'I will send you some medicine which will ease those pains of which you speak.'
'You mustn't talk too much. Rest and composure are what you principally need.'
'Confound your composure!' With a violent effort the man in the bed raised himself to a sitting posture. 'What do I want to be composed for when there's so little time to talk? There'll be all eternity to be silent in.'
As he gripped the coverlet with his cadaverous hands, blinking at us with his sightless eyes, he did not offer an agreeable spectacle. He trembled so from the exertion of the effort he had made that it was not surprising to see him, collapsing like a pack of cards, fall in a heap half in, half out of bed. With quick professional hands the doctor straightened him out. He eyed him when he had finished. The figure in the bed lay perfectly still.
'He's exhausted himself; but he'll be all right when he recovers. Can I speak to you outside before I go?' I went with him outside the bedroom door. 'Are you a relative of his?'
'If he has any relatives they should be sent for at once, if they wish to see him alive. It is quite possible that he will not live over to-day.'
'It's a case of general collapse; all the vital organs are weak. He seems to have lived a hard and irregular life on top of an originally poor constitution. I hope you don't mind my speaking frankly.'
'Not at all. I believe you are right. I have not seen him myself for fifteen years. We all thought he was dead.'
'He will be soon. He's consumed by fever; his lungs are affected; there's practically no pulse, and scarcely any motion of the heart. The whole machine's run down. As you see for yourself, he's nothing but skin and bone. But it's from the heart we have most to fear. If you allow him to excite himself there may be an instant stoppage.'
'Do you think we'd better have further advice?'
'That's as you please. I myself should welcome it. And it might be more satisfactory to every one concerned. But I don't think you'll find that anything can be done. Here's my card.' He handed me one; from which it appeared that he was Mr. Robert White, M.R.C.S., L.R.C.P., of 93 Craven Street, W.C. 'I'll look in again as soon as I can; and then, perhaps, a consultation may be arranged. But if any of his relatives wish to see him, if I were you I should lose no time in letting them know the state that he is in.'