‘I am pleased to say that religious opposition has almost entirely ceased here, if we except the occasional remark from some caustic old maid whose prospects of using chloroform are forever passed.’

Mrs Simpson frowned a little at this remark, but the professor continued without pause.

‘An Irish lady said to me recently how unnatural it was for the doctors of Edinburgh to be taking away the pains of labour. Painless labour, she said, was both unnatural and improper. How unnatural it is for you, I replied, to have swum over from Ireland to Scotland against wind and tide in a steamboat.’

The professor laughed at his own story, a laugh that became infectious the longer it went on, until Mrs Simpson and Raven joined in.

Raven thought that, on this point, the professor was probably right. There was always a certain prejudice in some minds against anything new, a resistance to breaking with tradition and custom. He remembered the concerns expressed about the speed of the new railway carriages, how such unaccustomed forces applied to the human frame would induce apoplexy. He was about to say as much but was prevented from doing so by a knock at the door. A man entered carrying a sheaf of papers.

‘Mr Quinton, I thought you had already left,’ Dr Simpson said. ‘Your wife will be wondering what has become of you.’

The newcomer looked curiously towards Raven, whereupon the professor made introductions.

‘Dr Will Raven, this is Mr James Quinton, who I have hired as my secretary. Mrs Simpson finally prevailed upon me that I ought to engage help in organising my papers.’

He said this as though talking about some trivial undertaking over which his wife had made an undue fuss. Mrs Simpson’s expression betrayed nothing, but Raven knew the truth of it. The professor was quite chaotic in his organisation, often forgetting appointments. And his lackadaisical attitude to certain practical matters was best summed up by the fact that it was one of Jarvis’s tasks to go through his pockets at the end of the day and collect the payments he had secreted there, as he was liable to forget about them altogether. Jarvis had also complained that Dr Simpson’s keen interest in archaeology led to him wrapping arrowheads and old coins he had found in banknotes of high denomination, lest the butler be tempted to throw them away.

Quinton was a thin man with a long face. He had a sombre look about him, as though heavily burdened by something. Raven could well imagine that organising the professor’s affairs was the cause.

‘Quinton is currently assisting me with a most vital project,’ the professor said. ‘I am in the process of collating the results of my enquiry into the mortality attendant on surgical operations and whether anaesthesia makes any difference.’