And so ended at Kilburn the Sunday on which Henry Halford entered upon his duties as a clergyman.
CHAPTER XXXII.
AT GUY'S HOSPITAL.
While the train is speeding on with Henry Halford to the Euston Station, we will go back to the Friday afternoon when Arthur Franklyn was carried in an apparently lifeless state to Guy's.
When dragged from the water many voices were raised in eager haste. "Send for a doctor!" "Carry him to the hotel!" "No use, the man is dead!" "Nonsense, he hasn't been five minutes in the water." This and other confusing advice was, however, set aside by the appearance of two policemen with a cab. Putting back the crowd, they lifted in the apparently drowned man, and bidding the driver make haste, jumped in with him.
The rapid movement produced an unexpected effect. Before they were half over London Bridge the policeman who sat opposite to Arthur was startled at seeing the eyes of the supposed dead man open suddenly, and after a heavily drawn breath came the words, "My carpet bag! where is my carpet bag?" The wild eyes, the unexpected recovery, and the firmly uttered words took these officers of the law by surprise.
"All right, sir, don't you go worritting yourself about carpet bags; yours is all safe, I daresay," was all one of them could reply in a soothing tone before the cab stopped at the hospital entrance, to the great satisfaction of Arthur Franklyn's companions.
The medical officers were quickly in attendance, but the shock of the accident had so increased the feverish excitement of Arthur Franklyn, that on being taken out of the cab he struggled with those who held him, and exclaimed frantically, "I must go back! You shall not detain me! Where is my carpet bag?"
Regardless of his almost frenzied manner, which they judged to arise from incipient disease, the attendants quickly relieved Arthur of his wet clothes; he was placed in bed, and the remedies against the consequences of a cold bath while in such a heated state vigorously applied.