to help in any way I can, though I'm just a general practitioner, and this seems like a case for a specialist; but if you think it's hopeless—well, I'm hanged if I'll let you hand me the bag to hold. Signing death certificates for other doctors' patients isn't my idea of recreation—"
"Oh, no, sir!" McCormick's sharp denial bordered on hysteria. "It's not like that, at all. It's a matter of professional ethics. My personal interest—you see—oh, hang it, sir!—I'm in love with my patient. I can't observe her objectively any more, can't regard her illness as a case; can't even see her as a woman. She's the woman; the one woman in the world for me, and I'm afraid I might overlook a symptom that might lead me to a cure. When you begin to see a body that's functioning faultily not as a defective piece of physical mechanism, but as a beloved woman, your value as a scientist is impaired. When every indication of unfavorable prognosis throws you into panic—"
"I understand, my boy," I interrupted. "The rule that makes us call in other doctors for our families is a wise one. Sometimes I think the physician, like the priest, should remain celibate. I'll be glad to look in on your patient—"
"And so shall I, if you permit it," Jules de Grandin added as he stepped into the study. "Your pardon, Monsieur," he apologized to McCormick, "but I could not help hear what you said to Friend Trowbridge as I came down the hall. It was not that I eavesdropped, but"—he raised one shoulder in a Gallic shrug—"je n’ai que faire de vous dire."
I made the necessary introductions and the little Frenchman dropped into a chair, then crossed his hands in his lap and stared fixedly at my visitor. "Say on, Monsieur," he ordered. "Tell me of this case which has deprived you of the goat."
"I'll try to be as clinical as possible," McCormick responded. "Her name is Anastasia Pappalukas; age twenty-three, unmarried. And"—his voice took on a sandy grittiness—"she's dying; dying for no earthly reason except that she is."
De Grandin nodded. "You have made the tentative diagnosis?"
"A dozen of 'em, sir, and they're all wrong. The only thing I'm certain of is that she's fading like a wilting flower, and nothing I can do seems any use."
"Pardonnez-moi, do not mean to be too obvious, but sometimes we are blinded by our very nearness to a case. You have not discounted the possibility of latent TB?"
McCORMICK gave a short, chinding laugh. "I have not, sir;, nor anemia, nor any other likely ailment. Her sputum tests are all negative, so are her X-rays. Her temperature is nearly always normal; I've made repeated blood counts, and while she’s just below the million mark the deficiency isn’t great enough to cause concern. About her only objective symptoms are progressive loss of weight and increasing pallor; subjectively she complains of loss of appetite, slight headaches in the morning and profound lassitude. Lately she’s been troubled by nightmares; says she’s afraid to go to sleep for fear of 'em."
"U'm? One sees. And how long has this condition obtained?"
"I'm not quite sure, sir. I've had the case about three months, but how long she'd been ill before they called me I can't say. I don't know much about her background; you see, I'd never met her till they called me. It seems she's been in what we used to call 'a decline' for some time, but you know how vague laymen are. She might have started downhill long before they called me, and not become aware of her condition till her illness had progressed beyond the hope of successful treatment."
He paused a moment, then, "Have you ever heard of a disease called gusel vereni?" he asked.
"Mon Dieu!” the Frenchman exploded. "Where did you hear of him, Monsieur, if you please?”
"I ran across the term for the first time last night, sir. I stopped at the County Medical Society library on my way from Anastasia's and happened to pick up a copy of Wolfgang Wholbruck's Medicine in the Near East. I don't know what made me consult the book, except that Anastasia is a Greek—her family came here in '21 as refugees from Smyrna after Greece had
