“In a word, then,” continued Maitland, not heeding the doctor's question, but bending his gaze fixedly on the piece of paper before him, scrawled over and blotted by his own hand,--“in a word, then, a man of seventy, seized with paralysis, and, though partially rallied by bleeding, attacked with shivering, is in a very critical state? But how long might he live in that way?” “We are not now speaking of Commodore Graham, I apprehend?” asked the doctor, slyly. “No; I am simply putting a case,--a possible case, Doctors, I know, are not fond of these imagined emergencies; lawyers like them.” “Doctors dislike them,” broke in Reede, “because they are never given to them in any completeness,--every important sign of pulse and tongue and temperature omitted--” “Of course you are right,” said Maitland, crumpling up the telegram and the other papers; “and now for the Commodore. You are not apprehensive of anything serious, I hope?” “It 's an anxious case, sir,--a very anxious case; he 's eighty-four.” “Eighty-four!” repeated Maitland, to whom the words conveyed a considerable significance. “Eighty-four!” repeated the other, once more. “No one would suspect it. Why, Sally Graham is the same age as my wife; they were at school together.” Too polite to push a question which involved a double-shotted answer, Maitland merely said, “Indeed!” and, after a slight pause, added, “You said, I think, that the road to Dundalk led past Commodore Graham's cottage?” “By the very gate.” “May I offer you a seat with me? I am going that way. I have received news which calls me suddenly to England.” “I thank you much, but I have some visits yet to make before I return to Port-Graham. I promised to stop the night there.” Having charged the doctor to convey to the Commodore's daughters his sincere regret for their father's illness, and his no less sincere hope of a speedy recovery, Maitland endeavored, in recognition of a preliminary question or two about himself, to press the acceptance of a fee; but the doctor, armed with that self-respect and tact his profession so eminently upholds, refused to accept it, and took his leave, perhaps well requited in having seen and spoken with the great Mr. Norman Maitland, of whom half the country round were daily talking. “Mr. Maitland is not ill, I hope?” said Alice, as she met the doctor on his way through the garden. “No, Mrs. Trafford; I have been making a friendly call--no more,” said the doctor, rather vain that he could thus designate his visit; and with a few words of advice about her sister, he went his way. Alice, meanwhile, saw that Maitland had observed her from his window, and rightly guessed that he would soon be in search of her.