Nurse Elisia

The roar of the big road sounded plainly, but it was far enough off for it to be subdued into a mellow hum, suggestive to the country sufferer lying in the narrow bed with its clean linen and neat blue checked hangings by the open window, of bees swarming, and a threshing machine at work in the farm beyond the park. And yet it was London, for the windows were coated with a sooty layer outside, and the sun shone as if Nature were afraid its beams would be too strong for Londoners’ eyes, to which it came as in an eclipse through smoked glass, and a murky haze full of germs and motes was interposed between the dwellers in the city and the blue sky above. The ward was long and clean, and every bed was occupied. The air was fairly fresh and pleasant, though dashed with the odour of antiseptics. But there was none of the faint medicinal effluvia of the sick wards, for this was surgical—the special empire of the celebrated Sir Denton Hayle, well known in his profession as the most skillful and daring operator this generation has seen. There were those who shrugged their shoulders and said he had murdered many a patient, and it was true that a percentage—thanks to his skill, a very small percentage—of his sufferers had died; but, on the other hand, he could point to those whom he had saved from an apparently inevitable early death, brought on by one of the evils of poor human nature which had heretofore set medical and surgical skill at defiance. Maria Bellows, in other respects a stout, hearty, country lass, had been one of these sufferers, and the provincial doctors called in to Hightoft by Aunt Anne to see the upper housemaid, had shaken their heads and said there was only one thing that would save her, and that was to go up to the great East Central Hospital and place herself in the hands of Sir Denton Hayle. Then, during one of his visits home, Aunt Anne insisted upon Neil Elthorne seeing the woman. Mr Elthorne said it was absurd, but he was quiet afterward when he heard that his son had also declared that the only thing that could save the patient’s life was for her to come up to the hospital in town. Furthermore, he said that he would speak to the illustrious chief under whom he studied, and see that every arrangement was made for her reception. Maria went up, and now lay by the open window thinking of the country, of how long it would be before the doctors made her well again and sent her back to her situation. Then she wondered how Miss Isabel was, and Mr Alison, and how soon there would be weddings at the house. For it was an open secret among the servants at Hightoft that “Master’s” sons were to marry the Misses Lydon, and that Miss Isabel would become Lady Burwood.