They weren't supposed
to release a sick patient, but there was an easy out for them; they
could remove her from the danger of spreading an unknown infection. Some
doctors must have doped her up on sedatives and painkillers and sent her
home, knowing that she would call him. For that matter, they might have
noticed her unrecorded tonsillectomy and considered her fair bait.
He grabbed the ether and slapped a cone over her nose. She tried to
protest; she never cooperated in anything. But the fumes of the ether he
dipped onto the packing of the cone soon overcame that.
It was peritonitis, of course. The only thing to do was to go in and
scrape and clean as best he could. It was a rotten job to have to do,
and he should have had help. But he gritted his teeth and began. He
couldn't trust anyone else to hold the instruments, even.
He cleaned the infection as best he could, knowing there was almost no
chance. He used all the penicillin he dared. Then he began sewing up the
incision. It was all he could do, except for dressing the wound with a
sterile bandage. He reached for one, and stopped.
While he'd been working, the woman had died, far more quietly than she
had ever lived.
It was probably the only gracious act of her life. But it was damning to
Doc. They couldn't hide her death, and any investigation would show that
someone had worked on her.
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