I am glad I did right," said he.

He stood at the foot of the couch upon which the sleeper was lying, and
looked thoughtfully and intently at the calm features.

"We shall never succeed in this way," he said at last. "This condition
may continue indefinitely, till you are old, and I--until I am older
than I am by many years. He may not grow weaker, but he cannot grow
stronger. Theories will not renew tissues."

Unorna looked up.

"That has always been the question," she answered. "At least, you have
told me so. Will lengthened rest and perfect nourishment alone give a
new impulse to growth or will they not?"

"They will not. I am sure of it now. We have arrested decay, or made it
so slow as to be imperceptible. But we have made many attempts to renew
the old frame, and we are no farther advanced than we were nearly four
years ago. Theories will not make tissues."

"What will?"

"Blood," answered Keyork Arabian very softly.

"I have heard of that being done for young people in illness," said
Unorna.

"It has never been done as I would do it," replied the gnome, shaking
his head and gathering his great beard in his hand, as he gazed at the
sleeper.

"What would you do?"

"I would make it constant for a day, or for a week if I could--a
constant circulation; the young heart and the old should beat together;
it could be done in the lethargic sleep--an artery and a vein--a vein
and an artery--I have often thought of it; it could not fail. The new
young blood would create new tissue, because it would itself constantly
be renewed in the young body which is able to renew it, only expending
itself in the old. The old blood would itself become young again as it
passed to the younger man."

"A man!" exclaimed Unorna.

"Of course. An animal would not do, because you could not produce the
lethargy nor make use of suggestion for healing purposes--"

"But it would kill him!"

"Not at all, as I would do it, especially if the young man were very
strong and full of life. When the result is obtained, an antiseptic
ligature, suggestion of complete healing during sleep, proper
nourishment, such as we are giving at present, by recalling the patient
to the hypnotic state, sleep again, and so on; in eight and forty hours
your young man would be waked and would never know what had happened to
him--unless he felt a little older, by nervous sympathy," added the sage
with a low laugh.

"Are you perfectly sure of what you say?"