"Yes," I said, remembering how that I had promised to blindly and obediently render my protectress whatever assistance she desired. "I presume you desire some service of me. What is it?" "No," he said. "You are mistaken. It is with regard to the terrible affliction from which I see you are suffering that I have been sent." "Are you a medical man?" I inquired, with some astonishment. "I am an oculist," was his reply. "And your name?" "Slade--James Slade." "And you have been sent here by whom?" "By a lady whose real name I do not know." "But you will kindly explain, before we go further, the circumstance in which she sought your aid on my behalf," I said firmly. "You are mutual friends," he answered, somewhat vaguely. "It is no unusual thing for a patient to seek my aid on behalf of a friend. She sent me here to see you, and to examine your eyes, if you will kindly permit me." The man's bearing irritated me, and I was inclined to resent this enforced subjection to an examination by one of whose reputation I knew absolutely nothing. Some of the greatest oculists in the world had looked into my sightless eyes and pronounced my case utterly hopeless. Therefore I had no desire to be tinkered with by this man, who, for aught I knew, might be a quack whose sole desire was to run up a long bill. "I have no necessity for your aid," I answered, somewhat bluntly. "Therefore any examination is entirely waste of time." "But surely the sight is one of God's most precious gifts to man," he answered, in a smooth, pleasant voice; "and if a cure is possible, you yourself would, I think, welcome it." "I don't deny that," I answered. "I would give half that I possess-- nay, more--to have my sight restored, but Sir Leopold Fry, Dr Measom, and Harker Halliday have all three seen me, and agree in their opinion that my sight is totally lost for ever. You probably know them as specialists?" "Exactly. They are the first men in my profession," he answered. "Yet sometimes one treatment succeeds where another fails. Mine is entirely and totally different to theirs, and has, I may remark, been successful in quite a number of cases which were pronounced hopeless." Mere quackery, I thought. I am no believer in new treatments and new medicines. The fellow's style of talk prejudiced me against him. He actually placed himself in direct opposition to the practice of the three greatest oculists in the world. "Then you believe that you can actually cure me?" I remarked, with an incredulous smile. "All I ask is to be permitted to try," he answered blandly, in no way annoyed by my undisguised sneer. "Plainly speaking," I answered, "I have neither inclination nor intention to place myself at your disposal for experiments. My case has been pronounced hopeless by the three greatest of living specialists, and I am content to abide by their decision."