This went on over and over again, with the feeling growing on Richard that he was to be "sent to Coventry," the two who had witnessed the encounter having evidently heard a great deal that passed between the cousins and communicated the words that had fallen at the time. All this was maddening, but it was overborne by the one dread thought-- Suppose Mark really were dead, what should he do? The leaden minutes went slowly on, and somehow he gathered that the two doctors had been performing a crucial operation and one of them had gone; and, unable to bear the suspense longer, Richard turned to go and ask for himself, when the door was opened and Jerry appeared, to raise his hand and beckon to him to come out. Richard obeyed the sign, and hurried into the hall in the midst of a profound silence. "How is he?" whispered the lad, excitedly; and the man shook his head. "Don't ask me, sir," he cried. "Master wants to see you in the study." Richard uttered a low, piteous sigh, and everything seemed to swing round him, while an intense desire came to rash wildly out of the house and hurry away anywhere--to woods, or out on some vast plain, where he would be alone to think, if it were possible, and get rid of the violent throbbing in his brain. "Oh, I shall go mad!" he muttered. At that moment Jerry threw open the study door, and, trying to nerve himself for the encounter, Richard entered, to find the great tutor standing, with his hands behind him, before the fireless grate. "How is he, Mr Draycott? Pray, pray speak!" cried Richard. "I sent for you to tell you, Frayne," said the tutor, in a low, deep voice. "Sinking fast!" "Dying?" cried Richard, wildly. "No, no, sir; don't say that!" "The doctors have done all they can, Frayne. He is perfectly insensible, and they say he will pass away before many hours are gone." Richard groaned, and clapped his hands to his head, pressing them there as if to clear his brain. "More help!" he said suddenly. "I have telegraphed for our greatest specialist." "Ah!" "And to the poor fellow's father at Cannes. A terrible business, Frayne--a terrible business!" "Yes; but he must not die--he must not die!" Mr Draycott was silent for a few minutes. There was much he wanted to say, but the words seemed loth to come. "We must be prepared for the worst, Frayne," he said at last. "This is a dreadful shock." "Yes--yes!" groaned Richard. "And I have something very hard to say to you." "You cannot say anything, sir, that will make me feel worse than I do." Mr Draycott shook his head. "It must come, Frayne," he said at last; "so we may as well get the matter over. Things look very black against you." "Black, sir?" "Yes. Sinjohn and Andrews both saw how strange you looked when you passed them, and they followed, being agreed that something was wrong. It was observed too, by others." "I was angry, sir--in a rage."