Candy contemplated
doing in the future, if his illness had not got in the way, and stopped
him. The question is whether this does, or does not, represent the lost
recollection which he vainly attempted to find when you called on him
this morning?"
"Not a doubt of it!" I answered. "Let us go back directly, and look at
the papers!"
"Quite impossible, Mr. Blake."
"Why?"
"Put yourself in my position for a moment," said Ezra Jennings. "Would
you disclose to another person what had dropped unconsciously from the
lips of your suffering patient and your helpless friend, without first
knowing that there was a necessity to justify you in opening your lips?"
I felt that he was unanswerable, here; but I tried to argue the
question, nevertheless.
"My conduct in such a delicate matter as you describe," I replied,
"would depend greatly on whether the disclosure was of a nature to
compromise my friend or not."
"I have disposed of all necessity for considering that side of the
question, long since," said Ezra Jennings. "Wherever my notes included
anything which Mr. Candy might have wished to keep secret, those notes
have been destroyed.
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