“One moment yet,” he said, “one moment before I take my leave.  I ask permission at parting to impress on you an urgent necessity.  It is this, sir.  You must not think of waiting till Miss Halcombe recovers before you receive Lady Glyde.  Miss Halcombe has the attendance of the doctor, of the housekeeper at Blackwater Park, and of an experienced nurse as well—­three persons for whose capacity and devotion I answer with my life.  I tell you that.  I tell you, also, that the anxiety and alarm of her sister’s illness has already affected the health and spirits of Lady Glyde, and has made her totally unfit to be of use in the sick-room.  Her position with her husband grows more and more deplorable and dangerous every day.  If you leave her any longer at Blackwater Park, you do nothing whatever to hasten her sister’s recovery, and at the same time, you risk the public scandal, which you and I, and all of us, are bound in the sacred interests of the family to avoid.  With all my soul, I advise you to remove the serious responsibility of delay from your own shoulders by writing to Lady Glyde to come here at once.  Do your affectionate, your honourable, your inevitable duty, and whatever happens in the future, no one can lay the blame on you.  I speak from my large experience—­I offer my friendly advice.  Is it accepted—­Yes, or No?”

I looked at him—­merely looked at him—­with my sense of his amazing assurance, and my dawning resolution to ring for Louis and have him shown out of the room expressed in every line of my face.  It is perfectly incredible, but quite true, that my face did not appear to produce the slightest impression on him.  Born without nerves—­evidently born without nerves.

“You hesitate?” he said.  “Mr. Fairlie!  I understand that hesitation.  You object—­see, sir, how my sympathies look straight down into your thoughts!—­you object that Lady Glyde is not in health and not in spirits to take the long journey, from Hampshire to this place, by herself.  Her own maid is removed from her, as you know, and of other servants fit to travel with her, from one end of England to another, there are none at Blackwater Park.  You object, again, that she cannot comfortably stop and rest in London, on her way here, because she cannot comfortably go alone to a public hotel where she is a total stranger.  In one breath, I grant both objections—­in another breath, I remove them.  Follow me, if you please, for the last time.  It was my intention, when I returned to England with Sir Percival, to settle myself in the neighbourhood of London.  That purpose has just been happily accomplished.  I have taken, for six months, a little furnished house in the quarter called St. John’s Wood.  Be so obliging as to keep this fact in your mind, and observe the programme I now propose.  Lady Glyde travels to London (a short journey)—­I myself meet her at the station—­I take her to rest and sleep at my house, which is also the house