I took immediate advantage of it to descend myself on Doctor Jones.  He received me with open arms and an insomniacal outburst.  He had been reading up; he had been seeing distinguished confreres; he had been mastering the subject to the last dot, and was panting to begin.  I hated to dampen such friendship and ardor by telling him that I had completely recovered.  Under the circumstances it seemed brutal—­but I did it.  The poor fellow tried to argue with me, but I insisted that I now slept like a top.  It sounded horribly ungrateful.  Here I was spurning the treasures of his mind, and almost insulting him with my disgusting good health.  I swerved off to the house-party; Eleanor’s delight, and so on; Mrs. Matthewman’s pending invitation; the hope that he might have an early date free—­

He listened to it all in silence, walking restlessly about the office, his blue eyes shining with a strange light.  He took up a bronze paper-weight and gazed at it with an intensity of self-absorption.

“I can’t go,” he said.

“Oh, but you have to,” I exclaimed.

“Mr. Westoby,” he resumed, “I was foolish enough to back a friend’s credit at a store here.  He has skipped to Minnesota, and I am left with three hundred and four dollars and seventy-five cents to pay.  To take a three days’ holiday would be a serious matter to me at any time, but at this moment it is impossible.”

I gave him a good long look.  He didn’t strike me as a borrowing kind of man.  I should probably insult him by volunteering.  Was there ever anything so unfortunate?

“I can’t go,” he repeated with a little choke.

“You may never have another opportunity,” I said.  “Eleanor is doing a thing I should never have expected from one of her proud and reserved nature.  The advances of such a woman—­”

He interrupted me with a groan.

“If it wasn’t for my mother I’d throw everything to the winds and fly to her,” he burst out.  “But I have a mother—­a sainted mother, Mr. Westoby—­her welfare must always be my first consideration!”

“Is there no chance of anything turning up?” I said.  “An appendicitis case—­an outbreak of measles?  I thought there was a lot of scarlatina just now.”

He shook his head dejectedly.

“Doctor,” I began again, “I am pretty well fixed myself.  I’m blessed with an income that runs to five figures.  If all goes the way it should we shall be brothers-in-law in six months.  We are almost relations.  Give me the privilege of taking over this small obligation—­”

I never saw a man so overcome.  My proposal seemed to tear the poor devil to pieces.  When he spoke his voice was trembling.

“You don’t know what it means to me to refuse,” he said.  “My self-respect my—­my . . . " And then he positively began to weep!

“You said three hundred and four dollars and seventy-five cents, I believe?”