"Read them, if you must; and, if you can--destroy. But"--his
voice sank so low that Dr. Laidlaw only just caught the dying
syllables--"but--never, never--give them to the world."

And like a grey bundle of dust loosely gathered up in an old garment the
professor sank back into his chair and expired.

But this was only the death of the body. His spirit had died two years
before.




4


The estate of the dead man was small and uncomplicated, and Dr. Laidlaw,
as sole executor and residuary legatee, had no difficulty in settling
it up. A month after the funeral he was sitting alone in his upstairs
library, the last sad duties completed, and his mind full of poignant
memories and regrets for the loss of a friend he had revered and loved,
and to whom his debt was so incalculably great. The last two years,
indeed, had been for him terrible. To watch the swift decay of the
greatest combination of heart and brain he had ever known, and to
realize he was powerless to help, was a source of profound grief to him
that would remain to the end of his days.

At the same time an insatiable curiosity possessed him. The study of
dementia was, of course, outside his special province as a specialist,
but he knew enough of it to understand how small a matter might be the