Poiccart rose and stood irresolutely, with his hands stuffed into his trousers pockets, looking into the fire.
“I often wonder,” he said, “who it is. Don’t you?”
“I’ve got over those sensations of curiosity,” said Gonsalez. “Whoever he is, I am of course satisfied that he is a large-hearted man, working with a singleness of purpose.”
The other nodded in agreement.
“I am sure,” said Graille enthusiastically, “that he has done great work, justifiable work, and honourable work.”
Poiccart nodded gravely.
“By the way,” said the other, “I went to old Lord Verlond—you remember, No. 4 suggested our trying him. He’s a pretty bitter sort of person with a sharp tongue.”
Poiccart smiled.
“What did he do? Tell you to go to the devil?”
“Something of the sort,” said Dr. Gonsalez. “I only got a grudging half-guinea from him, and he regaled me all the time with more than half a guinea’s worth of amusement.”
“But it wasn’t for this work,” said the other.
Gonsalez shook his head.
“No, for another department,” he said with a smile.
They had little more time for conversation. Patients began to come in, and within a quarter of an hour the two men were as busy as men could be attending to the injuries, the diseases and the complaints of the people of this overcrowded neighbourhood.
This great dispensary owed its erection and its continuance to the munificence of three doctors who appeared from nowhere. Who the man was who had contributed £5,000 to the upkeep, and who had afterwards appeared in person, masked and cloaked, and had propounded to three earnest workers for humanity his desire to be included in the organization, nobody knew, unless it was Manfred. It was Manfred the wise who accepted not only the offer, but the bona fides of the stranger—Manfred who accepted him as a copartner.
Casual observers described the three earnest medicos not only as cranks, but fanatics. They were attached to no organization; they gave no sign to the world that they could be in any way associated with any of the religious organizations engaged in medical work. It is an indisputable fact that they possessed the qualifications to practise, and that one—Leon Gonsalez—was in addition a brilliant chemist.
No man ever remembered their going to church, or urging attendance at any place of worship. The religious bodies that laboured in the neighbourhood were themselves astonished.
One by one they had nibbled at the sectarian question. Some had asked directly to what religious organization these men were attached. No answer was offered satisfactory to the inquirers.
It was nearly eleven o’clock that night when the work of the two dispensers had finished. The last patient had been dismissed, the last fretful whimper of an ailing child had died away; the door had been locked, the sweepers were engaged in cleaning up the big waiting-room.
The two men sat in the office—tired, but cheerful. The room was well furnished; it was the common room of the three. A bright fire burnt in the fireplace, big roomy armchairs and settees were in evidence. The floor was carpeted thickly, and two or three rare prints hung on the distempered walls.
They were sitting discussing the events of the evening—comparing notes, retailing particulars of interest in cases which had come under their notice. Manfred had gone out earlier in the evening and had not returned.
Then a bell rang shrilly.
Leon looked up at the indicator.
“That is the dispensary door,” he said in Spanish. “I suppose we’d better see who it is.”
“It will be a small girl,” said Poiccart. “ ‘Please will you come to father; he’s either dead or drunk.’ ”
There was a little laugh at this reminiscence of an incident which had actually happened.
Poiccart opened the door. A man stood in the entrance. “There’s a bad accident just round the corner,” he said. “Can I bring him in here, doctor?”
“What sort of an accident?” said Poiccart.
“A man has been knifed.”
“Bring him in,” said Poiccart.
He went quickly to the common room.
“It’s a stabbing case,” he said. “Will you have him in your surgery, Leon?”
The young man rose swiftly.
“Yes,” he said; “I’ll get the table ready.”
In a few minutes half a dozen men bore in the unconscious form of the victim. It was a face familiar to the two.
They laid him tenderly upon the surgical table, and with deft hands ripped away the clothing from the wound, whilst the policeman who had accompanied the party pushed back the crowd from the surgery door.
The two men were alone with the unconscious man.
They exchanged glances.
“Unless I am mistaken” said carefully, “this is the late Mr. Willie Jakobs.”
That evening May Sandford sat alone in her room reading. Her father, when he had come in to say goodbye to May before going to a directors’ dinner, had left her ostensibly studying an improving book, but the volume now lay unheeded at her side.
That afternoon she had received an urgent note from Black, asking her to meet him “on a matter of the greatest importance.” It concerned her father, and it was very secret. She was alarmed, and not a little puzzled. The urgency and the secrecy of the note distressed her unaccountably.
For the twentieth time she began to read the improving plays of Monsieur Molière, when a knock at the door made her hastily conceal the paper.
“There is a man who wishes to see you,” said the girl who had entered in response to her “Come in.”
“What sort of man?”
“A common-looking man,” said the maid.
She hesitated. The butler was in the house, otherwise she would not have seen the visitor.
“Show him into father’s study,” she said. “Tell Thomas this man is here and ask him to be handy in case I ring for him.”
She had never seen the man whom she found waiting. Instinctively she distrusted his face, though there was something about him which compelled her sympathy.
He was
