"Surely," I said, "it is not by Toddy--I mean Dr. Todhunter
MacWhister's advice that you keep these hours. The clocks are striking
two!"
"Ah, my friend," he replied wearily, in his precise and rather
elaborate English, "ill or well, I must live as I have been accustomed
to live. For twenty years I have gone to bed promptly at three o'clock
and risen at eleven o'clock. Must I change because of a broken thigh?
In an hour's time, and not before, my people will carry this couch and
its burden to my bedroom. Then I shall pretend to sleep; but I shall
not sleep. Somehow of late the habit of sleep has left me. Hitherto, I
have scorned opiates, which are the refuge of the weak-minded, yet I
fear I may be compelled to ask you for one. There was a time when I
could will myself to sleep. But not now, not now!"
"I am not your medical adviser," I said, mindful of professional
etiquette, "and I could not think of administering an opiate without
the express permission of Dr. MacWhister."
"Pardon me," he said, his eyes resting on me with a quiet satisfaction
that touched me to the heart, "but you are my medical adviser, if you
will honor me so far. I have not forgotten your neat hand and skilful
treatment of me at the time of my accident. To-day the little
Scotchman told me that my thigh was progressing quite admirably, and
that all I needed was nursing. I suggested to him that you should
finish the case. He had, in fact, praised your skill. And so, Mr.
Foster, will you be my doctor? I want you to examine me thoroughly,
for, unless I deceive myself, I am suffering from some mysterious
complaint."
I was enormously, ineffably flattered and delighted, and all the boy
in me wanted to caper around the room and then to fall on Alresca's
neck and dissolve in gratitude to him. But instead of these feats, I
put on a vast seriousness (which must really have been very funny to
behold), and then I thanked Alresca in formal phrases, and then, quite
in the correct professional style, I began to make gentle fun of his
idea of a mysterious complaint, and I asked him for a catalogue of his
symptoms. I perceived that he and Rosa must have previously arranged
that I should be requested to become his doctor.
"There are no symptoms," he replied, "except a gradual loss of
vitality. But examine me."
I did so most carefully, testing the main organs, and subjecting him
to a severe cross-examination.
"Well?" he said, as, after I had finished, I sat down to cogitate.
"Well, Monsieur Alresca, all I can say is that your fancy is too
lively. That is what you suffer from, an excitable fan--"