Flames

f a busy man's hobbies. No patient ever told the sad secrets of his body here. Here were no medical books, no appliances for the writing of prescriptions, no hints of

ants, Rupert and Mab, the doctor's mastiffs, who took their evening ease, pillowing their huge heads upon each other's heaving bodies. The ticking clock on the mantelpiece was an imitation of the Devil Clock of Master Zacharius. There were no newspapers in the room. That fact alone made it original. A large cage of sleeping canaries

of fresh air. The atmosphere of the European Hotel had been sinister and dreary, as of a building consecrated to hidden deeds, and inhabited mainly by wandering sinners. This home of a great doctor was open-hearted and receptive, frank and refined. The sleeping dogs, heaving gently in fawn-coloured beatitude, set upon it the

fference between men and the companion animals whom they love and who love them. What man, however natural, however independent and serene, could emulate the majestic and deliberate abandon of a big dog courted and caressed by a blazing fire and a soft rug? Man has not the dignity of soul to be so grandly natural. Yet his very pert self-consciousness, the fringed petticoats of affectation which he wears, give him the kennel, the collar, the muzzle, the whip, weapons of power to bring the dog to subjection. And Julian, as he watched Rupert and Mab wrapped in large lethargic dreams, found himself pitying them, as civilized man vaguely pities all other inhabitants of the round world. Poor old things! Sombre agitations were not theirs. They had nothing to aim at or to fight against. No devils and angels played at football with their souls. Their liaiso

see you, Add

onto their legs and laid th

lease brin

s,

you have bran

please,

cloak and hat, and the do

as gone home to

es

l right,

ooking more fit than usual to-day, mo

k me very forcibly, very forcibly indeed. But you-" and the doctor's

igar. The mastiffs coil

d, and he sighed too, q

fore midnight, the hour

t on Rupert's b

the Park. Get off your horse now and then, tie him up at a lych-gate and sit in a village church. Listen to the amateur organist practising 'Abide with me,' and the 'Old Hundredth,' on the Leiblich Gedacht and the Dulciana, with the bourdon on the pedals. There

I am feeling a bit out of sorts to-nig

y you haven't been sitt

promise. Wel

replied

ld you about,

lusions to Marr and evident strange interest in the man, had imp

t dis

here is going to

did he

st as Valentine came out of his trance, it must h

why do you connect t

can you tel

sion, the tone

ecting them. I told Valentine so to-night

come from tha

es

Hotel, but he left to the last the immense impressi

him," he said. "His face, dead, was the most absolutely direct c

gone, you s

it which remained to wor

, the droop of limbs and features, the absolute abs

s a-well, a strong happiness and a goodness. And Marr had alw

d the doctor, still meditatively, took the basin of gruel onto his knees. As he sipped it, he looked a strange, little, serious ascetic, sitting there in the light from the wax candles, h

utely nothing of Ma

not

o the aspect of good at death. I believe the man must have been far less evil than you thought him, for dead faces express something that was always

lian a

e greatest rips, one of the most merciless men in London. I never felt ab

een him," Docto

Julian's last remark

rong impression o

es

what way,

n hes

me. I felt that he had a great power of intellect, or of will, or something. But in every way he sugges

A

ruel and put down the bas

direction? Would he, for instance, go home from

w at all whe

im with animals,-with

N

as you suppose, any dog

ogs avoid pe

y, Add

and Val

d his right foot slowly backwards and forwards on Rupert

le beggar. But do you mean to tell me he has

worse than ever. If Val

gone half mad. I had to

'm

t unacco

rt and Mab were to turn against me like that I believe it would

n his hand over Rup

faithfulness of animals, but I don't mean to do that. I have a great belief in som

doctor, whom

him through thick and thin. And

, as if it puzzled him so utterly that

ous, subtle reason for t

ectionate knowledge of

he is not with Cresswel

atural and happy. Do

He did

ms contente

ui

, that Rip doesn't seem

unca

word, when I look back into the past of, say, a fortnight ago, I ask myself whether I am a fool, or dreaming, or

off. Then

at White's could see into my mind they wo

head and a good heart. But it is as you say. You and Valentine have run, as a train runs into the Black Country,

er whimsically

g male muscles. Yes, you want the foils, the bicycle, the droning organ, and the village church. I advise you to go out of town f

mark surpri

not?" h

t of your usual, your right course. I see that your mind is moving in a rather nar

cage, going round and round. That's just it. Valentine and Marr are in that cursed circle of our sittings, and so I

es

our last sitting. Supposing, as you say, he had a hypnotic power

ion in his quiet and yet very co

lly to connect them together. It is, as you said,"

ratic doctor. What

iendship

sts that human nature is perpetually at the pains to set walking in their shrouds to cause alarm. All Julian's ghosts were laid. He smoked on and grew to feel perfectly natural and comfortable. The dogs echoed and emphasized all the healing power of their small and elderly master. As they lay sleeping, a tangle of large limbs and supine strength, the fire shone over them till their fawn-coloured coats gleamed almost like satin touched with gold. The delightful sanctity of unmeasured confidence, unmeasured satisfaction, sang in their gentle and large-hearted snores, which rose and fell with the regularity of waves of the sea. Now and then one of them slowly s

his is, doctor," h

words go slowly from his lips. "I wish I could give to

ed their

go," Julian

pleasure. It loses its savour. But I think, Addison, t

Julian the

he added, looking at their happiness with a shini

y, into serenity and peace. Occasional coals dropping into the fender with a hot tick, tick, chirrupped a

vest attitude which such features of a dog can assume, lifted themselves up and pointed grimly forward as he listened to something. His flaccid legs contracted under him, and the muscles of his back quivered. Mab, less readily alert, quickly caught the infection of his a

t have heard some sound in the street that is entirely inaudible

yield readily, and tumble over onto the warm rug to sleep once more. But Rupert resisted h

after, doctor

a bell rang

easure," Levillier said. "A su

bell sounded again, and the footstep of Lawler, who always sat up as late as his master, was heard on the stairs from the servants' part of the house. It pass

his before," the doctor

tness, showing their teeth, and standing each by the door as if sentinels on guard. The colloquy ceasing, steps again sounded in the hall, but more than Lawler's. Evidently the man was returning toward

are not to op

ars in his two hands. They tugged and leaped to get away, but he held on. The surpr

our pard

said hastil

just come into the house to pieces if we

was like live iron with det

awler," the doctor said.

is Mr. Cresswell, Mr. Va

iso

himself go s