"Jaffe," she gasped, gurgling.
"Felix Jaffe?
Professor Felix Jaffe?" asked the doctor.
She nodded with her eyes.
He turned to me. "Could you telephone him?
It would be as well to ask him."
"Yes, yes," I replied. "At once. Then I'll fetch you . . .
Jaffe?"
"Felix Jaffe," said the doctor. "Ask the exchange the number."
"Will she come through?" I still asked.
"She must stop bleeding," said the doctor.
I found the maid and set off down the path.
She pointed out the house with the telephone.
I ran on and knocked at the door.
A small company of people was sitting over coffee and beer.
I took them in with one swift glance and could not understand that people could drink beer while Pat was bleeding.
I put through an urgent call and waited by the instrument.
As I listened into the humming darkness, I saw with strange vividness over the glass top of the door part of the other room.
I saw a bald head bobbing to and fro, yellow under the light; I saw a brooch on the black taffeta of a tight-laced dress, a double chin with a pair of pince-nez and a towering bun of hair—a bony old hand with thick veins drumming on the table . . . I wanted not to see, but I could not help it; it bored into my eyes like a too strong light.
At last the number answered.
I asked for the professor.
"I'm sorry," said, the nurse. "Professor Jaffe is out."
My heart stopped, then pounded again like a sledge-hammer. "Where is he?
I must speak to him at once."
"I don't know.
He may have gone to the clinic."
"Please telephone the clinic.
I'll wait.
You have a second telephone, of course?"
"One moment." The roar began again, the bottomless darkness, over it the thin swinging metal thread.
I gave a startled jump.
In a covered cage beside me a canary chirped.
The sister's voice came again. "Professor Jaffe has already left the clinic."
"Where for?"
"I really can't say, sir."
Beaten.
I leaned against the wall.
"Hello!" said the sister. "Are you there?"
"Yes.
Listen, nurse—you don't know when he will be back?"
"That is quite uncertain."
"Surely he says before he goes out?
He must surely!
In case anything should happen, surely it must be possible to get in touch with him?"
"There is a doctor at the clinic."
"Would you . . . no, that wouldn't help, he wouldn't know. . . .
All right, nurse," said I, dead-tired. "When Professor Jaffe does come in, ask him to ring here at once, urgently." I told her the number. "But most urgently, nurse, please. A matter of life and death."
"You can rely on that, sir." She repeated the number and rang off.
I stood there, alone.
The swaying heads, the bald pate, the brooch, the other room, all so much shiny rubber, very far away.