The doctors were some time with the patient, and then they went downstairs, and were closeted together in the library for a time that seemed very long to those who waited for the result of their consultation. Those anxious watchers had followed them downstairs, and were standing beside the expiring fire in the hall, waiting as for the voice of fate. The dining-room door was open. A table laid for supper, with glass and silver shining under the lamplight, and the glow of a blazing fire, suggested comfort and good cheer--and seemed to accentuate the gloom in the hearts of the watchers. What were they talking about, those two in the closed room yonder, Allan wondered. Was their talk all of the sufferer upstairs, and the means of alleviating pain and staving off the inevitable end? or did they wander from that question of life and death to the futilities of everyday conversation--and so lengthen out the agony of those who were waiting for their verdict? At last the door opened, and the two doctors came out into the hall, very grave still, but less gloomy than they had looked in the morning, Lady Emily thought. "He is better--decidedly better than he was twelve hours ago," said the physician. "We have tided over the immediate peril." "And he is out of danger?" questioned Allan, eagerly. "He is out of danger for the moment. He may go on for some time without a recurrence of this morning's attack; but I am bound to tell you that the danger may recur at any time. What has happened must be regarded--I am sorry to be obliged to say it--as the beginning of the end." There was a silence, broken only by the wife's stifled sobs. "My God, how sudden it is! and you say it is hopeless?" said Allan, stunned by the sentence of doom. "To you the thing is sudden; but the mischief is a work of many years. The evil has been there, suspected by your father, but never fully realized. He consulted me ten years ago, and I gave him the best advice the case allowed--prescribed a regimen which I believe he carefully followed--a regimen which consisted chiefly in quietness and careful living. I told him as much as it was absolutely necessary to tell, taking care not to frighten him." "You did not tell me that he was a doomed man," Lady Emily said reproachfully. "My dear lady, to have done that would have been to lessen his chance of cheerful surroundings, to run the risk of sad looks where it was most needful he should find hopefulness. Besides, at that stage of the disease, one might hope for the best--even for a long life, under favourable conditions." "And now--what is the limit of your hope?" asked Allan. "I cannot measure the sands in the glass. Another attack like that of to-day would, I fear, be fatal. It is a wonder to me that he survived the agony of this morning." "And you have told us--that agony may return at any hour. Nothing you can do can prevent its recurrence?" "I fear not; but we shall do the uttermost." "May I see him?"