"Don't be flurried, my dear," said Doctor Asher, as, in a calm, business-like way, he saw to Gartram being laid easily on the floor, where he had fallen in the study. "But he looks so ghastly. You do not think--" "Yes, I do, my child," said the doctor cheerfully. "Not what you think, because I know. He has another fit precisely the same as the last, and it was evidently a sudden seizure, just as he had risen from his chair, after writing that letter." "Then there is no danger?" "Oh, dear, no. That's right, you see. We'll have this mattress on the floor; and he can lie here. Don't be alarmed." "But I am horribly alarmed." "Then you must not be, my child. I will not conceal the fact from you that he will probably be subject to more fits, and may have one at any time." "But I feel so helpless." "So does a doctor, my dear. We try all we can, but time has to perform the greater part of the cure, after we have done all we can to avoid suffocation, and the patient injuring himself in his struggles. There, there; he's going on all right, and you've been a very good, brave girl. I quite admire your behaviour all through; and another time, if I am not here, you will know exactly how to act." "Oh, don't talk of another time, Doctor Asher." "Well, I will not," he said, smiling. "Now, don't be alarmed, but keep perfectly cool, for I must go back and see to that poor fellow at the quarry." "Yes, of course. But, doctor, if my poor father should be taken worse?" "He will not be taken worse, but gradually mend. I shall not be very long away." "No, no; pray don't be long." "No; and mind you are my assistant. So you must be cool and self-possessed. Shall I send Miss Dillon to sit with you?" "Yes, please, do," said the agitated girl, as she gazed wildly at her father's altered face. Doctor Asher seemed rather to resemble a very smooth, black tom cat, and, as he drew down his cuffs, and passed his white hands over his glossy coat, an imaginative person would not have been much surprised to see him begin to lick himself, to remove a few specks caused by the business in which he had been engaged. As he left the study and crossed the hall, with its polished granite flooring, his delicate manner of proceeding toward the drawing-room, and stepping from one to another of the oases of Eastern rugs, was still like the progress of the cat who believed the polished granite to be water, and tried to avoid wetting his paws. When he laid his hand upon the drawing-room door, a murmur of voices came from within, and, as he entered, Mary Dillon jumped up from the low ottoman upon which she had been seated, talking to Glyddyr, and ran quickly to the doctor's side. "How is he?" she said excitedly. "Better, certainly. Miss Gartram wants you to go and stay with her." "Yes, of course. Good-bye, Mr Glyddyr, and thank you for being so kind."