Dr. James Ripley was always looked upon as an exceedingly lucky dog by
all of the profession who knew him. His father had preceded him in a
practice in the village of Hoyland, in the north of Hampshire, and all
was ready for him on the very first day that the law allowed him to put
his name at the foot of a prescription. In a few years the old
gentleman retired, and settled on the South Coast, leaving his son in
undisputed possession of the whole country side. Save for Dr. Horton,
near Basingstoke, the young surgeon had a clear run of six miles in
every direction, and took his fifteen hundred pounds a year, though, as
is usual in country practices, the stable swallowed up most of what the
consulting-room earned.
Dr. James Ripley was two-and-thirty years of age, reserved, learned,
unmarried, with set, rather stern features, and a thinning of the dark
hair upon the top of his head, which was worth quite a hundred a year
to him. He was particularly happy in his management of ladies. He had
caught the tone of bland sternness and decisive suavity which dominates
without offending. Ladies, however, were not equally happy in their
management of him. Professionally, he was always at their service.
Socially, he was a drop of quicksilver. In vain the country mammas
spread out their simple lures in front of him. Dances and picnics were
not to his taste, and he preferred during his scanty leisure to shut
himself up in his study, and to bury himself in Virchow's Archives and
the professional journals.
Study was a passion with him, and he would have none of the rust which
often gathers round a country practitioner. It was his ambition to
keep his knowledge as fresh and bright as at the moment when he had
stepped out of the examination hall. He prided himself on being able
at a moment's notice to rattle off the seven ramifications of some
obscure artery, or to give the exact percentage of any physiological
compound. After a long day's work he would sit up half the night
performing iridectomies and extractions upon the sheep's eyes sent in
by the village butcher, to the horror of his housekeeper, who had to
remove the debris next morning. His love for his work was the one
fanaticism which found a place in his dry, precise nature.
It was the more to his credit that he should keep up to date in his
knowledge, since he had no competition to force him to exertion. In
the seven years during which he had practised in Hoyland three rivals
had pitted themselves against him, two in the village itself and one in
the neighbouring hamlet of Lower Hoyland. Of these one had sickened
and wasted, being, as it was said, himself the only patient whom he had
treated during his eighteen months of ruralising. A second had bought
a fourth share of a Basingstoke practice, and had departed honourably,
while a third had vanished one September night, leaving a gutted house
and an unpaid drug bill behind him. Since then the district had become
a monopoly, and no one had dared to measure himself against the
established fame of the Hoyland doctor.
It was, then, with a feeling of some surprise and considerable
curiosity that on driving through Lower Hoyland one morning he
perceived that the new house at the end of the village was occupied,
and that a virgin brass plate glistened upon the swinging gate which
faced the high road. He pulled up his fifty guinea chestnut mare and
took a good look at it. "Verrinder Smith, M. D.," was printed across
it in very neat, small lettering. The last man had had letters half a
foot long, with a lamp like a fire-station. Dr. James Ripley noted the
difference, and deduced from it that the new-comer might possibly prove
a more formidable opponent. He was convinced of it that evening when
he came to consult the current medical directory. By it he learned
that Dr. Verrinder Smith was the holder of superb degrees, that he had
studied with distinction at Edinburgh, Paris, Berlin, and Vienna, and
finally that he had been awarded a gold medal and the Lee Hopkins
scholarship for original research, in recognition of an exhaustive
inquiry into the functions of the anterior spinal nerve roots. Dr.
Ripley passed his fingers through his thin hair in bewilderment as he
read his rival's record. What on earth could so brilliant a man mean
by putting up his plate in a little Hampshire hamlet.
But Dr. Ripley furnished himself with an explanation to the riddle. No
doubt Dr. Verrinder Smith had simply come down there in order to pursue
some scientific research in peace and quiet. The plate was up as an
address rather than as an invitation to patients. Of course, that must
be the true explanation. In that case the presence of this brilliant
neighbour would be a splendid thing for his own studies. He had often
longed for some kindred mind, some steel on which he might strike his
flint. Chance had brought it to him, and he rejoiced exceedingly.
And this joy it was which led him to take a step which was quite at
variance with his usual habits. It is the custom for a new-comer among
medical men to call first upon the older, and the etiquette upon the
subject is strict. Dr. Ripley was pedantically exact on such points,
and yet he deliberately drove over next day and called upon Dr.
Verrinder Smith. Such a waiving of ceremony was, he felt, a gracious
act upon his part, and a fit prelude to the intimate relations which he
hoped to establish with his neighbour.
The house was neat and well appointed, and Dr. Ripley was shown by a
smart maid into a dapper little consulting room. As he passed in he
noticed two or three parasols and a lady's sun bonnet hanging in the
hall. It was a pity that his colleague should be a married man. It
would put them upon a different footing, and interfere with those long
evenings of high scientific talk which he had pictured to himself. On
the other hand, there was much in the consulting room to please him.
Elaborate instruments, seen more often in hospitals than in the houses
of private practitioners, were scattered about. A sphygmograph stood
upon the table and a gasometer-like engine, which was new to Dr.
Ripley, in the corner. A book-case full of ponderous volumes in French
and German, paper-covered for the most part, and varying in tint from
the shell to the yoke of a duck's egg, caught his wandering eyes, and
he was deeply absorbed in their titles when the door opened suddenly
behind him. Turning round, he found himself facing a little woman,
whose plain, palish face was remarkable only for a pair of shrewd,
humorous eyes of a blue which had two shades too much green in it. She
held a pince-nez in her left hand, and the doctor's card in her right.
"How do you do, Dr. Ripley?" said she.
"How do you do, madam?" returned the visitor. "Your husband is perhaps
out?"
"I am not married," said she simply.
"Oh, I beg your pardon! I meant the doctor--Dr. Verrinder Smith."
"I am Dr. Verrinder Smith."
Dr. Ripley was so surprised that he dropped his hat and forgot to pick
it up again.
"What!" he grasped, "the Lee Hopkins prizeman! You!"
He had never seen a woman doctor before, and his whole conservative
soul rose up in revolt at the idea. He could not recall any Biblical
injunction that the man should remain ever the doctor and the woman the
nurse, and yet he felt as if a blasphemy had been committed. His face
betrayed his feelings only too clearly.
"I am sorry to disappoint you," said the lady drily.
"You certainly have surprised me," he answered, picking up his hat.
"You are not among our champions, then?"
"I cannot say that the movement has my approval."
"And why?"
"I should much prefer not to discuss it."
"But I am sure you will answer a lady's question."
"Ladies are in danger of losing their privileges when they usurp the
place of the other sex. They cannot claim both."
"Why should a woman not earn her bread by her brains?"
Dr. Ripley felt irritated by the quiet manner in which the lady
cross-questioned him.
"I should much prefer not to be led into a discussion, Miss Smith."
"Dr. Smith," she interrupted.
"Well, Dr. Smith! But if you insist upon an answer, I must say that I
do not think medicine a suitable profession for women and that I have a
personal objection to masculine ladies."
It was an exceedingly rude speech, and he was ashamed of it the instant
after he had made it. The lady, however, simply raised her eyebrows
and smiled.
"It seems to me that you are begging the question," said she. "Of
course, if it makes women masculine that <i>would</i> be a considerable
deterioration."
It was a neat little counter, and Dr. Ripley, like a pinked fencer,
bowed his acknowledgment.
"I must go," said he.
"I am sorry that we cannot come to some more friendly conclusion since
we are to be neighbours," she remarked.
He bowed again, and took a step towards the door.
"It was a singular coincidence," she continued, "that at the instant
that you called I was reading your paper on 'Locomotor Ataxia,' in the
Lancet."
"Indeed," said he drily.
"I thought it was a very able monograph."
"You are very good."
"But the views which you attribute to Professor Pitres, of Bordeaux,
have been repudiated by him."
"I have his pamphlet of 1890," said Dr. Ripley angrily.
"Here is his pamphlet of 1891." She picked it from among a litter of
periodicals. "If you have time to glance your eye down this
passage----"
Dr. Ripley took it from her and shot rapidly through the paragraph
which she indicated. There was no denying that it completely knocked
the bottom out of his own article. He threw it down, and with another
frigid bow he made for the door. As he took the reins from the groom
he glanced round and saw that the lady was standing at her window, and
it seemed to him that she was laughing heartily.
All day the memory of this interview haunted him. He felt that he had
come very badly out of it. She had showed herself to be his superior
on his own pet subject. She had been courteous while he had been rude,
self-possessed when he had been angry. And then, above all, there was
her presence, her monstrous intrusion to rankle in his mind. A woman
doctor had been an abstract thing before, repugnant but distant. Now
she was there in actual practice, with a brass plate up just like his
own, competing for the same patients. Not that he feared competition,
but he objected to this lowering of his ideal of womanhood. She could
not be more than thirty, and had a bright, mobile face, too. He
thought of her humorous eyes, and of her strong, well-turned chin. It
revolted him the more to recall the details of her education. A man,
of course, could come through such an ordeal with all his purity, but
it was nothing short of shameless in a woman.
But it was not long before he learned that even her competition was a
thing to be feared. The novelty of her presence had brought a few
curious invalids into her consulting rooms, and, once there, they had
been so impressed by the firmness of her manner and by the singular,
new-fashioned instruments with which she tapped, and peered, and
sounded, that it formed the core of their conversation for weeks
afterwards. And soon there were tangible proofs of her powers upon the
country side. Farmer Eyton, whose callous ulcer had been quietly
spreading over his shin for years back under a gentle regime of zinc
ointment, was painted round with blistering fluid, and found, after
three blasphemous nights, that his sore was stimulated into healing.
Mrs. Crowder, who had always regarded the birthmark upon her second
daughter Eliza as a sign of the indignation of the Creator at a third
helping of raspberry tart which she had partaken of during a critical
period, learned that, with the help of two galvanic needles, the
mischief was not irreparable. In a month Dr. Verrinder Smith was
known, and in two she was famous.
Occasionally, Dr. Ripley met her as he drove upon his rounds. She had
started a high dogcart, taking the reins herself, with a little tiger
behind. When they met he invariably raised his hat with punctilious
politeness, but the grim severity of his face showed how formal was the
courtesy. In fact, his dislike was rapidly deepening into absolute
detestation. "The unsexed woman," was the description of her which he
permitted himself to give to those of his patients who still remained
staunch. But, indeed, they were a rapidly-decreasing body, and every
day his pride was galled by the news of some fresh defection. The lady
had somehow impressed the country folk with almost superstitious belief
in her power, and from far and near they flocked to her consulting room.
But what galled him most of all was, when she did something which he
had pronounced to be impracticable. For all his knowledge he lacked
nerve as an operator, and usually sent his worst cases up to London.
The lady, however, had no weakness of the sort, and took everything
that came in her way. It was agony to him to hear that she was about
to straighten little Alec Turner's club foot, and right at the fringe
of the rumour came a note from his mother, the rector's wife, asking
him if he would be so good as to act as chloroformist. It would be
inhumanity to refuse, as there was no other who could take the place,
but it was gall and wormwood to his sensitive nature. Yet, in spite of
his vexation, he could not but admire the dexterity with which the
thing was done. She handled the little wax-like foot so gently, and
held the tiny tenotomy knife as an artist holds his pencil. One
straight insertion, one snick of a tendon, and it was all over without
a stain upon the white towel which lay beneath. He had never seen
anything more masterly, and he had the honesty to say so, though her
skill increased his dislike of her. The operation spread her fame
still further at his expense, and self-preservation was added to his
other grounds for detesting her. And this very detestation it was
which brought matters to a curious climax.
One winter's night, just as he was rising from his lonely dinner, a
groom came riding down from Squire Faircastle's, the richest man in the
district, to say that his daughter had scalded her hand, and that
medical help was needed on the instant. The coachman had ridden for
the lady doctor, for it mattered nothing to the Squire who came as long
as it were speedily. Dr. Ripley rushed from his surgery with the
determination that she should not effect an entrance into this
stronghold of his if hard driving on his part could prevent it. He did
not even wait to light his lamps, but sprang into his gig and flew off
as fast as hoof could rattle. He lived rather nearer to the Squire's
than she did, and was convinced that he could get there well before her.
And so he would but for that whimsical element of chance, which will
for ever muddle up the affairs of this world and dumbfound the
prophets. Whether it came from the want of his lights, or from his
mind being full of the thoughts of his rival, he allowed too little by
half a foot in taking the sharp turn upon the Basingstoke road. The
empty trap and the frightened horse clattered away into the darkness,
while the Squire's groom crawled out of the ditch into which he had
been shot. He struck a match, looked down at his groaning companion,
and then, after the fashion of rough, strong men when they see what
they have not seen before, he was very sick.
The doctor raised himself a little on his elbow in the glint of the
match. He caught a glimpse of something white and sharp bristling
through his trouser leg half way down the shin.
"Compound!" he groaned. "A three months' job," and fainted.
When he came to himself the groom was gone, for he had scudded off to
the Squire's house for help, but a small page was holding a gig-lamp in
front of his injured leg, and a woman, with an open case of polished
instruments gleaming in the yellow light, was deftly slitting up his
trouser with a crooked pair of scissors.
"It's all right, doctor," said she soothingly. "I am so sorry about
it. You can have Dr. Horton to-morrow, but I am sure you will allow me
to help you to-night. I could hardly believe my eyes when I saw you by
the roadside."
"The groom has gone for help," groaned the sufferer.
"When it comes we can move you into the gig. A little more light,
John! So! Ah, dear, dear, we shall have laceration unless we reduce
this before we move you. Allow me to give you a whiff of chloroform,
and I have no doubt that I can secure it sufficiently to----"
Dr. Ripley never heard the end of that sentence. He tried to raise a
hand and to murmur something in protest, but a sweet smell was in his
nostrils, and a sense of rich peace and lethargy stole over his jangled
nerves. Down he sank, through clear, cool water, ever down and down
into the green shadows beneath, gently, without effort, while the
pleasant chiming of a great belfry rose and fell in his ears. Then he
rose again, up and up, and ever up, with a terrible tightness about his
temples, until at last he shot out of those green shadows and was in
the light once more. Two bright, shining, golden spots gleamed before
his dazed eyes. He blinked and blinked before he could give a name to
them. They were only the two brass balls at the end posts of his bed,
and he was lying in his own little room, with a head like a cannon
ball, and a leg like an iron bar. Turning his eyes, he saw the calm
face of Dr. Verrinder Smith looking down at him.
"Ah, at last!" said she. "I kept you under all the way home, for I
knew how painful the jolting would be. It is in good position now with
a strong side splint. I have ordered a morphia draught for you. Shall
I tell your groom to ride for Dr. Horton in the morning?"
"I should prefer that you should continue the case," said Dr. Ripley
feebly, and then, with a half hysterical laugh,--"You have all the rest
of the parish as patients, you know, so you may as well make the thing
complete by having me also."
It was not a very gracious speech, but it was a look of pity and not of
anger which shone in her eyes as she turned away from his bedside.
Dr. Ripley had a brother, William, who was assistant surgeon at a
London hospital, and who was down in Hampshire within a few hours of
his hearing of the accident. He raised his brows when he heard the
details.
"What! You are pestered with one of those!" he cried.
"I don't know what I should have done without her."
"I've no doubt she's an excellent nurse."
"She knows her work as well as you or I."
"Speak for yourself, James," said the London man with a sniff. "But
apart from that, you know that the principle of the thing is all wrong."
"You think there is nothing to be said on the other side?"
"Good heavens! do you?"
"Well, I don't know. It struck me during the night that we may have
been a little narrow in our views."
"Nonsense, James. It's all very fine for women to win prizes in the
lecture room, but you know as well as I do that they are no use in an
emergency. Now I warrant that this woman was all nerves when she was
setting your leg. That reminds me that I had better just take a look
at it and see that it is all right."
"I would rather that you did not undo it," said the patient. "I have
her assurance that it is all right."
Brother William was deeply shocked.
"Of course, if a woman's assurance is of more value than the opinion of
the assistant surgeon of a London hospital, there is nothing more to be
said," he remarked.
"I should prefer that you did not touch it," said the patient firmly,
and Dr. William went back to London that evening in a huff.
The lady, who had heard of his coming, was much surprised on learning
his departure.
"We had a difference upon a point of professional etiquette," said Dr.
James, and it was all the explanation he would vouchsafe.
For two long months Dr. Ripley was brought in contact with his rival
every day, and he learned many things which he had not known before.
She was a charming companion, as well as a most assiduous doctor. Her
short presence during the long, weary day was like a flower in a sand
waste. What interested him was precisely what interested her, and she
could meet him at every point upon equal terms. And yet under all her
learning and her firmness ran a sweet, womanly nature, peeping out in
her talk, shining in her greenish eyes, showing itself in a thousand
subtle ways which the dullest of men could read. And he, though a bit
of a prig and a pedant, was by no means dull, and had honesty enough to
confess when he was in the wrong.
"I don't know how to apologise to you," he said in his shame-faced
fashion one day, when he had progressed so far as to be able to sit in
an arm-chair with his leg upon another one; "I feel that I have been
quite in the wrong."
"Why, then?"
"Over this woman question. I used to think that a woman must
inevitably lose something of her charm if she took up such studies."
"Oh, you don't think they are necessarily unsexed, then?" she cried,
with a mischievous smile.
"Please don't recall my idiotic expression."
"I feel so pleased that I should have helped in changing your views. I
think that it is the most sincere compliment that I have ever had paid
me."
"At any rate, it is the truth," said he, and was happy all night at the
remembrance of the flush of pleasure which made her pale face look
quite comely for the instant.
For, indeed, he was already far past the stage when he would
acknowledge her as the equal of any other woman. Already he could not
disguise from himself that she had become the one woman. Her dainty
skill, her gentle touch, her sweet presence, the community of their
tastes, had all united to hopelessly upset his previous opinions. It
was a dark day for him now when his convalescence allowed her to miss a
visit, and darker still that other one which he saw approaching when
all occasion for her visits would be at an end. It came round at last,
however, and he felt that his whole life's fortune would hang upon the
issue of that final interview. He was a direct man by nature, so he
laid his hand upon hers as it felt for his pulse, and he asked her if
she would be his wife.
"What, and unite the practices?" said she.
He started in pain and anger.
"Surely you do not attribute any such base motive to me!" he cried. "I
love you as unselfishly as ever a woman was loved."
"No, I was wrong. It was a foolish speech," said she, moving her chair
a little back, and tapping her stethoscope upon her knee. "Forget that
I ever said it. I am so sorry to cause you any disappointment, and I
appreciate most highly the honour which you do me, but what you ask is
quite impossible."
With another woman he might have urged the point, but his instincts
told him that it was quite useless with this one. Her tone of voice
was conclusive. He said nothing, but leaned back in his chair a
stricken man.
"I am so sorry," she said again. "If I had known what was passing in
your mind I should have told you earlier that I intended to devote my
life entirely to science. There are many women with a capacity for
marriage, but few with a taste for biology. I will remain true to my
own line, then. I came down here while waiting for an opening in the
Paris Physiological Laboratory. I have just heard that there is a
vacancy for me there, and so you will be troubled no more by my
intrusion upon your practice. I have done you an injustice just as you
did me one. I thought you narrow and pedantic, with no good quality.
I have learned during your illness to appreciate you better, and the
recollection of our friendship will always be a very pleasant one to
me."
And so it came about that in a very few weeks there was only one doctor
in Hoyland. But folks noticed that the one had aged many years in a
few months, that a weary sadness lurked always in the depths of his
blue eyes, and that he was less concerned than ever with the eligible
young ladies whom chance, or their careful country mammas, placed in
his way.