“Oh no. It wants nothing but to be left to grow well with bandages round it. These fresh bandages. Young healthy flesh soon heals.”
“Are you a surgeon?” I asked.
“Yes; and learned to be one in London,” he continued, with a smile. “But now you must be still and not talk.”
I was not sorry to be forbidden to speak, for it was an effort, and I lay watching him, feeling very sick and faint, while he dressed my wound; and then I felt nothing till I found myself staring at the grave face of the eastern surgeon, as he lightly passed a moistened finger beneath my nostrils, and then touched the neck of a bottle which he turned upside down, and proceeded to moisten my temples, while a peculiar cool pungent odour filled the tent.
“Better?” he said.
“Yes,” I said dreamily; and then as I realised what had passed—“Did I faint?”
He bowed gravely.
“It was natural, sahib. I hurt you very greatly; but the wound looks well. Ah, your colour is coming back to your lips.”
“Thank you,” I said feebly. “I am sorry I was so cowardly. Now ask Captain Brace to come.”
He shook his head.