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As he wrote his prescription Philip Sheldon rose and looked over his shoulder. The form of the prescription told him that Dr. Jedd knew all! He had suspected this from the first, and the confirmation of this suspicion did not shake him. He grew firmer, indeed; for now he knew on what ground he was standing, and what forces were arrayed against him.
"This woman's help would be of inestimable service," he thought; "her age, her experience of sickness, her familiarity with the patient, especially adapt her for the office she will be required to fill. If Dr. Jedd should order a nurse to watch by the sick-bed, here is the nurse.
Jedd was the last man to stake his reputation upon such a hazard. No: Mr. Sheldon knew that he had played a cautious game; and if he should ultimately lose the stake for which he had ventured, it would be because he had been just a little too cautious. "These things are generally done too quickly," he said to himself. "My mistake has been to make matters too slow."
Hawkehurst is very anxious to hear what I have to say," said Dr. Jedd; "and I really see no objection to his hearing it." "If you have no objection, I can have none," Mr. Sheldon answered. "I must confess, your course of proceeding appears to me altogether exceptional, and " "Yes, Mr. Sheldon; but then, you see, the case is altogether an exceptional case," said the physician, gravely.
Once perceiving this, Valentine was prompt to act. It was the first flash of light in the darkness. "You mean to stand by me in this, don't you?" he asked Mr. Burkham. "With all my heart and soul." "Good. Then you must go to Dr. Jedd instantly.
He went downstairs to the dining-room and rang the bell The parlour-maid came in answer to his summons. "Where is your mistress?" he asked. "Gone out, sir; she went at eight o'clock this morning. And O, if you please, sir, Dr. Jedd called, and said I was to give you this with the certificate." The certificate!
The name of James Dutton was instantly on every lip in town. Citizens who had previously ignored his existence, or really had not been aware of it, were proud of him. The Hon. Jedd Deane said that he had. long regarded James Dutton as a young man of great promise, a er most remarkable young person, in short; one of the kind with much er latent ability.
He calculated the chances for and against this and the result was in his favour. That Dr. Jedd should form certain opinions of Miss Halliday's case was one thing; that he should give public utterance to those opinions was another thing. "What can his opinion matter to me?" Mr. Sheldon asked himself; "opinion cannot touch me in a case where there is no such thing as certainty.
"I really do not understand the basis of your treatment," he said, still looking over the physician's shoulder. Dr. Jedd turned his chair with a sudden movement, and faced him. "Am I talking to Mr. Sheldon the stockbroker, or Mr. Sheldon the surgeon-dentist?" he asked. This was a blow. This allusion to the past was a sharper stroke than any that Philip Sheldon had before received.
Jedd by repute very well indeed, and I withdraw my objection to your course of proceeding, my dear Hawkehurst; though I am sure Dr. Jedd will agree with me that such a course is completely against all professional etiquette, and that Dr. Doddleson will have the right to consider himself aggrieved." "There are cases in which one hardly considers professional etiquette.
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