"He was in the very act of leaping when a hand grasped him by the collar."
I MUST confess that I have not told the truth concerning the beginning of my relations with Dr. Ivan Brodsky, in whose company I witnessed so many marvels of psychical experiment. I have said that I became his secretary through our association at the hospital, where I was one of his lecture class. That is true; nevertheless, I have omitted—through shame, I must confess—the story of the experiences that brought about our intimacy.
I was desperate with ill fortune. Everything had gone against me. I had graduated from the hospital the year before, rashly married upon the strength of an expected position which never materialized, attempted to practise without obtaining a single patient a week, and finally found ruin at my side. What little fortune I had left was lost when the great panic of '93 swept over the country. Is it a wonder that I resolved to seek that oblivion which I foolishly believed would be attained by suicide?
It was a dark November evening and I was standing upon the extremity of the deserted wharf, ill-clad, hungry, and homeless. I remember how I looked at the black, oily water flowing swiftly beneath me, gathering resolution to jump. At last I attained it; I stepped back a few paces, and was in the very act of leaping when a hand grasped me by the collar and forcibly arrested me in mid-air. It was then that, looking back at my rescuer, I discovered that it was the doctor who had saved me.
NOTE.—This is the ninth in a series of stories, each complete in itself, dealing with Dr. Ivan Brodsky, "The Surgeon of Souls."
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