Page:Avon Fantasy Reader 17.djvu/55

RV 53 (THE NOTICEABLE CONDUCT OF PROFESSOR CHADD) "What you are trying to explain to me may be a joke—a slightly unfeeling joke. It may be your sincere view, in which case I ask your pardon for the former suggestion. But, in any case, it appears quite irrelevant to my duties. The mental morbidity, the mental downfall, of Professor Chadd is a thing so painful to me that I cannot easily endure to speak of it. But it is clear there is a limit to everything. And if the Archangel Gabriel went mad it would sever his connection, I am sorry to say, with the British Museum Library."

He was stepping towards the door, but Grant's hand, flung out in dramatic warning, arrested him.

"Stop!" said Basil, sternly. "Stop while there is yet time. Do you want to take part in a great work, Mr. Bingham? Do you want to help in the glory of Europe—in the glory of science? Do you want to carry your head in the air when it is bald or white, because of the part that you bore in a great discovery? Do you want—"

Bingham cut in sharply:

"And if I do want this, Mr. Grant—"

"Then," said Basil, lightly, "your task is easy. Get Chadd £800 a year till he stops dancing."

With a fierce flap of his swinging gloves, Bingham turned impatiently to the door, but in passing out of it found it blocked. Dr. Colman was coming in.

"Forgive me, gentlemen," he said, in a nervous, confidential voice, "the fact is, Mr. Grant, I—er—have made a most disturbing discovery about Mr. Chadd."

Bingham looked at him with grave eyes. "I was afraid so," he said. "Drink, I imagine."

"Drink!" echoed Colman, as if that were a much milder affair. 'Oh no, it's not drink."

Mr. Bingham became somewhat agitated, and his voice grew hurried and vague. "Homicidal mania—" he began.

"No, no," said the medical man, impatiently.

"Think he's made of glass," said Bingham, feverishly, "or says he's God—or—"

"No," said Dr. Colman, sharply, "the fact is, Mr. Grant, my discovery is of a different character. The awful thing about him is—"

"Oh, go on, sir," cried Bingham, in agony.

"The awful thing about him is," repeated Colman, with deliberation, "that he isn't mad."

"Not mad!"

"There are quite well-known physical tests of lunacy," said the doctor, shortly, "he hasn't got any of them."

"But why does he dance?" cried the despairing Bingham. "Why doesn't he answer us? Why hasn't he spoken to his family?"