“The Doctor”

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXXIII, 5 July 1939, Page 3

“The Doctor”

by MARY ROBERTS RINEHART.

SYNOPSIS ll was two weeks since Ur Clu-is Arden completed his interneship and started a practice of his own. His first mistake was to rent an office and room from the shiftless Walters tarnily but he felt sorry for mild, inefficient Henry Walters and his drab, listless wife, Lily. They obviously needed the money. His sympathy did nut lessen when he thought of llieii lazy daughter, Katie, and ne'er-do-well son, Uick. It is Sunday morning, and Chris descends the stairs to his office with a jaunty step. No one looking at him could know that there was a new doctor ready to serve a city which was seemingly unaware of his existence. But Chris does have one patient that morning. Beverly Lewis, from the mansion on the bill, filing her terrier and apologetically asks him to remove a bone from the dogs throat. Beverly cries with relict, when it is over. Having forgotten her handkerchief, Chris goes to get her u towel, but his careless housekeepers had forgotten to put any on tlie rack. Searching everywhere, he finally finds one in the kitchen. chapter iv "lien he returned to the office, it was t'* find the girl more embarrassed than l e “1 caught it,” he said, holding out -he towel. "It was a good run, fiul 1 wore it down. Look at it. ' It s exhi.ist. M ” laughed and wiped her face, and the rubbing brought a hunt coin n to l.cr cheeks. Then she got up a »cl *ooked at him uncertainly. . I forgot my bag. Doctor, but if you will take my name and address—- ‘ Nothing would please me more. But just why?'’ "Don't tell me .you won't make a charge for what won have done. I couldn't He eyed her. I , did what any liumain man would have done. If I'd seen you; dog choking on the street, I'd nave done t'he «ame tiling. v 0 don't spoil .1. I m pot a veterinarian, unci I happen to hue dogti.’’ "You make me very uncomfortable.” “That ? ridiculous. I had nothing else to do. I was merely putting in time until I started out to fool the neighbours.” And as she looked puzzled —"Pretending to be busy,” he added, smiling down at her. ‘‘Every morning I pick up that bag over- there-arid'start out. The proper technique is to go out fast, as though in a hurry. Once around the corner, of

course I can slow down a hit, but I keep going.” 'L'len you are just starting?” weeks. Two endless, empty She seemed so surprised at that, hovvever, that lie hastened to reassure her. "Don't let tliut worry you. W'e all go U.rough it. But as* you g 0 out you might look at my sign on the door. It may he a trifle modest, you know. There's a chap over on HilJ street who has an appendix in a jar outside. They say lie does a laud-office business.” She smile,l at tlmt. -'lt looked iiUe ;i teiy nice sign, ’ she said, and got up. ■'And how, Doctor, if I leave my name and address, do pit-use ” "Don't be foolish. I'd hove helped any dup." ".And you won't send a bill’” "Certainly I won't send a bill.” Her ein" went up, and lie saw .that her pride woa'affronted. But lie had a very pretty pride of liis own, and a dm. Us stubborn us hers. "No hill,” he repeated, and she stiff, eued and moved towards the door, Then I'm sorry I've been such a niiis"N'o nuisance, either,” said Chris. “And if you have any more dogs—!” 1 banks, she said coldly. "1 wouldn't dieaiii ui imposing on you again,” and going out, the nog at her heels, slammed the dour behind her. "Now why did I say that?” Chris thought as lie went hack to straighten liis ollive "After all. she's a girl and a nice one, sltibhon, too.” He smiled ul the memory of that exit of hers hut lie was not too comfortable. (Kit of sheer blazing pride he had affront. v,l her. and there was les. s than his usual truculence in liis carriage as lie sought out | Lily Walters in the hack of the house. But | once more Lily dclea Led him by her very weakness and ineptitude. I m sorry about the towels, Doctor. I was washing some when you called. ’’ Well, just see it doesn't happen again.” He looked at her. Here at last, he knew after God knew what tragedy of li'mg, she had iouud sanctuary for herself and her family. His success would be hers, his failure hers also. Henry tinkering m a back shed with his useless inventions ; Dick haunting billiard parlors instead of hunting for work ; even Katie, sulky and lazy going to the high school and eyeing boys with a distaste which concealed a keen interest—all of them were hung around his neck by that sheer necessity of Lily’s. He leaned over and patted he v shoulder.

"Cheer up," he said. It s only a matter of tune, you know. We ll carry on all right.” J Uut s | le hardly heard him. There na, a sound of a door unlocking overhead, ana then Dick s peevish voice. 'Hey,Mom. How about some coffee*" , l hns went back into the front hull; catefully straightened his tie in front of ,* mirl '°''i picked up his black bug, and suited out « 111, daily round, this time lor tlie hospital. Rut before he started, he locked about aud xemg nobody,, gat out bis handker. cl.iel again and .rapidly and expertly put. islted ins sign. 1 Tlie hospital was very old. Nevertheless it "as still useful, and largely dependent oi Us upkeep on one Staunton Lewis, local magnate and political power, .whose puormous gray stone house crowned the ridge above the city, and who was popu. lptl.v supposed—as to the hospital—either U be building a memorial to himself or box mg favours of a God he had every rea. sou to fear. Lewis or no Lewis, however, it, was still the hospital. It welcomed to its doors all who needed it. sinners and saints, rich and poor; and for a time they ceased to be'either one or the other, and .vej.fe reduced to the common level of the. beds oil which they lay. It changed with time, of course. The nurses no longer swept the floors with their long blue skirts; rubbed sole* had taken the place of the bandages worn over their shoes hy the night workers. There were.diet kitchens and dietitians now, and evening classes had superseded evening prayers. Perhaps only Miss Nettie Simpson, the head of the training school, felt these changes or missed the prayers. She had gi'eii her life? to her work, and she was stil, woi’king, ruling her school with a rod Ot iron, moving from ward to ward, from hed to bed ; and each night asking for and receiving strength lor the day to come. *ut now she was old. Occasionally at the annual meeting, when she had made n.». report and departed, there was quiet talk of replacing Nettie. Rut the bos. pital temporised and compromised. Her sfMstant was of the new school, brisk and modern. They let it go at that. But Miss Simpson knew. Sometimes, sitting in her quiet office, slip felt slightly dazed. How tor back slip could remember ! •he day of the carbolic spray, and an odor that followed and stuck indefinitely. Like iodoform; carbolic and iodoform—they were an era in themselves. (To be continued.) Copyright by Mary Roberts Rinehart. Distributed by King Features Syndicate, Inc.