Part 10

Without a word she snatched up the baby and bolted from the house, leaving the child’s sock and shoe on the consulting-room floor. She had been given my name as a possible person to consult and had dashed off to my house, carrying the child through the streets with its bare foot and leg dangling in the air. On being admitted she asked which was my room. It was pointed out to her, and without more ado she flung herself in as I have described. The child, I may say, was beaming with delight. This dashing in and out of other people’s houses and being carried through the streets without a sock or a shoe on her foot struck her as a delicious and exciting game.

The mother’s fury against my surgical colleague was almost inexpressible. If the poor man had suggested cutting off the child’s head he could not have done worse. “How dare he!” she gasped. “How dare he talk of cutting off her foot! If he had proposed to cut off my foot I should not have minded. It would be nothing. But to cut off her little foot, this beautiful little foot, is a horror beyond words, and then look at the child, how sweet and wonderful she is! What wickedness!” It was a marvellous display of one of the primitive emotions of mankind, a picture, in human guise, of a tigress defending her cub. By a happy good fortune, after many months and after not a few minor operations, the foot got well so that the glare in the eyes of the tigress died away and she remembered again that she was a pretty woman.

It is well known that the abrupt reception of ill-tidings may have a disastrous effect upon the hearer. The medical man is aware that, if he would avoid shock, the announcement of unpleasant facts or of unhappy news must be made slowly and with a tactful caution. In this method of procedure I learnt my lesson very early and in a way that impressed my memory.

I was a house-surgeon and it was Christmas time. In my day each house-surgeon was on what was called “full duty” for one entire week in the month. During these seven days all accident cases came into his surgeon’s wards. He was said to be “taking in.” On this particular Christmas week I was “taking in.” Two of my brother house-surgeons had obtained short leave for Christmas and I had undertaken their duties. It was a busy time; so busy indeed that I had not been to bed for two nights. On the eve of the third night I was waiting for my dressers in the main corridor at the foot of the stair. I was leaning against the wall and, for the first and the last time in my life, I fell asleep standing up. The nap was short, for I was soon awakened, “rudely awakened” as novelists would put it.

I found myself clutched by a heated and panting woman who, as she clung to me, said in a hollow voice, “Where have they took him?” The question needed some amplification. I inquired who “he” was. She replied, “The bad accident case just took in.” Now the term “accident” implies, in hospital language, a man ridden over in the street, or fallen from a scaffold, or broken up by a railway collision. I told her I had admitted no such case of accident. In fact the docks and the great works were closed, and men and women were celebrating the birth of Christ by eating too much, by getting drunk and by street rioting, which acts involved only minor casualties. She was, however, convinced he was “took in.” He was her husband. She gave me his name, but that conveyed nothing, as it was the dresser’s business to take names. With a happy inspiration I asked, “What is he?” “A butler,” she replied. Now a butler is one of the rarest varieties of mankind ever to be seen in Whitechapel, and it did so happen that I had, a few hours before, admitted an undoubted butler. I told her so, with the effusion of one eager to give useful information. She said, “What is the matter with him?” I replied cheerily, “He has cut his throat.”

The effect of this unwise readiness on my part was astonishing. The poor woman, letting go of my coat, collapsed vertically to the floor. She seemed to shut up within herself like a telescope. She just went down like a dress dropping from a peg. When she was as small a heap as was possible in a human being she rolled over on to her head on the ground. A more sudden collapse I have never seen. Had I been fully awake it would never have happened. We placed her on a couch and soon restored her to consciousness.

Her story was simple. She and her husband had met. The two being “full of supper and distempering draughts” (as Brabantio would say) had had a savage quarrel. At the end he banged out of the house, exclaiming, “I will put an end to this.” She had bawled after him, “I hope to God you will.” He had wandered to Whitechapel and, creeping into a stable, had cut his throat there and then. The friend who hastened to inform the wife told her, with a tactfulness I so grievously lacked, that her husband had met with an accident and had been taken to the hospital. This lesson I never forgot and in the future based my method of announcing disaster upon that adopted by the butler’s discreet friend.

Although a digression from the present subject I am reminded of the confusion that occasionally took place in the identity of cases. All patients in the hospital who are seriously ill, whether they have been long in the wards or have been only just admitted, are placed on “the dangerous list” and have their names posted at the gate so that their relatives might be admitted at any time of the day or night.

A man very gravely injured had been taken into the accident ward. He was insensible and his condition such that he was at once put on the dangerous list, or, in the language of the time, was “gated.” During the course of the evening a youngish woman, dressed obviously in her best, bustled into the ward with an air of importance and with a handkerchief to her lips. She demanded to see the man who had been brought in seriously injured. She was directed by the sister to a bed behind a screen where lay the man, still insensible and with his head and much of his face enveloped in bandages. The woman at once dropped on her knees by the bedside and, throwing her arms about the neck of the unconscious man, wept with extreme profusion and with such demonstrations of grief as are observed at an Oriental funeral. When she had exhausted herself she rose to her feet and, staring at the man on the bed, exclaimed suddenly, “This is not Jim. This is not my husband. Where is he?”

Now, in the next bed to the one with the screen, and in full view of it, was a staring man sitting bolt upright. He had been admitted with an injury to the knee. This was Jim. He was almost overcome by amazement. He had seen his wife, dressed in her best, enter the ward, clap her hand to her forehead, fall on her knees and throw her arms round the neck of a total stranger and proceed to smother him with kisses. Jim’s name had been “gated” by mistake.

When she came to the bedside of her real husband she was annoyed and hurt, so hurt, indeed, that she dealt with him rudely. She had worked herself up for a really moving theatrical display in the wards, had rehearsed what she should say as she rode along in the omnibus and considered herself rather a heroine or, at least, a lady of intense and beautiful feeling which she had now a chance of showing off. All this was wasted and thrown away. An injured knee, caused by falling over a bucket, was not a subject for fine emotional treatment. She was disgusted with Jim. He had taken her in. “Bah!” she exclaimed. “Come in with water on the knee! You might as well have come in with water on the brain! You are a fraud, you are! What do you mean by dragging me all the way here for nothing? You ought to be ashamed of yourself.” With this reproof she sailed out of the room with great dignity—a deeply injured woman.

To return to the original topic. In all my experience the most curious manner in which a painful announcement was received was manifested under the following circumstances. A gentleman brought his daughter to see me—a charming girl of eighteen. He was a widower and she was his only child. A swelling had appeared in the upper part of her arm and was increasing ominously. It became evident on examination that the growth was of the kind known as a sarcoma and that the only measure to save life was an amputation of the limb at the shoulder joint, after, of course, the needful confirmatory exploration had been made.

A more distressing position could hardly be imagined. The girl appeared to be in good health and was certainly in the best of spirits. Her father was absolutely devoted to her. She was his ever-delightful companion and the joy and comfort of his life. Terrible as the situation was it was essential not only that the truth should be told but told at once. Everything depended upon an immediate operation and, therefore, there was not a day to be lost. To break the news seemed for a moment almost impossible. The poor father had no suspicion of the gravity of the case. He imagined that the trouble would probably be dealt with by a course of medicine and a potent liniment. I approached the revelation of the dreadful truth in an obscure manner. I discussed generalities, things that were possible, difficulties that might be, threw out hints, mentioned vague cases, and finally made known to him the bare and ghastly truth with as much gentleness as I could command.

The wretched man listened to my discourse with apparent apathy, as if wondering what all this talk could mean and what it had to do with him. When I had finished he said nothing, but, rising quietly from his chair, walked over to one side of the room and looked at a picture hanging on the wall. He looked at it closely and then, stepping back and with his head on one side, viewed it at a few feet distant. Finally he examined it through his hand screwed up like a tube. While so doing he said, “That is a nice picture. I rather like it. Who is the artist? Ah! I see his name in the corner. I like the way in which he has treated the clouds, don’t you? The foreground too, with those sheep, is very cleverly managed.” Then turning suddenly to me he burst out, “What were you talking about just now? You said something. What was it? For God’s sake say that it is not true! It is not true! It cannot be true!”

XII

A QUESTION OF HATS

I had had a very busy afternoon and had still two appointments to keep. The first of these was in the suburbs, a consultation with a doctor who was a stranger to me. It was a familiar type of house where we met—classic Doric pillars to the portico, a congested hall with hat-pegs made of cow horns, a pea-green vase with a fern in it perched on a bamboo tripod, and a red and perspiring maid-servant. Further, I became acquainted with a dining-room containing bomb-proof, mahogany furniture, and great prints in pairs on the walls, “War” and “Peace” on one side, “Summer” and “Winter” on the other. Then there was the best bedroom, rich in lace and wool mats, containing a bedstead as glaring in brass as a fire-engine, a mirror draped with muslin and pink bows, and enough silver articles on the dressing-table to start a shop. After a discussion of the case with the doctor in a drawing-room which smelt like an empty church, I rushed off, leaving the doctor to detail the treatment we had advised, for I found—to my dismay—that I was twenty minutes late.

The second case was that of an exacting duke whom I had to visit at regular periods and, according to the ducal pleasure, I should be at the door at least one minute before the appointed hour struck. I was now hopelessly late and consequently flurried. On reaching the ducal abode I flew upstairs prepared to meet the storm. His Grace ignored my apologies and suggested, with uncouth irony, that I had been at a cricket match. He added that it was evident that I took no interest in him, that his sufferings were nothing to me, and concluded by asserting that if he had been dying I should not have hurried. I always regard remarks of this type as a symptom of disease rather than as a considered criticism of conduct, and therefore had little difficulty in bringing the duke to a less contentious frame of mind by reverting to that topic of the day—his engrossing disorder.

The duke never allowed his comfort to be in any way disturbed. He considered his disease as a personal affront to himself, and I therefore discussed it from the point of view of an unprovoked and indecent outrage. This he found very pleasing, although I failed to answer his repeated inquiry as to why His Grace the Duke of X should be afflicted in this rude and offensive manner. It was evident that his position should have exempted him from what was quite a vulgar disorder, and it was incomprehensible that he, of all people, should have been selected for this insult.

The interview over, I made my report to the duchess, who was in a little room adjacent to the hall. She followed me out to ask a final question just as I was on the point of taking my hat. The hat handed to me by the butler was, however, a new hat I had never seen before. It was of a shape I disliked. The butler, with due submission, said it was the hat I came in. I replied it was impossible, and, putting it on my head, showed that it was so small as to be absurd. The duchess, who was a lady of prompt convictions, exclaimed, “Ridiculous; that was never your hat!” The butler could say no more: he was convicted of error. The duchess then seized upon the only other hat on the table and held it at arm’s length. “Whose is this?” she cried. “Heavens, it is the shabbiest hat I ever saw! It cannot be yours.” (It was not.) Looking inside, she added, “What a filthy hat! It is enough to poison the house.” Handing it to the butler as if it had been an infected rag, she exclaimed, “Take it away and burn it!”

The butler did not at once convey this garbage to the flames, but remarked—as if talking in his sleep—“There is a pianoforte tuner in the drawing-room.” The duchess stared with amazement at this inconsequent remark. Whereupon the butler added that the new hat I had rejected might possibly be his. He was at once sent up to confront the artist, whose aimless tinkling could be heard in the hall, with the further message that if the dirty hat should happen to be his he was never to enter the house again. The butler returned to say that the musician did not “use” a hat. He wore a cap, which same he had produced from his pocket.

While the butler was away a great light had illumined the mind of the duchess. It appeared that Lord Andrew, her son-in-law, had called that afternoon with his wife. He had just left, his wife remaining behind. It was soon evident that the duchess had a grievance against her son-in-law. When the light fell upon her she exclaimed to me, “I see it all now. This horrible hat is Andrew’s. He has taken yours by mistake and has left this disgusting thing behind. It is just like him. He is the worst-dressed man in London, and this hat is just the kind he would wear.”

At this moment the daughter appeared. She had overheard her mother’s decided views, and was proportionately indignant. She disdained to even look at the hat, preferring to deal with the indictment of Andrew on general grounds. She defended her husband from the charge of being unclean with no little show of temper. Without referring to the specific hat, she said she was positive, on a priori grounds, that Andrew would never wear a dirty hat. Her mother had no right to say such things. It was unjust and unkind.

The duchess was now fully roused. She was still more positive. This, she affirmed, was just the sort of thing Andrew would do—leave an old hat behind and take a good one. She would send him at once a note by a footman demanding the immediate return of my hat and the removal of his own offensive headgear.

The daughter, deeply hurt, had withdrawn from the discussion. I suggested that as Lady Andrew was about to go home she might inquire if a mistake had been made. Her Grace, however, was far too moved to listen to such moderation. She wanted to tell Andrew what she thought of him, and it was evident she had long been seeking the opportunity. So she at once stamped off to write the note. In the meanwhile I waited, gazing in great melancholy of mind at the two hats. The silent butler also kept his eyes fixed upon them with a gloom even deeper than mine. I had hinted that the new hat might belong to Lord Andrew, but the duchess had already disposed of that suggestion by remarking with assurance that Andrew never wore a new hat. The note was produced and at once dispatched by a footman.

I have no idea of the wording of the note, but I was satisfied that the duchess had not been ambiguous, and that she had told her son-in-law precisely what were her present views of him in a wider sense than could be expressed in terms of hats. The writing of the letter had relieved her. She was almost calm.

She now told the silent butler to fetch one of the duke’s hats, so that I might have at least some decent covering to my bare head thus unscrupulously stripped by the unclean Andrew. The butler returned with a very smart hat of the duke’s. It had apparently never been worn. It fitted me to perfection. In this vicarious coronet I regained my carriage. I felt almost kindly towards the duke now that I was wearing his best hat.

Next day I placed the ducal hat in a befitting hat-box and, having put on another hat of my own, was starting for the scene of the downfall of Lord Andrew. At my door a note was handed me. It was from the suburban doctor. He very courteously pointed out that I had taken his hat by mistake, and said he would be glad if I would return it at my convenience, as he had no other, and my hat came down over his eyes. It was a dreadful picture, that of a respected practitioner going his rounds with a hat resting on the bridge of his nose; but at least it cleared up the mystery of the new hat. The butler was right. In my anxiety at being late on the previous afternoon I was evidently not conscious that I was wearing a hat which must have looked like a thimble on the top of an egg.

On reaching the ducal residence I was received by the butler. He said nothing; but it seemed to me that he smiled immoderately for a butler. The two hats, the new and the dirty, were still on the table, but the duchess made no appearance. I returned the duke’s hat with appropriate thanks and expressed regret for the stupid mistake I had made on the occasion of my last visit. I then placed the doctor’s new hat I had repudiated in the hat-box ready for removal.

The full mystery was still unsolved, while the butler stood in the hall like a hypnotized sphinx. I said, in a light and casual way, “And what about Lord Andrew? Did his lordship answer the note?” The butler replied, with extreme emphasis, “He did indeed!” Poor duchess, I thought, what a pity she had been so violent and so hasty.

Still the dirty hat remained shrouded in mystery, so, pointing to it, I said to the butler, “By the way, whose hat _is_ that?” “That hat, sir,” he replied, adopting the manner of a showman in a museum, “that hat is the duke’s. It is the hat His Grace always wears when he goes out in the morning.” “But then,” I asked, “why did you not tell the duchess so yesterday?” He replied, “What, sir! After Her Grace had said that the hat was enough to poison the house! Not me!”

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+--------------------------------------------------------------+ | FOOTNOTES: | | | | [1] _British Medical Journal_, Dec., 1886, and April, 1890. | | | | [2] Fisher Unwin, London, 1922. | | | | [3] The name is fictitious. | | | +--------------------------------------------------------------+

Transcriber’s Notes:

- Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_). - Blank pages have been removed. - Redundant title page has been removed. - Redundant chapter heading pages have been removed. - Silently corrected typographical errors. - Hyphenation variations made consistent.