Bella Donna Part 100

"Hard on her!"

"I sympathize with her very much. Of course, she's told me nothing.

She's too loyal. But I can read between the lines. Tell me, though. Do you think him very bad?"

"Very."

Isaacson spoke without emotion, as if out of a solely medical mind.

"You don't--ah--you don't surely think him in any danger?"

Isaacson slightly shrugged his shoulders.

"But--h'm--but about the sunstroke! If it isn't sunstroke--?"

Hartley waited for an interruption. None came.

"If it isn't sunstroke entirely, the question is, what is it?"

Isaacson looked at him in silence.

"Have you formed any definite opinion?" said Hartley, at last bringing himself to the point.

"I should have to watch the case, if only for a day or two before giving any definite opinion."

"Well, but--informally, what do you think about it? What did you mean upstairs about unless very great care was taken a--a--medical reputation might be--er--ruined over it. 'Ruined' is a very strong word, you know."

The egoist was evidently very much alarmed.

"And then you said that very possibly I might regret ever having had anything to do with it. That was another thing."

Isaacson looked down meditatively.

"I didn't, and I don't, understand what your meaning could have been."

"Doctor Hartley, I can't say very much. A doctor of any reputation who is at all known in the great world has to be guarded. This is not my case. If it were, things would be different. I may have formed an opinion or not. In any event, I cannot give it at present. But I am an older man than you. I have had great experience, and I should be sorry to see a rising young physician, with probably a big future before him, get into deep waters."

"Deep waters?"

Isaacson nodded gravely.

"Mrs. Armine may think this illness is owing to a sunstroke. But she may be wrong. It may be owing to something quite different. I believe it is."

"But what? What?"

"That has to be found out. You are here to find it out."

"I--I really believe a consultation--"

He hesitated.

"But there's her great dislike of you!" he concluded, navely.

Isaacson got up.

"If Mr. Armine gets rapidly worse--"

"Oh, but--"

"If he dies and it's discovered afterwards that the cause of his illness had never been found out by his doctor, and that a consultation with a man--forgive me--as widely known as myself was refused, well, it wouldn't do you any good, I'm afraid."

"Good Heavens!" exclaimed the young man, getting up in a flurry.

"But--but--look here, have you any idea what's the matter?"

"Unless there's a formal consultation, I must decline to say anything on that point."

Doctor Hartley dabbed his forehead with his handkerchief.

"I--I do wish you were on better terms with Mrs. Armine," he said. "I should be delighted to meet you in consultation. It would really be better, much better."

"I think it would. It often requires two brains working in accord to unravel a difficult case."

"Of course it does! Of course it does!"

"Well, I'm just down the river. And I may pole up little higher."

"Of course, if I demand another opinion--"

"Ah, that's your right."

"I shall exercise it."

"Women, even the best of women don't always understand as we do, the gravity of a situation."

"Just what I think!"

"And if--he should get worse--" said Isaacson, gravely, almost solemnly, and at this moment giving some rein to his real, desperately sincere feeling.

"Oh, but--do you think it's likely?"

Isaacson looked steadily at Hartley.

"I do--very likely."

"Whatever she wishes or says, I shall summon you at once. She will be thankful, perhaps afterwards."

"Women admire the man who takes a strong line."

"They do!"