“I suppose we may presume there is a fracture,” said he; “at any rate there is no point in looking at it here. I’ll look at it under an anæsthetic,” he said to me, not unkindly, but still without a smile. And a little later, as he went out, he half looked back at my bed.
“Eleven o’clock,” he said to the nurse as he went out.
The tension relaxed. An orderly spoke in a bold ordinary voice. The spell was gone out with the man.
“Who is that?” I asked the nurse.
“Oh! that’s Mr. Bevan; he’s a very good surgeon indeed.”
“I know,” said I, “I can feel that.”
About an hour later, two orderlies whom I had not seen before came in with a stretcher, and laid it on the floor by the bed. The tall nurse asked me if I had any false teeth, and said I had better put socks on, as my feet might get cold. The orderly did this, and then they helped me on to the stretcher. My head went back, and I felt a strain on my neck. The next second my head was lifted and a pillow put under it. And they had moved me without altering the position of my arm. I was surprised and pleased at that. Then a blanket was put over me, and one of the orderlies said “Ready?”
“Yes,” I said, but suddenly realised he was talking to the other orderly. I was lifted up, and carried across the room out into the courtyard. What a blazing sun! I closed my eyes.
“Dump, dump, dump.” The stretcher seemed to bob along, with a regular rhythmic swaying. Then they turned a corner, and I felt a slight nausea. I opened my eyes. The stretcher was put on a table. I felt very high up.
The matron-person appeared. She was older than the nurses, and had a chain with scissors dangling on the end of it. She smiled, and asked what kind of a wound it was. Then the orderlies looked at each other, at some signal that I could not see, and lifted me up and into the next room. They held the stretcher up level with the operating table, and helped me on to it. I did some good right elbow-work and got on easily. As I did so, I saw Mr. Bevan sitting on a chair in his white overall, his gloved hands quietly folded in his lap. He said and did nothing. Again I felt immensely impressed by his competence, reserving every ounce of energy, waiting, until these less masterful beings had got everything ready.