Vigil in the Night Read Online Free PDF Page B

talkin’ about—he’ll be in the operating room by now. Special emergency operating staff requisitioned, a flock of them, and you’re honored by being picked. You can have it with my blessing, young woman, and welcome!”
      With mixed feelings Anne reported to Sister Gilson. Honor or no honor, it was a real injustice that the understaffing of the hospital should entail the canceling of any nurse’s hard-won leisure. But when she reached the operating amphitheatre of B, she lost her grievance in the rush of preparation.
      Clearly the occasion was deemed of paramount importance. Matron herself was on the scene, ordering furiously, with Sister Gilson, the sister of Ward B, and Prescott’s own operating-assistant sister and four specially selected nurses. Two porters staggered in with fresh oxygen cylinders, the anesthetist was connecting up his tubing. The place boiled with energy, intensifying the inevitable difficulty of getting the theatre going at short notice. But at last it was ready with everyone gloved and gowned.
      Only then did Doctor Prescott appear. He came in quietly and quickly, without the slightest pretentiousness or fuss, with a curious detachment, an aloofness which seemed to notice nothing yet in reality noticed everything. One swift glance round, and that was all.
      Though he had been pointed out to her in the distance, Anne had never seen Prescott near at hand. Now at close quarters in the operating theatre she was struck instantly by his poise, the vibrant force of his personality. He was neither broad nor tall, but he had a good supple figure which he held very erect. His features were well chiseled, his expression perpetually calm. His hair was thick and dark, his chin firm, but most striking of all were his reserved yet penetrating eyes of an almost glacial blue.
      He gave a quiet sign. The patient, already under the influence of the anesthetic, was wheeled in and transferred to the operating table. All that could be seen of the great Matt Bowley, a supine, covered figure, was a section of iodined skin. Prescott at once picked up a knife and made the preliminary incision.
      Anne was quite hardened to the atmosphere of the operating room. She had seen many operations performed competently by Dr. Hassall at Shereford, operations performed faultlessly by specialists called in to the County. But this was different—this was brilliant, unique, a sheer delight to behold.
      Holding her breath, she followed each swift sure step. Once when Sister Carr, who was his operating-assistant nurse, handed the wrong instrument, Anne could have cried out at such a lack of understanding. But Prescott merely paused without turning his head, and let the offending bistoury fall to the floor. The faint tinkle of the instrument upon the floor was a sterner rebuke than any torrent of abuse. Then he opened his gloved fingers to receive the forceps he required. He did not once speak. During an operation he insisted upon the minimum of speech. Cold, silent, thought Anne, but oh, what a surgeon! Here was a star that she might follow, a purpose that matched her own.
      He was almost done now; there remained only the suturing of the abdominal wall, and, once again he paused, awaiting the word which would enable him to proceed. That pause again made Anne wince. Sister Carr, flustered a little out of her normal routine, glanced at the nurse whose duty it was to count the swabs. The nurse hurriedly whispered, “Twenty-four.”
      Sister Carr, with a movement of her bunchy figure, turned to Prescott. “All correct, sir,” she declared, and handed him a needle.
      Anne felt herself grow cold inside. This time it was no mere exasperation. She went cold as ice. Though her duty had been only to stand by with the irrigator, she had noted instinctively the most minute detail of the operation. Almost unconsciously she had counted the used swabs. And she had counted, not the full tally of twenty-four, but only