Still, I will give Kennedy credit for a tactfulness that I didn't
know the old fellow possessed. He carried through the preliminary
questions very well for a pseudo-doctor, appealing to me as his
assistant on inconsequential things that enabled me to "save my
face" perfectly. When he came to the critical moment of opening
the black bag, he made a very appropriate and easy remark about
not having brought any sharp shiny instruments or nasty black
drugs.
"All I wish to do, Miss Bond, is to make a few, simple little
tests of your nervous condition. One of them we specialists call
reaction time, and another is a test of heart action. Neither is
of any seriousness at all, so I beg of you not to become excited,
for the chief value consists in having the patient perfectly
quiet and normal. After they are over I think I'll know whether
to prescribe absolute rest or a visit to Newport."
She smiled languidly, as he adjusted a long, tightly fitting
rubber glove on her shapely forearm and then encased it in a
larger, absolutely inflexible covering of leather. Between the
rubber glove and the leather covering was a liquid communicating
by a glass tube with a sort of dial. Craig had often explained to
me how the pressure of the blood was registered most minutely on
the dial, showing the varied emotions as keenly as if you had
taken a peep into the very mind of the subject.
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