I have seen sick people look at me in the same way, when they were afraid they were to be operated upon; and I thought I now understood at any rate this much, that what wanted operating on here was my friend's confidence, and this would require all my dexterity.
I was once the most confiding fellow under the sun; but since I became a doctor and saw what people really are, I have become thoroughly suspicious; for there is nothing in the whole world you may not have to presuppose, even with the best of mortals, if you do not want to be misled as to the cause of their disease.

I suspect everybody and everything, even, as the reader has seen above, those sedate men who go out in stormy weather.

An Indian does not steal more unperceived and noiselessly through a primeval forest than I, when necessary, into my patient's confidence; and my friend David had all at once become my patient.

He would scarcely succeed in deceiving _me_ any longer with his talk about "old days" and a glass of punch in his "unchanged student's den." My first strategem was now hastily to continue the inspection of the room, which my friend had somewhat cursorily allowed me to begin.

I took the lamp and began to look about me.
Under the sloping ceiling, against the wall opposite the sofa, was the bed, with a little round table beside it.