The Keeper of the Door | Page 4

balancing himself on the edge of the hammock. "I am deeply touched by your solicitude for my welfare. I partook of tea at the Campions' half an hour ago."
"At the Campions'!" There was quick surprise in Olga's voice.
It elicited no explanation however. He sat and swayed in the hammock as though he had not noticed it.
After a moment she turned and looked at him fully. The green eyes were instantly upon her, alert and critical, holding that gleam of satirical humour that she invariably found so exasperating.
"Well?" said Olga at last.
"Well, fair lady?" he responded, with bland serenity.
She frowned. He was the only person in her world who ever made her take the trouble to explain herself, and he did it upon every possible occasion, with unvarying regularity. She hated him for it very thoroughly, but she always had to yield.
"Why did you go to the Campions'?" she asked, barely restraining her irritation.
"That, fair lady," he coolly responded, "is a question which with regret I must decline to answer."
Olga flushed. "How absurd!" she said quickly. "Dad would tell me like a shot."
"I am not Dad," said the doctor's assistant, with unruffled urbanity. "Moreover, fair lady--"
"I prefer to be called by my name if you have no objection, Dr. Wyndham," cut in Olga, with rising wrath.
He smiled at something over her head. "Thank you, Olga. It saves trouble certainly. Would you like to call me by mine? Max is what I generally answer to."
Olga turned a vivid scarlet. "I am Miss Ratcliffe to you," she said.
He accepted the rebuff with unimpaired equanimity. "I thought it must be too good to be true. Pardon my presumption! When you are as old as I am you will realize how little it really matters. You are genuinely angry, I suppose? Not pretending?"
Olga bit her lip in silence and returned to her work, conscious of unsteady fingers, conscious also of a scrutiny that marked and derided the fact.
"Yes," he said, after a moment, "I should think your pulse must be about a hundred. Leave off working for a minute and let it steady down!"
Olga stitched on in spite of growing discomfiture. The shakiness was increasing very perceptibly. She could feel herself becoming hotter every moment. It was maddening to feel those ironical eyes noting and ridiculing her agitation. From exasperation she had passed to something very nearly resembling fury.
"Leave off!" he said again; and then, because she would not, he laid a detaining hand upon her work.
Instantly and fiercely her needle stabbed downwards. It was done in a moment, almost before she realized the nature of the impulse that possessed her. Straight into the back of his hand the weapon drove, and there from the sheer force of the impact broke off short.
Olga exclaimed in horror, but Max Wyndham made no sound of any sort. The cigarette remained between his lips, and not a muscle of his face moved. His hand with the broken needle in it was not withdrawn. It clenched slowly, that was all.
The blood welled up under Olga's dismayed eyes, and began to trickle over the brown fist. She threw a frightened glance into his grim face. Her anger had wholly evaporated and she was keenly remorseful. But it was no matter for an apology. The thing was beyond words.
"And now," said Max Wyndham, coolly removing the ash from his cigarette, "perhaps you will come to the surgery with me and get it out."
"I?" stammered Olga, turning very white.
"Even so, fair lady. It will be a little lesson for you--in surgery. I hope the sight of blood doesn't make you feel green," said Max, with a one-sided twitch of the lips that was scarcely a smile.
He removed his hand to her relief, and stood up. Olga stood up too, but she was trembling all over.
"Oh, I can't! Indeed, I can't! Dr. Wyndham, please!" She glanced round desperately. "There's Nick! Couldn't you ask him?"
"Unfortunately this is a job that requires two hands," said Max. "Besides, you did the mischief, remember."
Olga gasped and said no more. Meekly she laid her work on the chair by the hammock and accompanied him to the house. It was the most painful predicament she had ever been in. She knew that there was no escape for her, knew, moreover, that she richly deserved her punishment; yet, as he held open the surgery-door for her, she made one more appeal.
"I'm sure I can't do it. I shall do more harm than good, and hurt you horribly."
"Oh, but you'll enjoy that," he said.
"Indeed, I shan't!" Olga was almost in tears by this time. "Couldn't you do it yourself with--with a forceps?"
"Afraid not," said Max.
He went to a cupboard and took out a bottle containing something which he measured into a glass and filled up with water.
"Fortify yourself with this," he