Part 18 (1/2)
The doctor did not know what to say. ”Allow me to congratulate you, madam,” he began. ”No doubt Mr. McEcchran is still alive and well; no doubt he will return to you. But if this is not your husband, whose husband is he?”
The room had filled with the neighbors, and in the crowd the small boy who had brought them there made his escape.
”Can any one tell me who this is?” the surgeon asked.
”I knew that weren't Mr. McEcchran as soon as I see him,” said another boy. ”That's Mr. Carroll.”
”And where does--did Mr. Carroll live?” the doctor pursued, repenting already of his zeal as he foresaw a repet.i.tion of the same painful scene in some other tenement-house.
”It's only two blocks off--on the Boulevard,” explained the second boy.
”It's over a saloon on the corner. I'll show you if I can ride on the wagon.”
”Very well,” agreed the doctor; and the body was carried down and placed again in the ambulance.
As the ambulance started he overheard one little girl say to another: ”He was killed in a blast! My! ain't it awful? It blew his legs off!”
To which the other little girl answered, ”But I saw both his boots as they carried him out.”
And the first little girl then explained: ”Oh, I guess they put his legs back in place so as not to hurt his wife's feelings. Turrible, ain't it?”
[Ill.u.s.tration: ”MY! AIN'T IT AWFUL? IT BLEW HIS LEGS OFF!”]
When the ambulance started, the driver began grumbling again: ”It's not Dr. Chandler that 'ud have a thing like this happen to him. Him an'
me never went traipsing round wid a corp that didn't belong to n.o.body.
We knew enough to take it where the wake was waitin'.”
The boy on the box with the driver guided the ambulance to a two-story wooden shanty with a rickety stairway outside leading up to the second floor.
He sprang down as the ambulance backed up, and he pointed out to the doctor the sign at the foot of these external steps--”Martin Carroll, Photographer.”
”That's where he belongs,” the boy explained. ”He sleeps in the gallery up there. The saloon belongs to a Dutchman that married his sister. This is the place all right, if it really is Mr. Carroll.”
”What do you mean by that?” shouted the doctor. ”Are you not sure about it?”
”I ain't certain sure,” the fellow replied. ”I ain't as sure as I was first off. But I think it's Mr. Carroll. Leastways, if it ain't, it looks like him!”
It was with much dissatisfaction at this doubtfulness of his guide that the doctor helped the driver slide out the stretcher.
Then the side door of the saloon under the landing of the outside stairs opened and a stocky little German came out.
”What's this? What's this?” he asked.
The young surgeon began his explanation again. ”This is where Mr.
Carroll lived, isn't it? Well, I am sorry to say there has been an accident, and--”
”Is that Martin there?” interrupted the German.
”Yes,” the Southerner replied, ”and I'm afraid it is a serious case--a pretty serious case--”