United States or Mexico ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
He made nothing of the mystery which the newspaper wished, after the manner of its kind, to cast about the case, and thought of other things, while he smoked cigarettes, till he reached the hospital. The house-physician was somewhat surprised by his appearance. "I have just read that paragraph," said Lefevre, handing him the paper. "Oh yes, sir," said the house-physician.
"We'll try again in half an hour," said he to his assistant, and turned away to complete his round of the ward. At the end of the half-hour, Lefevre and the house-physician were again by Lady Mary's bedside.
It was, however, not speculation but action that was needed then. The apparatus described in the case of the young officer was ready, and the house-physician was waiting to give his assistance.
Lefevre and the house-physician passed silently up the ward between the rows of silent blue-quilted beds, while the nurse came silently to meet them with her lamp. Lefevre turned aside a moment to look at a man whose breathing was laboured and stertorous.
Only that evening, just before she had talked with Andover about Pete, she had heard the surgeon tell the house-physician jokingly that all that stood between him and absolute destitution was a very thin and exceedingly popular check-book and Andover had written his personal check for ten dollars which he had cashed at the office.
"I'm insignificant and crippled and ordinary and ugly." She took his face in both her hands and kissed his lips. "You're an old silly, that's what you are," she said. When the hops were picked, Philip with the news in his pocket that he had got the appointment as assistant house-physician at St. Luke's, accompanied the Athelnys back to London.
They came in, strings of anaemic girls, with large fringes and pallid lips, who could not digest their bad, insufficient food; old ladies, fat and thin, aged prematurely by frequent confinements, with winter coughs; women with this, that, and the other, the matter with them. Dr. Tyrell and his house-physician got through them quickly.
"Get some brandy and milk," said Lefevre to his companion. "Who? Where am I?" murmured the patient in a faint voice. "I am Dr Lefevre, and this is St. James's Hospital." "Doctor? hospital? oh, I'm dreaming!" murmured the patient. "We'll talk about that when you have taken some of this," said Lefevre, as the house-physician reappeared with the nurse, bearing the brandy and milk.
"Now, you will observe that he could not have been on the staff of the hospital, since only a man well-established in a London practice could hold such a position, and such a one would not drift into the country. What was he, then? If he was in the hospital and yet not on the staff he could only have been a house-surgeon or a house-physician little more than a senior student.
Lefevre was left seriously discomposed, but at once he sent for the house-physician, summoned the Sister and the nurse, and set about his third attempt to revive his patient. He got the bed turned north and south.
Word Of The Day