"Not since I was sixteen," she exclaimed. "But I could use one right now. No, that might hurt the baby." She folded her arms protectively around her middle. "I don't get it. I don't get it at all. But if that's the way it is—" A crooked, pleased smile wrinkled tears from her cheeks. "Leave it to Sary to do things the unusual way."
She looked up at me. "Did you know I was the first white woman to interview a Rajah's harem eunuch?"
"Looks like you have a real story this time," I said, playing along with her.
"Yeah. But who in hell will write it?"
hillipe Sansome made himself eminently useful. He assisted in surgery every morning, refusing fees and pleading with everyone to maintain his anonymity. The staff was in on the conspiracy, and the nurses smiled indulgently at him behind his back. But Sansome was too great a man to ridicule. The general feeling was the same as mine. He was older than he thought, not in body, but in over-tired nerves and exhausted mind. None contested his skill with the scalpel; but none gave ten cents worth of credence to his twist on the theory of evolution.
As Sara's confinement proceeded with precise conformity to my expectations, I thought Sansome would lose heart—but he didn't. He arranged to be present in the delivery room with as much interest as if we expected a breach birth of a two-headed panda.
I was unfortunately called to Baltimore at the last minute. I flew both ways, but my haste was in vain. Sara gave birth while I was still aloft.
I checked in with more excitement than I'd thought possible. I asked at the desk, "How's Caffey?"