"You know the reason—surely!"
"Oh, yes—yes! Very well, dear. At half-past seven."
So that was agreed.
Next morning, just before noon, Boyne called at Pont Street and learned from Lilla—who had just spoken to Ena—that Mrs. Morrison of Carsphairn was in an extremely critical condition.
"H'm!" grunted her husband. "Then all goes as it should—eh? No other acute disease presents so great a liability to sudden death as diphtheria. I suppose the doctor, whoever he is, has been all along examining the patient's heart for any indication of an approaching catastrophe."
"But sudden death can't take place—can it?" asked Lilla.
"Oh, yes," replied her husband in a voice of authority. "The more insidious forms of sudden death from diphtheria take place through the nervous system and heart. In such a case the pulse beats only twenty or thirty a minute—and that is probably what has aroused the doctor's fears."
"But, according to Ena, she hasn't a very bad throat."
"That may be so," he said, speaking in the way of a medical man. "She may have an extension of the false membrane into the air passage, which would block the larynx trachea or bronchi, which is always gradual, and may be fatal. But if the doctor has come to the conclusion that she's in a very bad way, I should think that the end will come this evening."
"You'll dine at Ena's—eh?"