Page:Rowland--The Mountain of Fears.djvu/301

  the door which opened on the boiler-room, and the three of us began to snivel in the shame-faced way characteristic of certain emotional members of the Anglo-Saxon race. I think Burton prayed a little, for he was inclined to be theosophical.

Does he know?' asked Burton, presently.

" 'No,' muttered the doctor, . . . I . . . I put him off. . . .'

" 'You put him off!' I snapped. 'Do you mean to say that you have any hope?'

" 'There's none to have,' he answered a bit sulkily; 'the cornea might just as well have been seared with a Paquelin. . . . '

And yet you put him off!' I snarled, 'and add the hell of uncertainty to the agony he's got to suffer anyway when he hears the truth!'

" 'Go in and tell him yourself then,' grumbled this doctor.

" 'I will,' said I, and flung open the door and went out. I found Dalton lying on his [ 285 ]