"Oh! when?" the doctor replied carelessly. "Perhaps to-day--perhaps in
a week. Here, you see, Science is sometimes baffled. I cannot say."
Lord Harry breathed deeply. "If the man is in so serious a condition,"
he said, "is it safe or prudent for us to be alone in the house without
a servant and without a nurse?"
"I was not born yesterday, my lord, I assure you," said the doctor in
his jocular way. "They have found me a nurse. She will come to-day. My
patient's life is, humanly speaking"--Lord Harry shuddered--"perfectly
safe until her arrival."
"Well--but she is a stranger. She must know whom she is nursing."
"Certainly. She will be told--I have already told her--that she is
going to nurse Lord Harry Norland, a young Irish gentleman. She is a
stranger. That is the most valuable quality she possesses. She is a
complete stranger. As for you, what are you? Anything you please. An
English gentleman staying with me under the melancholy circumstances of
his lordship's illness. What more natural? The English doctor is
staying with his patient, and the English friend is staying with the
doctor. When the insurance officer makes inquiries, as he is very
likely to do, the nurse will be invaluable for the evidence she will
give."
He rose, pulled up the blinds noiselessly, and opened the windows.
Neither the fresh air nor the light awoke the sleeping man.
Vimpany looked at his watch. "Time for the medicine," he said. "Wake
him up while I get it ready."
"Would you not--at least---suffer him to have his sleep out?" asked
Lord Harry, again turning pale.
"Wake him up. Shake him by the shoulder. Do as I tell you," said the
doctor, roughly. "He will go to sleep again. It is one of the finer
qualities of my medicine that it sends people to sleep. It is a most
soothing medicine. It causes a deep--a profound sleep. Wake him up, I
say." he went to the cupboard in which the medicines were kept. Lord
Harry with some difficulty roused the sick man, who awoke dull and
heavy, asking why he was disturbed.
"Time for your medicine, my good fellow," said the doctor. "Take it,
and you shall not be disturbed again--I promise you that."
The door of the cupboard prevented the spy from seeing what the doctor
was doing; but he took longer than usual in filling the glass. Lord
Harry seemed to observe this, for he left the Dane and looked over the
doctor's shoulder. "What are you doing?" he asked in a whisper.