'I take it, you think we doctors can work miracles.'
'Quite the reverse, Sir,' retorted Dangerfield, with a cold scoff. 'But
you say he may possibly live six weeks more; and all that time the wick
is smouldering, though the candle's short--can't you blow it in, and
give us even one minute's light?'
'Ay, a smouldering wick and a candle if you please; but enclosed in a
glass bottle, how the deuce _are_ you to blow it?'
'Pish!' said the silver spectacles, with an icy flash from his glasses.
'Why, Sir, you'll excuse me--but you don't understand,' said Toole, a
little loftily. 'There are two contused wounds along the scalp as long
as that pencil--the whole line of each partially depressed, the
depression all along being deep enough to lay your finger in. You can
ask Irons, who dresses them when I'm out of the way.'
'I'd rather ask you, Sir,' replied Dangerfield, in turn a little high.
'Well, you can't apply the trepan, the surface is too extended, and all
unsound, and won't bear it--'twould be simply killing him on the
spot--don't you see? and there's no way else to relieve him.'
General Chattesworth had not yet returned.
Pages:
511
512
513
514
515
516
517
518
519
520
521
522
523
524
525
526
527
528
529
530
531
532
533
534
535