d then went and
tapped gently at the door of the patient's room. It was opened and shut
very softly, and Lady Cicely, dressed in black, and looking paler than
ever, came into the room.

"Dr. Staines, I think?"

He bowed.

"Thank you for coming so promptly. Dr. Barr is gone. I fear he
thinks--he thinks--O Dr. Staines--no sign of life but in his poor hands,
that keep moving night and day."

Staines looked very grave at that. Lady Cicely observed it, and, faint
at heart, could say no more, but led the way to the sick-room.

There in a spacious chamber, lighted by a grand oriel window and two
side windows, lay rank, title, wealth, and youth, stricken down in a
moment by a common accident. The sufferer's face was bloodless, his eyes
fixed, and no signs of life but in his thumbs, and they kept working
with strange regularity.

In the room were a nurse and the surgeon; the neighboring physician, who
had called in Dr. Barr, had just paid his visit and gone away.

Lady Cicely introduced Dr. Staines and Mr. White, and then Dr. Staines
stood and fixed his eyes on the patient in profound silence. Lady
Cicely scanned his countenance searchingly, and was struck with the
extraordinary power and intensity it assumed in examining the patient;
but the result was not encouraging. Dr. Staines looked grave and gloomy.

At last, without removing his eye from the recumbent figure, he said
quietly to Mr. White, "Thrown from his horse, sir."

"Horse fell on him, Dr. Staines."

"Any visible injuries?"

"Yes. Severe contusions, and a rib broken and pressed upon the lungs. I
replaced and set it. Will you see?"

"If you please."

He examined and felt the patient, and said it had been ably done.

Then he was silent and searching.

At last he spoke again. "The motion of the thumbs corresponds exactly
with his pulse."

"Is that so, sir?"

"It is. The case is without a parallel. How long has he been so?"

"Nearly a week."

"Impossible!"

"It is so, sir."

Lady Cicely confirmed this.

"All the better," said Dr. Staines upon reflection. "Well, sir," said
he, "the visible injuries having been ably relieved, I shall look
another way for the cause." Then, after another pause, "I must have his
head shaved."

Lady Cicely demurred a little to this; but Dr. Staines stood firm, and
his lordship's valet undertook the job.

Staines directed him where to begin; and when he had made a circular
tonsure on the top of the head, had it