The place smelt strong of drugs; shelves laden with bottles climbed up one wall, and the others were decorated with framed photographs and cases of medical books. Everything was strictly professional and methodically neat; and the doctor, slight and dark in appearance, cool and composed in manner, was the essence of his room embodied.
“What’s your trouble?” he asked of the stranger, who stood before him interested and insouciant, his hands still in his pockets.
“Hæmorrhage from the lungs. Oh, I’ve had the charming complaint before, and I know the ways of it; I’ve been despaired of three times already. But I’d like you just to tinker up my old constitution, if that’s possible.”
“When did the hæmorrhage occur?”
“I had a smart attack Sunday, and it’s been off and on ever since.”
“Then you ought to be in bed.”
“Quite so, Æsculapius, but I haven’t one.”
“There is the workhouse infirmary at Alresworth.”
“To which I’m on the way; but I didn’t think I could git.”
Then there was silence, while Maude applied his stethoscope. After testing the lungs he tried the heart, and after the heart other organs, and soon discovered that his patient was a collection of inceptive diseases. His questions elicited a tale of ill-health lightly borne in which he did not believe, for stoicism is rare in surgery patients.