rmed Wade that the Doctor was out on a call, but
would be back presently. She led the way into the study, turned up the
lamp and left him. The study was office and library and living-room in
one, a large, untidy room with books lining two sides of it, and a third
devoted to shelf on shelf of bottles and jars and boxes. Near the bottle
end of the apartment the Doctor had his desk and his few appliances. At
the other end was a big oak table covered with a debris of books,
magazines, newspapers, tobacco cans, pipes, and general litter. There
was a mingled odor, not unpleasant, of drugs and disinfectants, tobacco
and leather. Wade made himself comfortable in a big padded armchair, one
of those genuinely comfortable chairs which modern furnishers have
thrust into oblivion, picked up a magazine at random, slapped the dust
off it and filled his pipe. He was disturbed by the sound of brisk
footsteps on the bricks outside. Then a key was inserted in the lock and
the Doctor entered from the little lobby, bag in hand.

"Ha! Who have we here? Welcome, my dear Herrick, welcome! I hope you
come as a friend and not as a patient. Quite right, sir. Keep out of the
doctor's clutches as long as possible. Well, well, a warm night this."
The Doctor wiped his face with his handkerchief, wafting a strong odor
of ether about the room. Then he took off his black frock-coat, hung it
on a hook behind the door, and slipped into a rusty old brown velvet
house-coat. After that he filled his pipe, talking the while, and, when
it was lighted, said "Ha" again very loudly and contentedly, and took
down a half-gallon bottle from the medicine shelves. This he placed on
the table by the simple expedient of sweeping a pile of newspapers to
the floor.

"Now where are those glasses, I wonder?" He looked about the room
searchingly over the tops of his spectacles. "There we are." He
discovered one on his desk and another on the shelf over the little
sink. The latter held some liquid which he first smelled, then tasted
and finally threw away. "Wonder what that was," he muttered. "Well, a
little rinsing will fix it. Here we are now, Mr. Herrick. Pour your
drink, sir, and I'll put the water in. Don't be afraid of it. It's as
mild as milk."

"You're quite sure it isn't laudanum?" asked Wade, with a suspicious
look at the big bottle.

"Bless you, no." The Doctor lowered himself into a chair with a sigh of
relief and contentment. "Now tell me the news, Mr. Herric