"Dr. Austin Atwood," said the girl solemnly.
"Oh! And you say he also observed something queer about me? What did he see? Are there spots on me? Am I turning any remarkable color? Am I--" And in the very midst of his genuine alarm he suddenly remembered the make-up box and what the Tracer of Lost Persons had done to his eyes. Was _that_ it? Where was the Tracer, anyway? He had promised to appear. And then Carden recollected the gray wig and whiskers that the Tracer had waved at him from the cupboard, bidding him note them well. _Could_ that beaming, benignant, tottering old gentleman have been the Tracer of Lost Persons himself? And the same instant Carden was sure of it, spite of the miraculous change in the man.
Then logic came to his aid; and, deducing with care and patience, an earnest conviction grew within him that the dark circles under his eyes and the tottering old gentleman resembling Dr. Austin Atwood had a great deal to do with this dreadful disease which Dr. Hollis desired to study.
He looked at the charming girl beside him, and she looked back at him very sweetly, very earnestly, awaiting his decision.
For a moment he realized that she had really scared him, and in the reaction of relief an overwhelming desire to laugh seized him. He managed to suppress it, to compose himself. Then he remembered the Tracer's admonition to acquiesce in everything, do what he was told to do, not to run away, and to pay his court at the first decent opportunity.
He had no longer any desire to escape; he was quite willing to do anything she desired.
"Do you really want to study me, Dr. Hollis?" he asked, feeling like a hypocrite.
"Oh, truly, truly, you are! You don't suspect--you cannot conceive how important you have suddenly become to me."
"Then I think you had better take my case, Dr. Hollis," he said seriously. "I begin now to realize that you believe me to be a sort of freak--an afflicted curiosity, and that, in the interest of medicine, I ought to go to an asylum or submit myself to the ceaseless observation of a competent private physician."
"I--I think it best for you to place yourself in my care," she said. "Will you?"
"Yes," he said, "I will. I'll do anything in the world you ask."