Doctor Brudenell did so, then started and stopped involuntarily. A sick man, a man on the point of dying--were they mad enough to keep him in a room such as this? A room? A sty, rather! The door was stone, with a few sacks spread upon it; the windows were secured by crazy shutters, the only table was formed by boards laid upon two old barrels, and the two or three chairs were broken. The only other piece of furniture or semblance of furniture was an old couch, the horse-hair covering tattered, straggling pieces of the stuffing hanging down. Lying upon it was the figure of a man, with some roughly-applied bandages about his head and face. Strange as it all was, the sight of this man, the cause of his being there, restored to the Doctor his professional coolness and self-possession. He was a medical man--this was his patient. He advanced, and with rapid deft fingers removed the bandages, laying bare a face so horribly disfigured that, practiced as he was, he felt his own turn pale. He spoke quickly and aloud, knowing that the sick man was insensible, and looking at the other two. "What's this? What has happened to this man? He is burnt!" "As you say, sir." The gray-haired man, still holding the lamp, bowed. "Most horribly burnt--and with chemicals. Is it not so?" "It is, sir." "There has been an explosion. He was trying to do something with them--probably combine them--he made a mistake in his method or calculations, and they exploded," said the Doctor rapidly. "Again you are right, sir." The two men exchanged swift glances of mingled admiration and contempt--admiration of the Doctor's quickness and lucidity, contempt of him for being there. He did not see them; he was continuing his examination of the insensible man. The injuries to the head and face were the worst, but the throat, chest, and arms were also burned severely. Doctor Brudenell rose from the knee upon which he had sunk down to pursue his examination. "You should have told me what the case was," he said sternly, looking at the young man. "You bring me here in ignorance, and I am absolutely helpless. I have no materials for treating injuries such as these. I require lint, oil, bandages." "They are here," said the gray-haired man quietly; and as his companion, in obedience to a motion of his hand, left the room, he looked at the Doctor, and asked anxiously, "Sir, can you save his life?" "I don't know--it depends upon his constitution--of which I know nothing--and the care that is bestowed upon him. But"--with a glance round the wretched apartment--"he will not live if he stays here." "He will not stay here."