“That is very simple.  You will hypnotise him, he will yield very easily, and you will suggest to him very forcibly to forget the girl’s existence.  You can suggest to him to come back to-morrow and the next day, or as often as you please, and you can renew the suggestion each time.  In a week he will have forgotten—­as you know people can forget—­entirely, totally, without hope of recalling what is lost.”

“That is true,” said Unorna, in a low voice.  “Are you sure that the effect will be permanent?” she asked with sudden anxiety.

“A case of the kind occurred in Hungary last year.  The cure was effected in Pesth.  I was reading it only a few months ago.  The oblivion was still complete, as long as six months after the treatment, and there seems no reason to suppose that the patient’s condition will change.  I thought it might interest you to try it.”

“It will interest me extremely.  I am very grateful to you for telling me about him.”

Unorna had watched her companion narrowly during the conversation, expecting him to betray his knowledge of a connection between the Wanderer’s visit and the strange question she had been asking of the sleeper when Keyork had surprised her.  She was agreeably disappointed in this however.  He spoke with a calmness and ease of manner which disarmed suspicion.

“I am glad I did right,” said he.

He stood at the foot of the couch upon which the sleeper was lying, and looked thoughtfully and intently at the calm features.

“We shall never succeed in this way,” he said at last.  “This condition may continue indefinitely, till you are old, and I—­until I am older than I am by many years.  He may not grow weaker, but he cannot grow stronger.  Theories will not renew tissues.”

Unorna looked up.

“That has always been the question,” she answered.  “At least, you have told me so.  Will lengthened rest and perfect nourishment alone give a new impulse to growth or will they not?”

“They will not.  I am sure of it now.  We have arrested decay, or made it so slow as to be imperceptible.  But we have made many attempts to renew the old frame, and we are no farther advanced than we were nearly four years ago.  Theories will not make tissues.”

“What will?”

“Blood,” answered Keyork Arabian very softly.

“I have heard of that being done for young people in illness,” said Unorna.

“It has never been done as I would do it,” replied the gnome, shaking his head and gathering his great beard in his hand, as he gazed at the sleeper.

“What would you do?”

“I would make it constant for a day, or for a week if I could—­a constant circulation; the young heart and the old should beat together; it could be done in the lethargic sleep—­an artery and a vein—­a vein and an artery—­I have often thought of it; it could not fail.  The new young blood would create new tissue, because it would itself constantly be renewed in the young body which is able to renew it, only expending itself in the old.  The old blood would itself become young again as it passed to the younger man.”