n came, and the doctor
was bending above him seated in an arm-chair. The blaze of the
gas-microscope in his eyes made him wince. The doctor's hand touched the
scar of the sword-cut on Dick's head, and Dick explained briefly how he
had come by it. When the flame was removed, Dick saw the doctor's face,
and the fear came upon him again. The doctor wrapped himself in a
mist of words. Dick caught allusions to 'scar,' 'frontal bone,' 'optic
nerve,' 'extreme caution,' and the 'avoidance of mental anxiety.'

'Verdict?' he said faintly. 'My business is painting, and I daren't
waste time. What do you make of it?'

Again the whirl of words, but this time they conveyed a meaning.

'Can you give me anything to drink?'

Many sentences were pronounced in that darkened room, and the prisoners
often needed cheering. Dick found a glass of liqueur brandy in his hand.

'As far as I can gather,' he said, coughing above the spirit, 'you call
it decay of the optic nerve, or something, and therefore hopeless. What
is my time-limit, avoiding all strain and worry?'

'Perhaps one year.'

'My God! And if I don't take care of myself?'

'I really could not say. One cannot ascertain the exact amount of injury
inflicted by the sword-cut. The scar is an old one, and--exposure to the
strong light of the desert, did you say?--with excessive application to
fine work? I really could not say?'

'I beg your pardon, but it has come without any warning. If you will
let me, I'll sit here for a minute, and then I'll go. You have been very
good in telling me the truth. Without any warning; without any warning.

Thanks.'

Dick went into the street, and was rapturously received by Binkie.

'We've got it very badly, little dog! Just as badly as we can get it.
We'll go to the Park to think it out.'

They headed for a certain tree that Dick knew well, and they sat down to
thin, because his legs were trembling under him and there was cold fear
at the pit of his stomach.

'How could it have come without any warning? It's as sudden as being
shot. It's the living death, Binkie. We're to be shut up in the dark in
one year if we're careful, and we shan't see anybody, and we shall
never have anything we want, not though we live to be a hundred!' Binkie
wagged his tail joyously. 'Binkie, we must think. Let's see how it
feels to be blind.' Dick shut his eyes, and flaming commas and
Catherine-wheels floated inside the lids. Yet when he looked across the
Park t