The Doctor said no more, for the young man came back with bandages, lint, and oil. All three had evidently been purchased in anticipation of their being wanted. The Doctor applied them as well as he could, by the dim light of the lamp. The patient moved and moaned, but he did not open his eyes or show any signs of consciousness; the other two did not speak once. His task concluded, the Doctor turned to them abruptly. "He had better be moved at once; he cannot pass the night here--indeed, he should have been got up-stairs at the first. If there is any assistance that you can call it will be as well. He is utterly helpless. He must be carried." "Good!" said the elder man quietly, and with the suspicion of a mocking smile at the corners of his mouth. "Explain, sir, if you please. Carried where?" "Up-stairs, of course!" "Up-stairs!" Both men laughed, but only the elder echoed the word. "Impossible, sir!" he said coolly. "But I tell you he must be moved!" exclaimed the Doctor impatiently. "You have risked his life already by your delay." "Reassure yourself, sir," said the other, in the same tone as before. "He shall be moved--I have said it!" "Then where, if not up-stairs?" "Out of the house." "Out of the house--in this condition? You must be out of your mind! It will kill him!" Doctor Brudenell was excited. He rebelled against this treatment of his patient--as his patient. As merely a man he would not have cared. "Kill him--so be it!" The speaker shrugged his shoulders, with a smile that expanded the scar on his cheek, and the Doctor involuntarily moderated his tone. He instinctively recognized that he had spoken too bluntly, too hastily to this man, who looked impenetrable. "You must really understand," he urged, "the great risk of what you are about to do. This man's condition is dangerous now; the shock to the system may be so great that even with the best of care he will not recover. By doing what you propose you seriously jeopardize what chance he has of life. When do you intend to move him?" "Sir, at once!" "What--now--in the middle of the night?" "Exactly, sir." "Preposterous!" the Doctor cried excitedly. "It shall not be done!" "Indeed. And who, sir, will prevent it?" "If necessary, I will." The man put down the lamp upon the boards that served as a table, put his hands to his sides, and laughed. Not loudly or heartily, but with intense mocking enjoyment, as at something too grotesquely absurd for speech. Then suddenly, exerting a surprising amount of strength for so old a man, he put his two hands upon the shoulders of the slightly-built Doctor, and, holding him so, stood looking down at him tauntingly, laughing still.