The great surgeon lolled back in his chair, and, raising a glass of champagne in those delicately formed, yet steel-strong fingers that had resolved the intricacies of life and death for many a sufferer, he gazed thoughtfully at the whirling torrent of tiny bubbles and then touched it lightly to his lips. It was one of those rare times when the wheel of Fate had brought together a group of men united by the strongest bond that friendship can tie, the bond of the college life and love of auld lang syne. It was heart to heart here, even as it had been with us a quarter century before, ere we had parted to go our several ways in the broad fields of life.
Of us all, Harrington had become the one pre-eminently famous, and his remark came in reply to a bit of the congratulatory flattery that only the intimacy of the college chum dare venture with impunity.
“What do you mean, Harrington?” asked Dalbey, the banker. “Perplexities of diagnosis, the nervous strain of responsibility, and the like?”
“I think I can say without conceit,” replied the surgeon, “that diagnosis has become with me almost an intuition. In that field I have absolute confidence in myself. As for nerves, I haven’t any. I can cut within the fiftieth of an inch of certain death as coolly as you pare your nail. No; I mean deliberate wickedness, malice, blackmail. We are never free from this danger. Let me give you an instance, if it won’t bore you.”
There was a chorus of calls, “Go on, go on,” and Jenkins cried, “Never heard it!” for which he was promptly squelched.
It was just two years ago (Harrington began), and my five gray hairs date from that night. I was sitting in my office just after my evening office hour had ended, and I was pretty well tired out. The bell rang furiously, and I heard the attendant saying that my hour was over and that I could see no one. There was some very vigorous insistence, and I caught the words “urgent,” “imperative,” and a few more equally significant, so I called to the man that I would see the belated visitor. He entered quickly. He was evidently a man of wealth and breeding, and as evidently laboring under great excitement.
“Is this Dr. Harrington?” he asked as he seated himself close by my desk.
“It is,” I answered.
“Dr. James Y. Harrington?”
“Yes.”