We continued our way downstairs, Alice endeavouring to stifle her sobs, and I in a dazed condition of mind. I was stunned by the fact that that mad experiment of ours should have had such a sudden and strange result. It produced in me a fear that was far worse to bear than the vague anxiety I had felt ever since those fatal tubes of the Sarakoff-Harden bacillus had been emptied into the lake. I stumbled into the drawing-room and threw myself upon a chair. My legs were weak, and my hands were trembling. "Alice," I said, "you must not allow this to distress you. The Blue Disease is not dangerous." She lifted a tear-stained face and looked at me dully. "Richard, I can't bear it any longer. I've given half my life to looking after father. I simply can't bear it." I sat up and stared at her. What strange intuition had come to her? "What do you mean?" She sobbed afresh. "I can't endure the sight of him with those blue eyes," she went on, rather wildly. "Richard, I must get away. I've never been from him for more than a few hours at a time for the last fifteen years. Don't think I want him to die." "I don't." "I'm glad he's better," she remarked irrelevantly. "So am I." "The Perrys were saying that the doctors up in Birmingham think that the Blue Disease cut short other diseases, and made people feel better." She twisted her handkerchief for some moments. "Does it?" she asked, looking at me directly. "I--er--I have heard it does." An idea had come into my mind, and I could not get rid of it. Why should I not tell her all that I knew? "I'm thirty-five," she remarked. "And I'm forty-two." I tried to smile. "Life's getting on for us both," she added. "I know, Alice. I suggested that we should get engaged a short while ago. Now I suggest that we get married--as soon as possible." I got up and paced the room. "Why not?" I demanded passionately. She shook her head, and appeared confused. "It's impossible. Who could look after him? I should never be happy, Richard, as long as he was living." I stopped before her. "Not with me?" "No, Richard. I should be left a great deal to myself. A doctor's wife always is. I've thought it out carefully. I would think of him." After a long silence, I made a proposal that I had refused to entertain before. "Well, there's no reason why he should not come and live with us. There is plenty of room in my house at Harley Street. Would that do?" It was a relief to me when she said that she would not consent to an arrangement of that kind. I sat down again. "Alice," I said quietly, "it is necessary that we should decide our future. There are special reasons." She glanced at me enquiringly. There was a pause in which I tried to collect my thoughts. "Your father," I continued, "is suffering from a very peculiar disease. It is wrong, perhaps, to call it a disease. You wouldn't call life a disease, would you?" "I don't understand."