“He is a good man--there is no better in India--that is all I can say.
Just hold the candle a little closer, will you, please? Thanks--yes--he
is quite dead.”
We passed on to the next bed.
“It is both his duty and his inclination to take care of himself,” I
said as we went--going back with her in the spirit to Capoo.
“How do you know it is his inclination?” she asked guardedly.
And I knew that I was on the right path. The vague message given to
“any one” by Fitz as he rode by my side that night--only a week before,
although it seemed to be months--that message was intended for Elsie. It
referred to something that had gone before, of which I had no knowledge.
“Because he told me so,” I answered.
And then we went on with our work. Charlie Thurkow was quite right. I
knew that all along. It was not fit for her. Elsie was too young, too
gentle and delicate for such a place as ward number four. I make no
mention of her beauty, for I took no heed of it then. It was there--but
it had nothing to do with this matter. Also I have never seen why women
who are blessed or cursed by beauty should be more considered in such
matters, as they undoubtedly are.
I was up and about all that night. The next morning rose gloomily, as if
the day was awakening unrefreshed by a feverish sleep. The heat had been
intense all night, and we could look for nothing but an intensification
of it when the sun rose with a tropical aggressiveness. I wanted to get
my reports filled in before lying down to snatch a little rest, and
was still at work when Charlie Thurkow came in to relieve me. He looked
ghastly, but we all did that, and I took no notice. He took up the
ward-sheets and glanced down the columns.
“Wish I had gone to Capoo,” he muttered. “It couldn't have been worse
than this.”
I had finished my writing, and I rose. As I did so Charlie suddenly
clapped his hand to his hip.
“I say!” he exclaimed, “I say!”
He looked at me in a stupid way, and then suddenly he tottered towards
me, and I caught him.
“Old chap!” he exclaimed thickly, with his face against my shoulder,
“I've got it. Take me to number four.”
He had seen by the list that there was a vacant cot in number four.
I carried him there, stumbling as I went, for I was weak from want of
sleep.
Elsie had just gone to her room, and Mrs. Martin was getting the vacant
bed ready. I was by that bedside all day. All that I knew I did for
Charlie Thurkow. I dosed myself with more than one Indian drug to
stimulate the brain--to keep myself up to doing and thinking. This was
a white man's life, and God forgive me if I set undue store upon it as
compared with the black lives we were losing daily. This was a brain
that could think for the rest. There was more than one man's life
wrapped up in Charlie Thurkow's. One can never tell. My time might
come at any moment, and the help we had sent for could not reach us for
another fortnight.
Charlie said nothing. He thanked me at intervals for some little service
rendered, and nearly all the time his eyes were fixed upon the clock. He
was reckoning with his own life. He did not want to die in the day, but
in the night. He was deliberately spinning out his life till the night
nurse came on duty. I suppose that in his superficial, happy-go-lucky
way he loved her.
I pulled him through that day, and we managed to refrain from waking
Elsie up. At nightfall she came to her post. When she came into the room
I was writing a note to the brigadier. I watched her face as she
came towards us. There was only distress upon it--nothing else. Even
women--even beautiful women grow callous; thank Heaven! Charlie Thurkow
gave a long sigh of relief when she came.
My note was duly sent to the brigadier, and five minutes afterwards I
went out on to the verandah to speak to him. I managed to keep him out
of the room by a promise that he should be sent for later. I made no
pretence about it, and he knew that it was only the question of a few
hours when he walked back across the palace square to his quarters. I
came back to the verandah, and found Elsie waiting to speak to me.
“Will he die?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“Quite sure?”
There was a strange glitter in her eyes which I could not understand.
“Quite,” I answered, forgetting to be professional. She looked at me for
a moment as if she were about to say something, and then she apparently
decided not to say it.