Part 15 (2/2)

He had ”heard old people say”--things like these that he was now saying And Bettesworth's phrase will bear thinking of, for its indication of the topics which the progress of the summer months had always been wont to renew in his brain year by year

Unhappily, about this period so to force itself upon his attention

XXVI

Into the peacefulness of Bettesworth's last working su; and noith August, it developed into a subject of grave fears I do not knohen I first noticed a small sore on the old man's lower lip, but I think itasked, he said it had been there since his illness in the spring, and ”didn't see about it

Weeks passed, perhaps six weeks, in which, though the ugly, angry look of the thing soain, being unwilling to arouse alarm Then it occurred to me that if I was too fanciful, Bettesworth was not fanciful enough In his robust out-door life he had never learnt to be nervous and anticipate horrors; and he ht not be sufficiently alive to the dreadful possibilities which were presenting thely to see his club doctor

He did so, not i an interval I aot into my note-book The doctor no sooner saw the sore than he said it must be cut out ”Do you smoke?” was one of his first questions; and ”Where is your pipe?”

was the next Bettesworth produced his pipe--an old blackened briar--and was comforted to learn that it was considered harmless But heteeth near it would have to come out When could he have it done? the doctor asked Bettesworth said that heto do so

Considering how sure he must have been that I should put no obstacle in his way, I incline to think that by now he un to feel alar off he went again to see the doctor, half expecting, I believe, to have the operation done then and there, before he ca worried The doctor was just setting off for his holiday, and could not now undertake the operation, but advised hio to Guildford Hospital Perhaps Bettesworth would have liked estion--he little relished the idea of leaving his wife and his work, and taking a railway journey to so dis on his lip that which e, where he could obtain a necessary letter of introduction to the hospital

Of what immediately followed my memory is quite blank I only recall that the old chap started at last all alone on his journey to Guildford, not knowing how long he would be away, or as likely to happen to him A niece of his had provided him with a stamped addressed envelope and a clean sheet of note-paper, in case he should need to get anyone at the hospital to send a ust 6, 1904_--So he disappeared for a time Three or four days, we supposed, would be the extent of his absence; but the days went by and no word caht never have reached the hospital; and it began to be a serious question ould become of his wife, and whether she would not have to be sent to the workhouse for want of a protector At last, I wrote for information to the matron of the hospital Her anshich lies before me now, and is the only piece of evidence I have preserved of the whole business, is dated August 6th On that day, it stated, Bettesworth was to be operated upon, and, if all ell, he would most likely be able to leave the hospital in ten days or a fortnight

Unless I ed out to nearly three weeks, in which I had the old wife onreassured me Poor old Lucy Bettesworth! I did not anticipate, then, that I should never again see her alive Dirty and dishevelled as ever, alone in the squalid cottage, she received me with a meek simplicity that in my eyes made amends for many faults

She was er for ”Fred” to co hi; she ate no etable arden that ”wanted cuttin'”

Perceiving that she desired etable et it ”Could I cut it?” Of course I could, and did Then a qual it! But she ht be able to wrap it up in a piece of newspaper

To that, however, I deetable ; and I took it, undraped by paper, aware that the despised old woreatest courtesy in her power And that was, as it proved, the last time I ever saw her

Bettesworth, otten His niece has been ave him the staood deal of her, later on--a helpful but delicate woe with a nephew of his, of who--it being a quiet, half-hazy, half-sunny August day--walked over to Guildford, and brought back news that the oldas well as could be hoped They proposed to repeat the visit the folloeek It

But before that as ended Bettesworth was suddenly hoain, unannounced An odd look about hirown a beard--a white, scrubby, short-triave him a foxy expression that I did not like His lip was in strapping, a little blood-stained, but he reported that all was going on well The surgeons had carved down into his jaw, and believed the operation to have been quite successful Satisfied as to this, I could endure his changed appearance

So back, I think I knoas the matter; but at the time a sort of levity in him struck a false note Besides, he seeht have suffered by his absence, or that others had put themselves about on his behalf He struck ot what a lonely expedition his had been, and how he had had to start off and face this miserable experience without a friend at hand to care whether he cah it alive or not

Left to hih the business in manly fashi+on, he had rather overdone it--had over-played his part In refusing to admit fear, he had erred a little on the other side, and he still erred so in telling his experiences, perhaps because he was still not quite free of fear By his account, his stay in the hospital had been an interesting holiday

Everything about it was a little too good to be believed He had jested with the doctors and the nurses They called hi old man,” and he felt flattered: they had had a ”fire-drill,”

and fro the convalescents, he had entered into the spirit of the thing Grimmer details, too, did not escape hiht--”accident cases” brought in for is he witnessed; the hopeless condition of a railway porter, and so forth All this was told in his own ly true; with a genuine sense of the hu-roohter-house”; but none the less his narrative had an offensive eht, of Bettesworth

A little more sense would have shown me the clue to it, in his behaviour just before the operation He was dressed in ”a sort of a white night-goaiting for his turn; and, he said, ”I ot up and danced about on the floor 'Now I be Father Peter,' I says” Then the nurse caoin' to 'ave so now,' they”

(the nearer patients) ”says I took hold o' the nurse's ar lady,' I says 'We be goin' out courtin''” And in such fashi+on, over-excited, he e he was all but losing He never confessed to having felt fear The nearest approach to it hen he was actually lying on the operating-table Left quite alone there (for half an hour, he alleged and believed), ”I looked all round,” he said, ”and up at the skylight, and I says to myself, 'So this is where it is, is it?'”

With these tales he ca them until I eary By and by, however, he settled down to work, although one or two visits had to be paid to the hospital, for dressing the lip; and as he settled down, his norer--his friends were not free of anxiety about hih to draw dire forebodings from those of pessimistic humour But Bettesworth owned to no fears

So it went on for a month or so, when that occurred which effectually banished from his mind all remembrance of this trouble