But I want to go
down to the practice all the same."
"It's out of the question. You know the sequel of
this complaint. You'll have endocarditis, embolism,
thrombosis, metastatic abscesses--you know the danger as
well as I do."
He sank back into his bed laughing.
"I take my complaints one at a time, thank you," said
he. "I wouldn't be so greedy as to have all those--eh,
Munro, what?--when many another poor devil hasn't got an
ache to his back." The four posts of his bed quivered
with his laughter. "Do what you like, laddie--but I say,
mind, if anything should happen, no tomfoolery over my
grave. If you put so much as a stone there, by Crums,
Munro, I'll come back in the dead of the night and
plant it on the pit of your stomach."
Nearly three weeks passed before he could set his
foot to the ground again. He wasn't such a bad patient,
after all; but he rather complicated my treatment by
getting in all sorts of phials and powders, and trying
experiments upon his own symptoms. It was impossible to
keep him quiet, and our only means of retaining him in
bed was to allow him all the work that he could do there.
He wrote copiously, built up models of his patent
screen, and banged off pistols at his magnetic target,
which he had rigged tip on the mantelpiece. Nature has
given him a constitution of steel, however, and he shook
off his malady more quickly and more thoroughly than the
most docile of sufferers.
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