Page:Guy Boothby - The Beautiful White Devil.djvu/93

 in English that I was his new master, and that he was to see that I wanted for nothing. It is only fair to add that during my stay in the island no man could have desired a better and more trustworthy servant.

From the bedroom and sitting-room we passed on to the room at the end of the verandah, which I found had been set apart for, and equipped as, a surgery. Neatly arranged round the walls, on shelves, were enough drugs of all sorts and descriptions to stock half a dozen chemists' shops, while my instruments, cases, and other paraphernalia were spread out upon the table in the centre. Altogether the arrangements were most satisfactory and complete, and I intimated as much to Alie, who stood watching me from the window.

"It is all Mr. Christianson's doing," she said. "You must thank him,"

I did so, and then proposed that we should set about our work at once.

"In the first place, Mr. Christianson," I began, "have you had any symptoms of the disease yourself?"

"Not one! Since it started I have been as well as I remember ever to have been in my life."

"When were you vaccinated last?"

I put the question with some little timidity, for I feared lest by so doing I might wake some unpleasant memory in the old man's mind. But, whatever his past may have been,—and there were few men in the settlement, I afterwards found, who had not more or less of a romantic history,—he answered without hesitation:

"I was vaccinated in Liverpool, twelve years ago next March."

"Then, with your permission, I'll do it for you again.