The Dop Doctor. Richard Dehan

son if he didn't gall the withers of some hobby-horse or other – the doctors agreed there was nothing for him but South Africa."

      He frowned, knowing how many sufferers had died of that deadly prescription. She went on:

      "So he came out – alone – upon the advice of the well-intentioned wiseacres, knowing nothing of the country, to live on his two hundred a year until the end. And the end is coming – in Gueldersdorp Hospital – with giant strides." She blinked. "They've isolated him in a small detached ward. He has a kind friend in the Matron, and the chart-nurse is in love with him, unless I'm mistaken in the symptoms of the complaint. And he looks like St. Francis of Assisi, wedded to Death instead of Poverty – and coughs – fit to tear your heart. B'rrh!" she shuddered.

      He repeated: "I'll see what can be done to-morrow. These cases are deceptive. There may be a gleam of hope."

      "There is one doubt about the case which might infer a hope. I don't know what discoveries the London doctors made, but I wormed out of the chart-nurse, who plainly adores him, that the doctors in Gueldersdorp can't scare up a bacillus for the life of them."

      His eyes lightened involuntary admiration, though his tone was jesting.

      "You're thrown away on mere journalism. Criminal Investigation or Secret Intelligence would offer wider fields for your abilities."

      "Wait!" she said, her beady eyes black diamonds. "I shall hope to prove one day that an English woman-journalist can be as useful as a Boer spy in the matter of useful information. Why, why am I not a man? You only don't trust me because I am a woman."

      He had touched the rankling point in her ambition. He applied balm as he knew how.

      "Your being a woman may have made all the difference – for Fraithorn. I shall set Taggart of the R.A.M.C. at him to-morrow; the Major's a bit of a crack at pulmonary cases. And he shall consult with Saxham, and – "

      "Saxham." Her eyebrows were knitted. "I thought I knew the names of your Medical Staff men. But I can't recall a Saxham."

      "This Saxham is Civilian – and rather a big pot – M.D., F.R.C.S., and lots more. We're lucky to have got him."

      She stiffened, scenting the paragraph.

      "Can it be that you mean the Dr. Saxham of the Old Bailey Case?"

      "The Jury acquitted, let me remind you."

      "I believe so," she said; "but – he vanished afterwards. I think an innocent man would have stopped and faced the music, and not beaten a retreat with the Wedding March almost sounding in his ears. But – who knows? You have met his brother, Captain Saxham, of the – th Dragoons? It was he who stepped into the matrimonial breach, and married the young woman."

      "The young woman?"

      "His brother's fiancée – an heiress of the Dorsetshire Lee-Haileys, and rather a pretty-faced, silly person, with a penchant for French novels and sulphonal tabloids. I always shall believe that she liked the handsome Dragoon best, and took advantage of the Doctor's being – under the cloud of acquittal by a British Jury, to give him what the dear Irish call 'the back of her hand.'"

      "The better luck for him!"

      "It was mere instinct to let go when the man was dragging them both under water," she asserted.

      "A Newfoundland bitch would have risen above it."

      "You hit back quick and hard."

      "I'm a tennis-player and a polo-player and a cricketer."

      "What game is there that you don't play?"

      "I could tell you of one or two… But I must really go and speak to some of these ladies. One of them is an old friend."

      "I know whom you mean. If I didn't, her glare of envy would have enlightened me. Did I tell you that I encountered an old friend – or, at least, a friend of old – at the Hospital yesterday?"

      "You mean poor Fraithorn?"

      "Not at all. I'm only a friend of his mother. I had only heard of the boy, not met him, until I tumbled over him here. But this face – severely framed in a starched white guimpe and floating black veil – belonged to my Past in several ways."

      He showed interest.

      "Your friend is a nun? At the Convent here? How did you come across her?"

      "She called to see the Bishop's son – while I was with him. It seems that, judging by the poor dear boy's religious manuals and medals, and other High Church contraptions, the Matron had got him on the Hospital books as a Roman Catholic. And, consequently, when my friend looked in to visit a day-scholar who was to be operated on for adenoids – I've no idea what they are, but a thing with a name like that would naturally have to be cut out of one – she was told of this poor fellow, and has shed the light of her countenance on him occasionally since. Yesterday was one of the occasions, and Heavens! what a countenance it is even now! What a voice, what eyes, what a manner! I believed I gushed a bit… She met me as though we'd only parted last week. Nuns are wonderful creatures: she's unique, even as a nun."