The door opened, and his scout looked in cautiously. “Thought I heard you moving, sir. May the doctor come in?”
The young surgeon appeared who had been violently rung up by Meyrick some five hours earlier. He had a trim, confident air, and pleasant eyes. His name was Fanning.
“Well, how are you? Had some sleep? You gave yourself an uncommonly nasty wound. I had to set a small bone, and put in two or three stitches. But I don’t think you knew much about it.”
“I don’t now,” said Radowitz vaguely. “How did I do it?”
“There seems to have been a ‘rag’ and you struck your hand against some broken tubing. But nobody was able to give a clear account.” The doctor eyed him discreetly, having no mind to be more mixed up in the affair than was necessary.
“Who sent for you?”
“Lord Meyrick rang me up, and when I got here I found Mr. Falloden and Mr. Robertson. They had done what they could.”
The colour rushed back into the boy’s pale cheeks.
“I remember now,” he said fiercely. “Damn them!”
The surgeon made no reply. He looked carefully at the bandage, asked if he could ease it at all—took pulse and temperature, and sat some time in silence, apparently thinking, by the bed. Then rising, he said: