The Tiger Lily

“You leave yourself in my hands, please,” said the surgeon, smiling, and going across to the door, which he left open, and then uttering a sharp cough, returned.

A minute later there was a faint rustling sound beyond the heavy curtains, and the patient, frowning heavily, turned his head in the direction of the door. Then the scowl upon his sharp face gave place to a look of wonder and delight as a rather slight, dark-haired girl, in a closely fitting black dress and white-bibbed apron, advanced towards him, with her large dark eyes beaming sympathy, and a smile, half pitying, half affectionate, played about her well-formed, expressive lips.

“Cornel!” he cried. “Why, my dear little girl, this is good of you to come and see me. I thought it was the nurse.”

He stretched out his hands, drew the girl to him, and kissed her tenderly on both cheeks, and then on the lips, before sinking back with the tears in his eyes – two utter strangers, which, possibly finding their position novel, hurriedly quitted their temporary resting-place, fell over the sides, and trickled down his cheeks.

“I am the nurse,” came now, in a sweet, silvery voice, as the new-comer began to arrange the pillow in that peculiarly refreshing way only given by loving hands.

“You? Impossible!”

“Oh no, Mr Masters. Michael told me everything, and I was going to offer, when he asked me if I would come and help him.”

“Oh, but nonsense! You, my child! It would be too horrible and disgusting for a young girl like you.”

“Why?” she replied gently. “Michael trusts me, and thinks I carry out his wishes better than a paid servant would.”

“That’s it, my dear sir. I want, both for the sake of an old friend and for my reputation, to make my operation perfectly successful. Cornel here will carry out my instructions to the letter. She will help me too in the operation.”

“But an operation is not fit – not the place for a young girl.”

“Why not?” said Cornel, smiling.

“It is unsexing you, my child.”

“Unsexing me, when I come to help to calm your pain, to nurse you back to health and strength! A woman never unsexes herself in proving a help to those who suffer. Besides, I have often helped my brother before.”

Meanwhile the surgeon had busied himself at a table upon which he had placed a mahogany case. He had had his back to them, but now turned and advanced to the bed, with a little silver implement in his hand.

“Now, my dear sir, a little manly fortitude and patience, and you may believe me when I tell you that there is nothing to fear.”

“Who is afraid?” said the old man sharply. “But what’s that?”

“A little apparatus for injecting an anaesthetic.”

“I said I wouldn’t have anything of the kind,” cried the patient angrily. “I can and will bear it.”

“But I cannot and will not,” said the surgeon, smiling. “You could not help wincing and showing your suffering. That would trouble, perhaps unnerve me, and I could not work so well.”

“What are you going to do? – give me chloroform?”

“No; I am going to inject a fluid that will dull the sensitive nerves of the part, and place you in such a condition that you will lose all sense of suffering.”

“And if I don’t come to?”

“You will not for some time. Now, old friend, show me your confidence. Are you ready?”

There was a long, deep-drawn breath, a look at the young girl’s patient, trust-giving face and then Ezekiel Masters, one of the wealthiest men in Boston, said calmly —

“Yes.”

A few minutes later he was lying perfectly insensible, and breathing as gently as an infant. “Can you repeat that from time to time, as I tell you?” said the surgeon.

“Yes, dear.”

“Without flinching?”

“Yes. It is to save him. I shall not shrink.”

“Then I depend upon you.”

Busy minutes followed, with the patient lying perfectly unconscious.

“How long could he be kept like this, Michael?” whispered Cornel, whose face looked very white.

“As long as you wished – comparatively. Don’t talk; you hinder me.”

“As long as I liked,” thought Cornel, with her eyes dilating as she gazed at the patient, with the little syringe in her hand, and the stoppered bottle, from which the fluid was taken, close by – “as long as I liked, and he as if quite dead. What an awful power to hold within one’s grasp!”

Chapter Two.

The Certain Person

“Hah!”

A long-drawn sigh of content, which made Cornelia Thorpe emerge from her chair behind the bed-curtains, and bend over to lay her soft white hand upon the patient’s forehead, but only for it to be taken and held to his lips.

“Well, angel?” he said quietly.

“Your head is quite cool; there is no fever. Have you had a good night’s rest?”

“Good, my child? It has been heavenly. I seemed to sink at once into a delicious dreamless sleep, such as I have not known for a year, and I feel as if I had not stirred all night.”

“You have not.”

“Then you have watched by me?”

“Oh, yes.”

“Hah!” There was a pause. Then: “You must have given me a strong dose?”

“No,” said Cornel, smiling. “Your sleep was quite natural. Why should it not be? Michael says the cause of all your suffering is completely removed, and that he has been successful beyond his hopes.”

The old man lay holding his nurse’s hand, and gazing at her fair, innocent face intently for some minutes before breaking the silence again.

“When was it?” he said at last.

“A week to-day, and in another month you may be up again.”