United States or Netherlands ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
If Vittie is crafty enough to devise such a complicated scheme-for bribing McMeekin without bringing himself within the meshes of the Corrupt Practices Act he is certainly too wise to allow himself to be subjected to my nurse. "Anyway," said Titherington, "it's not Vittie's influenza I came here to talk about." "Have you got the key of your bag with you?"
Of my own actions during the day I can say nothing certainly except this: I asked McMeekin, not once or twice, but every time I saw him, how long it took for influenza to develop its full strength in a man who had thoroughly imbibed the infection. McMeekin either would not or could not answer this simple question.
That evening McMeekin and Titherington both settled down in my bedroom. I was so angry with them that I could not take in what they said to each other, though I was dimly conscious that they were discussing the election. I learned afterward that McMeekin promised to be present at my meeting on the 21st in order to hear Lalage speak.
McMeekin came to see me next morning, and had the effrontery to repeat the statement that I was better. I was not, and I told him so distinctly. After he was gone Titherington came with a large bag in his hand. He sent the nurse out of the room and unpacked the bag. He took out of it a dozen small bottles of champagne. He locked the door and then we drank one of the bottles between us.
I found out afterward that she was the nurse whom McMeekin had summoned by telegraph. What she said to McMeekin or what he said to her I cannot remember.
You can see for yourself, Miss Pettigrew, that I'm not in a state to make suggestions. I'm completely exhausted already and any further mental exertion will bring on a relapse. Do let me ring for tea. I want it myself." The door opened as I spoke. I hoped that my nurse or McMeekin had arrived and would insist on my being left in peace.
I had to explain myself. "The only object I should have in getting up," I said, speaking very slowly and distinctly, "would be to prevent Vittie going round the constituency when I couldn't be after him. Now that he's down himself he can't do anything more than I can; so I may just as well stay where I am." Even then McMeekin failed to catch my point.
I noticed, while she stood before me, that her face was unusually flushed. It seemed to me that she was passing through what McMeekin used to describe as a nerve storm. I leaped to the conclusion that the Archdeacon had not taken kindly to the idea of a marriage with Miss Battersby. "How did it go off?" I asked. "Where's your mother?" said Lalage. "She's not here.
I gave McMeekin twenty-five pounds for medical attendance up to date, just before I asked him to sign the bulletin. I also presented the nurse with a brooch of gold filagree work, which I had brought home with me from Portugal, intending to give it to my mother. It would have been churlish of them, afterward, to refuse to sign my bulletin. This disposed of Vittie and O'Donoghue for the time.
He scolded me and would, I am sure, have gone on scolding me until I cried if what he took for a brilliant idea had not suddenly occurred to him. "It's an ill wind," he said cheerfully, "which can't be made to blow any good. I think I see my way to getting something out of this miserable collapse of yours. I'll call in McMeekin." "If McMeekin is a doctor, get him.
Word Of The Day