Dr. Grosnoff recovered in a manner which showed considerable caliber.
"Well," he grunted, "that being the case, we'd best be looking after him. Nervous shock, possible electric shock and electric burns, psychasthenia--that's going to be a long-drawn affair--bruises, maybe a little concussion, and possibly internal injury--that was equivalent to a ten-foot unbroken fall flat on his stomach, and I'll never forgive myself if.... Get me a chair!"
With infinite care and reassuring words, the big doctor with our help pulled my brother down, the latter frantically begging us not to let him "fall" again. Holding him securely on the bed and trying to reassure him, Grosnoff said:
"Straps and ropes won't do. His whole weight hangs in them--they'll cut him unmercifully. Take a sheet, tie the corners with ropes, and let him lie in that like a hammock!"
It took many reassurances as to the strength of this arrangement before Tristan was at comparative peace. Dr. Grosnoff effected an examination by slacking off the ropes until Tristan lay a couple of feet clear of the bed, then himself lay on the mattress face up, prodding the patient over.
The examination concluded, he informed us that Tristan's symptoms were simply those of a general physical shock such as would be expected in the case of a man standing close to the center of an explosion, though from our description of the affair he could not understand how my brother had survived at all. The glimmering of an explanation of this did not come until a long time afterward. So far as physical condition was concerned, Tristan might expect to recover fully in a matter of weeks. Mentally--the doctor was not so sure. The boy had gone through a terrible experience, and one which was still continuing--might continue no one knew how long. We were, said the doctor, up against a trick played by the great Sphinx, Nature, and one which, so far as he knew, had never before taken place in the history of all mankind.
"There is faintly taking shape in my mind," he said, "the beginning of a theory as to how it came about. But it is a theory having many ramifications and involving much in several lines of science, with most of which I am but little acquainted. For the present I have no more to say than that if a theory of causation can be worked out, it will be the first step toward cure. But--it may be the only step. Don't build hopes!"
