"
"You are not highly circumstantial," Thorndyke remarked.
Mr. Brodribb looked at me with a genial smile.
"What a glutton for facts this fellow is, Jervis. But you're right,
Thorndyke; I'm vague. However, Fred will be here presently. We travel
down together, and I took the liberty of asking him to call for me.
We'll get him to tell you about his delusions, if you don't mind. He's
not shy about them. And meanwhile I'll give you a few preliminary facts.
The trouble began about a year ago. He was in a railway accident, and
that knocked him all to pieces. Then he went for a voyage to recruit,
and the ship broke her propeller-shaft in a storm and became helpless.
That didn't improve the state of his nerves. Then he went down the
Mediterranean, and after a month or two, back he came, no better than
when he started. But here he is, I expect."
He went over to the door and admitted a tall, frail young man whom
Thorndyke welcomed with quiet geniality, and settled in a chair by the
fire. I looked curiously at our visitor. He was a typical
neurotic--slender, fragile, eager. Wide-open blue eyes with broad
pupils, in which I could plainly see the characteristic "hippus"--that
incessant change of size that marks the unstable nervous
equilibrium--parted lips, and wandering taper fingers, were as the
stigmata of his disorder.
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