Chapter IV

The Official View


I rose on the following morning still possessed by the determination to
make some oportunity during the day to call on Thorndyke and take his
advice on the now urgent question as to what I was to do. I use the word
"urgent" advisedly; for the incidents of the preceding evening had left
me with the firm conviction that poison was being administered for some
purpose to my mysterious patient, and that no time must be lost if his
life was to be saved. Last night he had escaped only by the narrowest
margin--assuming him to be still alive--and it was only my unexpectedly
firm attitude that had compelled Mr. Weiss to agree to restorative
measures.

That I should be sent for again I had not the slightest expectation. If
what I so strongly suspected was true, Weiss would call in some other
doctor, in the hope of better luck, and it was imperative that he
should be stopped before it was too late. This was my view, but I meant
to have Thorndyke's opinion, and act under his direction, but


"The best laid plans of mice and men
Gang aft agley."

When I came downstairs and took a preliminary glance at the rough
memorandum-book, kept by the bottle-boy, or, in his absence, by the