III
DOCTOR JOE
Doctor Joe’s usually jovial face had suddenly become drawn and tired. He had not answered Thomas’s question, “How, now, can we ever get th’ money t’ pay th’ lad’s way t’ have th’ great doctor cure him?” How, indeed, could they get the necessary money? What could they do to save Jamie’s eyes without money? And he was thinking of the years before he came to The Labrador—of what he had once been—of the years that he had spent on The Labrador as a hunter and fisherman. Had his life been wasted? he asked himself.
“We’re in a tight pinch, but hard luck is bound to come now and again,” said Thomas, at length, startling Doctor Joe out of his reveries, “and we’ll try not to worry about un. If ’tweren’t for Jamie’s eyes needin’ t’ be cured ’twouldn’t be so bad.”
“No, if ’tweren’t for Jamie’s eyes it wouldn’t be so bad. If ’tweren’t for Jamie’s eyes,” said Doctor Joe.
And then he turned and went out of doors and down to the beach, and for a little while paced up and down, with his head bent in thought.
There is no regret in life so bitter as regret for indiscretions that have ruined a career and ended life’s hopes and ambitions. The world is a desolate place indeed for a man to live in when he has no ambition and no goal of attainment. He is simply existing—a clog in the moving throng of doers. The man who does not go forward must of necessity go backward. There is no room in the hustle and bustle and jostle along the trail of life for one to stand still.
Now, as Doctor Joe paced the beach, he was thinking of these things and looking in retrospection upon his own life. What a wreck he had made of it! Once he had all but gained his life’s ambition, and a noble ambition it was. Through years of toil and tireless effort he had ascended the ladder of attainment. He had reached a high place in the world. In those days he was strong and able and self-reliant. The top round of the high ladder which he had climbed so tediously was within his grasp. Then came a day when he lost his balance and slipped and fell to the very bottom. In an hour all that he had worked for and hoped for and won was lost, and with it his courage and ambition.
Doctor Joe, contemplating his past and reviewing the train of circumstances which had ended his career, showered upon himself bitter denunciation and condemnation. He had indulged in appetites which had seemed innocent and harmless enough at first, but which had gradually and insidiously wormed their way into his soul until they had gained possession of him and had become his master. Then they had mercilessly ruined him and wrecked his life. Even the little fortune he had accumulated was lost. If he had only clung to that, at least, he would now be in position to meet the expense of Jamie’s necessary surgical operation.