"It does not endanger his life," her visitor replied, "because that is
already forfeit. I come now to the condition which involves you, which
explains my presence here this afternoon. It is also his earnest
desire that you should attend him so far as London as his nurse."

The look of vague apprehension which had brought a questioning frown
into Katharine Beverley's face faded away. It was succeeded by an
expression of blank and complete surprise.

"That I should nurse him--should cross with him to London?" she
repeated. "Why, I do not know this man Phillips. I never saw him in my
life! I have not even been in Ward Fourteen since he was
brought there."

"But he," Jocelyn Thew explained, "has seen you. He has been a visitor
at your hospital before he was received there as a patient. He has
received from various doctors wonderful accounts of your skill.
Besides this, he is a superstitious man, and he has been very much
impressed by the fact that you have never lost a patient. If you had
been one of your own probationers, the question of a fee would have
presented no difficulties, although he personally is, I believe, a
poor man. As it is, however, his strange craving for your services has
become a charge upon me."

"It is the most extraordinary request I ever heard in my life,"
Katharine murmured. "If I had ever seen or spoken to the man, I could
have understood it better, but as it is, I find it impossible to
understand."