“For thirty years I have always used cotton wool——”
“Believe me, Proby, that’s enough. You will not put any of it in the wounds. You understand.”
M. Dufrêne turned his back and began examining the next wounded man.
I watched Professor Proby’s face. I was sure the honoured academician was going to burst in again. The much-expected scientific controversy was at last about to take place before my eyes, and ideas would cross to and fro like glittering swords. I waited, holding my breath.
In grave silence, the academician replied:
“Very good, Monsieur le médecin inspecteur-général!”
I looked at everybody in turn. It seemed to me that a glove had been thrown down, and that some one was going to pick it up with polite audacity. But everybody looked vague and attentive. Professor Proby went up to the Medical Inspector-General, and repeated mechanically:
“Very good, Monsieur le médecin inspecteur-général!”
The experience of thirty years’ practice vanished like a light that went out.
M. Dufrêne went from bed to bed, heavy and majestic. “You made a mistake in operating upon this man: you would have done better to wait,” he said. Sometimes he approved: “Here is a result which justifies our theories.” Most often his criticism was unrestrained: “Why didn’t you use my apparatus—the Dufrêne apparatus? I wish to see it used here.”