As soon as he had gone Baltazar threw off the bedclothes and sprang to his feet.
“Doctors be hanged!” said he. “I’ve not given in to illness all my life long, and I’m not going to begin now. Besides, I’m as fit as ever I was. I’m going to dress.”
“I’m afraid you can’t,” said the nurse.
“Why?”
“You haven’t any clothes.”
He glanced for a second or two at the unfamiliar green and purple striped silk pyjamas in which he was clad, and remembered the undervest and flannel trousers, foul with blood and grime, in which he had arrived at Water-End.
“The devil!” said he, and he stood gasping as a new conception of himself flashed across his mind. “Except for these borrowed things, I am even more naked than when I came into the world.”
“You’d better go back to bed,” said the nurse.
“I’ve got to go back to the world,” retorted Baltazar. “As quick as possible.”
“You can’t do it in pyjamas,” said the nurse.