The little doctor followed the man, filled with considerable curiosity as to what manner of man could have inspired so strong a sensation of fear and dislike in the breast of his young wife. Lady Cranstoun’s father had spoken of the son-in-law who would not acknowledge his existence as the “gray wolf.” But then Gypsy Carewe was hardly an unprejudiced person, and Dr. Netherbridge, who always desired to preserve an impartial mind, reminded himself of the fact that a girl of Clare Cranstoun’s undisciplined, keenly emotional nature would necessarily be an extremely trying companion to a man as reserved and proud as Sir Philip was popularly supposed to be. “Dr. Netherbridge, sir.” The servant threw open the library door after a deferential tap on its panels, which was followed by a curt “Come in!” The young doctor found himself in a spacious apartment completely lined with oaken book-cases well filled with volumes. Before the fire, in the Englishman’s favorite attitude, his hands behind him, and his feet set rather wide apart on a lion-skin rug, stood a broad-shouldered and deep-chested man, rather below the medium height, with a square pale face, and black hair which, in spite of the fact that he was but eight-and-twenty, was already streaked with gray. In some indefinable way Sir Philip impressed all who saw him with the sense of power, of mental as well as physical force of very exceptional kind. In features he somewhat resembled the first Napoleon Bonaparte, but, if anything, his mouth was even more rigidly compressed and hard in outline than that of the great conqueror. He appeared to be a man of superb health and physique, notwithstanding his exceptional pallor, which contrasted strangely with the inky blackness of his eyebrows, and of the lashes which bordered his deep-set, glittering, steel-gray eyes. He gazed keenly at the doctor, and then with haughty condescension waved his long white hand toward a chair, which the latter did not take, but remained standing. “You have seen Lady Cranstoun?” Sir Philip began abruptly, in a low-pitched but peculiarly grating voice. “I have just left her.” “What is your opinion?” “She is extremely ill, but more so in mind than in body.” Sir Philip smothered an exclamation of impatience. “As I presume your business doesn’t extend to the mind, perhaps you will be good enough to tell me what is wrong with the body?” “Certainly, Sir Philip. Lady Cranstoun is deliberately starving herself because she does not wish to live.” Sir Philip’s black eyebrows bent heavily over his eyes, which gleamed with suppressed anger. “Can’t she be made insensible by drugs, and food be administered to her then?” he asked, harshly.