ped
the new patient carefully forth from the cab. It was Mary's duty to
see the one trunk of new shining tin carried in and placed in the
room that was prepared for the house's new inmate. This done, she
went to the others in the little drawing-room. Her father and
Professor Fish were seated in the window, busy with talk; the new
patient had an upright chair against the wall, and sat in it with the
same lassitude and downcast gaze which had already drawn Mary's
wondering compassion. The Professor rose at her entry.

"Ah! Miss Pond," he said in his cheerful, booming voice, "I was just
giving your father a few particulars about our young friend."

"I should like to hear them," she answered, taking the chair he
reached for her. "You see, I shall have a good deal to do with him."

Old Dr. Pond nodded. "Mary," he said, "is my right hand, Professor."

"Of course," agreed the Professor. "I can see that."

He was seated again, and he leaned across to Mary confidentially,
with an explanatory forefinger hovering.

"As I told your father, Miss Pond, it isn't necessary to go far back
in the case," he said. "As a matter of fact, I took this case up--
experimentally. The subject was a good one for a--well, call it a
theory of mine, a new idea in pathology. You see? I wanted to try it
on the dog before publishing it, and our young friend there"--he
nodded at the back of the room and sank his voice--"he was the dog.
You understand?"

Mary nodded, and the Professor smiled.

"Well," he said, "I have succeeded. The patient is convalescent,
but--you see how he is. He has very little vital force, and also,
occasionally, delusions. Merely ephemeral, you know, but delusions.
He wants quiet chiefly, and very little else--just that atmosphere of
repose and--er--peace which you can create for him, Miss Pond."

"These delusions," put in Dr. Pond, "are they of any special
character!"

"H'm!" The Professor stroked his chin. "No," he said. "Curious, you
know, but not symptomatic." His hard eye scanned the old doctor
purposely. "Sometimes," he said slowly, "he thinks he has been dead,
and that I brought him back to life."

"And he hates you for it," suggested Mary. The Professor stared at
her in open astonishment.

"How on earth did you know that?" he cried.

"I saw him looking after you in the station," Mary explained. "He
just--glared."

"I see." Professor Fish was always rather extravagant in manner and
speech; his relief now se