Show r H w 1 7 4 1 F T 0 0 0 1 by RUPERT HUGHES HUGH 0 0 RUPERT HUGHES SERVICE SYNOPSIS on board tile the nord express with ostend as h his immediate destination dr david jebb is bound tor for america with him Is five cearold cynthia thatcher Thatch cr his temporary ward on the train they meet bill gaines ormer former classmate of davids s david tells V gaines in es of his outstanding weakness an overwhelming desire to drink he feels the urge coming to him again and wants to safeguard the child who is returning to america with him during a stop games gaines leaves the train to buy cynthia a present the tram train leaves without hi him M then jebb is painfully injured in a minor accident A fellow passenger revives him with a drink which makes his desire for liquor all the stronger at the next stop david and cynthia leave the tram train david begins drinking the next thing he Is conscious of is a strange s sort 0 rt of chanting he looks around dazed and sick A door opens and in walks a strange negro closely followed by 4 woman heavily veiled and dressed in flowing robes she tells him that he is in that her name Is hiruma and that she is the gift wife of the pasha who has another wife and who is husband tn in name only y to she knows nothing of the missing child learning that david is a surgeon tells him of a powerful man in akef bey whose son is slowly dying jebb operates one rates on the boy and saves his life thus earning the fam ilys deep gratitude jebb is surprised by a visit from the pasha who has heard of his prowess as a surgeon he wants jebb to examine the wife he loves bahir hanim who is ill jebb examines her with as an interpreter CHAPTER V continued jebb answered she is too ill to feel it much but you tell her so just tell her I 1 shall not give her much pain and that it is necessary for me to find out what causes this condition though sought to reassure bahir hanim she yielded rather from inability to resist than from conviction and so at last with holding the trembling hands of the pan ic smitten bahir jebb placed the point of the needle against the white skin at the fifth space set his thumb along the needle as a check and pressed it backward inward and downward with the uttermost nicety avoiding bone and artery and cartilage and throbbing heart bahir hanim quivered with a twinge of pain but she watched jebbs eyes she saw his intense frown dissolve in an arch of exultance of that exultance surgeons feel on tracking a hidden trouble home when he lifted away the needle the cylinder was filled with an evil fluid he nodded his head and again he became very solemn what ees beet effen dim biru rna ma whispered come with me to the pasha madame he turned to nod and smile as reassuringly as he could to the anxious patient and went into the hall where the pasha rose to his feet with many questions translated pasha effendi to know do you know what beet ees jebb answered of the pericardium threw up her hands in dismay the pasha nagged her to translate but she could not jebb tried to describe what he meant the heart you understand the heart ah yes yes the heart hangs in a kind of a sack called the pericardium it has a little fluid to lubricate it but the pericardium of madame bahir is not well it is filled with thick liquid like this in the tube and her heart must beat through it like a man wading through heavy snow it grows wearier and weaker it cannot beat much longer tell him the brows of were beautiful with pity for the old pasha and she told him as gently as if he were a child he plucked his beard in mourning and sent his lean fingers to and fro among his beads turned to jebb bees beet no hope of to save her must she must she dreena of the cup jebb answered 1 I think I 1 can save her I 1 think I 1 hope I 1 believe so if I 1 operate there is at least a chance for her it is a very hard operation but without it there is no chance one cannot always be sure of a diagnosis but here I 1 am sure I 1 know I 1 can see it if the pericardium is not opened drained at once she will die die soon if I 1 am given freedom act I 1 can save her I 1 think I 1 almost sure translated the message hope with a lilt of enthusiasm raised the pasha from the ashes of despair at length pasha took the leap his beloved to the goodness of allah and the skill of the Ameri ciali jebb was more alarmed than he dared confess he felt the need of skilled help ho he could think of no one but to hold the instruments and hand them to him as they were needed after the deed should be done a trained nurse was sadly to be desired lacking such an aide he turned to minima 1 I need someone to care for na hir hanim afterward to help me will you did not trust herself to speak she nodded and now I 1 must find Mur lson explain it to the pasha please madame all he saw of her face was her eyes they were enough they widened and deepened with understanding of an inner meaning he had hardly realized himself till the moment in a seizure of confusion he dashed from the house CHAPTER VI bahir hanim was too weak to be very curious the ebbing of her life had brou brought alit its own anesthesia to soul and h ody body her chief emotion was a dim wonder like moonlight wavering through a fog A part of her was detached from the total of her the softhearted soft hearted was far more terrified than she he stood fighting off womanly tenderness and whispering to himself to be a man lest jebb despise him the doctor selected a scalpel of medium size and holding it like a violin bow drew it across the skin which parted and drew back like silk then he incised the thin covering of the fascia of the greater breast muscle and pressed the blade through its stout fabric some retractors he said felt the room rocking the retractors quick jebb repeated sharply and he fitted them 91 daveed jebb effendi could not have passed through salonica into the opposite edges of the muscle to hold it back the forceps he commanded and a clamp clamping one end of a severed vein he picked up the other with the forceps hold this he gave the forceps into jurisons Muri sons white hand while he snatched up a catgut thread looped it over the mouth of an artery and knotted it with a dexterity a sailor would have envied and so he did with all the small arteries he was compelled to cut give me a couple ot of toothed for eps quick handed him a cartilage knife hell growled jebb as he snatched two forceps himself and delicately fastened one of them them in the wall of the pericardium hold this and be careful and he put the forceps in jurisons jurisons Muri sons sons grip dont move he seized the wall a little lower down in the other forceps transferred them to his left hand with his right reached for the scissors and made a slight incision which he lengthened a trifle with a probe pointed knife the gushing result so delighted jebb that he called out to the wa vering that ought to please you old man were turning the yellow devils out see tern em scat scatter terl 1 at last with every faculty at work his task of reconstruction was finished he had come fafel safely y through a thousand dangers and he breathed deep it was a long and busy week before jebb felt that bahir hanim could safely be entrusted to the care of and though he had schooled them in all the tasks and problems that were likel likely to arise meanwhile gani gan bey was flourishing in the radiant household of his father and mother he felt that he had a right to set about his own business jebb called upon the pasha and after as much delicacy of palaver as his curt soul could manage he broached the hateful subject of compensation pensa tion your servant can never repay you for your service by mere paras and pias tres jebb Effen dim but may he ask what you would consider a fair recompense his smile turned turned to a grimace of pain as jebb answered crisply twelve hundred pounds Ma zallah it is the price of the wife herself having led him into the noose jebb tightened it 1 I will throw oft off one thousand pounds of my bill pasha if you will release hanim and restore her you ask me to to divorce my wife your other wife but wh why do you want to marry her if I 1 wanted to marry her should I 1 be leaving tomorrow forever you leave forever what of my poor sick wife my bashka bash ka din you will leave her to die the best thing I 1 can think of to cure your wife pasha would be the news that she no longer had a young and beautiful rival if you went to her and said you are my only wife now it would be bett better er than any medicine I 1 could prescribe the pasha was breathing deeply and his eye was softening and jebb added you will save one thousand pounds of my fee you think my wife bahir is well enough to leave with the instructions I 1 have div en n him effendi can bring her back to health in two or three months and you truly think it will help her to recover if I 1 inform her that I 1 shall put away the gift wife it will help more than all my skill then your servant will obey your instructions in everything hanim shall have her talaq falaq and her ne on my honor and as soon as the court will grant the decree and once more you are sure you are leaving forever tomorrow fo morrow without fail if you could have my money at my hotel it will be there effen dim for your skill I 1 shall pray allah also to reward you for your journey allah aloon jebb had indeed resolved to leave forever and forever the fierce demands of his duties to the lost child cried out against him for his neglect though he felt absolved to a degree by the necessity of earning funds and s saving av the lives perishing at his very feet but now there was no further excuse to give his conscience he had come to know better through the veil the actual veil she wore and the impalpable yet impenetrable veil her self respect her duty the danger of their situation situ atio n drew about her and he had come com e to 10 love ve her and desire her with a passion his heart had never dreamed itself itsek capable of entertaining he planned to hurry forth to hunt the lost child he dreamed that he stumbled upon her without delay he imagined himself telegraphing to join him and go with him to america as his wife and then his thanks choked in his throat A chill hand seemed to reach from the fog and throttle him it was his curse that had brought him to with infinite disgrace with a deep shame that he had concealed only by cowardly silences his curse forbade him to marry any woman least of all he thought long and fiercely over his farewell to he wrote many letters and tore them in pieces worn out and nauseated with life he dashed off and sealed the curtest cartest message of all with no hint of the love that neither had expressed in a word and both had understood with all their hearts hanim madame madama I 1 leave for salonica by the next train I 1 shall hunt for the child until I 1 find her I 1 will let you know when I 1 do fehmi pasha has promised me on his honor that he will grant you at once a talaq falaq and restore your in full I 1 should like to be assured of this you might send me word if it is not too much trouble my permanent address will be the union bank I 1 graben 13 vienna diyana Vi yana austria with all good wishes yours faithfully DAVID JEBB CHAPTER VII Sa salonica Ionica the hot springs of ancient greece seemed pretty ancient to the yankee surgeon who came in an express train and took a cab to the grand hotel dAngle terre Hell wald and the british consul had helped him over the important matter of his missing papers had provided him with a substitute for his lost passport and a or license to travel had coached him in the important intricacies of turkish machinery and given him cordial letters to the representatives of great britain and austria in salonica when he left the train he was compelled to have his by a turkish official who took it in charge until he should leave the town again will the effendi look through his papers and see if by chance he is holding another of mine he asked he did not fail to slip a little baksheesh under the documents on the desk the recorder ransacked his files graciously daveed jebb effendi could not have passed through salonica at least not openly and legally jebb dissipated the menace of this bugge suggestion stion with a further insinuation a of baksheesh and hastened to his cab at the austrian consulate jebb was received with the distinction due his recommendations as a friend and a physician he also learned that every effort to trace the missing child had ended in negation he visited the american consulate but the consul had been summoned to constantinople and his office could give no help at the british consulate they had much proffer of aid but no encouragement one of the attaches a younger son of a noble house but smothered under the simple style and title of cranford banbury esq was especially courteous he took jebb to the office of the polis oom iseri introduced him and translated the commissioners account of his vain efforts to find the child banbury insisted on jebbs dining with him youre in a blue funk old man and you to be alone im always alone said jebb grimly well ill do my best to make salonica an exception theres not much to occupy an anglo saxon in salonica unless youre interested in politics we rather feel were sitting g on on dynamite the young turks are in power but they have an augean stable to clean up and the old sultan dead yet what have they done with the old sultan why you beard hes here here in salonica fact he is a kind of prisoner de settled in a wonderful villa built ten years ago by an italian for the Al allatinis latini family now the government has turned it into a gilded cage for the ex sultan they quite like to treat him as we did charles 1 I but hes a problem and no mistake the old tarantula may pop up any day and there are people enough eager to help him back to his web TO BE CONTINUED |