The nurse rose from the lounge across the foot of the bed. "Your wife was worn out, Mr. Dumont," she began. "She has—"
"What day is it?" he interrupted.
"Thursday."
"Of the month, I mean."
"The seventeenth," she answered, smiling in anticipation of his astonishment.
But he said without change of expression,
"Then I've been ill three weeks and three days. Tell Mr. Culver I wish to see him at once."
"But the doctor—"
"Damn the doctor," replied Dumont, good-naturedly. "Don't irritate me by opposing. I shan't talk with Culver a minute by the clock. What I say will put my mind at rest. Then I'll eat something and sleep for a day at least."
The nurse hesitated, but his eyes fairly forced her out of the room to fetch Culver. "Now remember, Mr. Dumont—less than a minute," she said. "I'll come back in just sixty seconds."