Page:Sorrell and Son - Deeping - 1926.djvu/326

 had ever dared to challenge. He had eyes, deep under bushy eyebrows, that gave the world quick, acute and sidelong glances. When watching him Kit had always been struck by the perfect stillness of the great man's hands.

To Christopher old Gaunt was a great man. Sorrell's son had not that pettifogging type of mind, the mind of little facetious envies that must tie a sneer to the tails of a man's coat. Kit was sanguine and creative. He knew how hard it was to do the great things well, and that old Gaunt had done them well. The little people who tickled life with straws were not to his liking.

Old Gaunt held out a wholesome, fresh-coloured hand to Kit.

"Well, Sorrell,—here we are."

And Christopher blushed. He had a feeling that there was something in the air, a "Tinker Bell" of a nice conspiracy to set some disgraceful but pleasant piece of favouritism floating in through the windows of St. Martha's. But unlike Peter Pan Kit did not set great store by his own shadow. Other people saw to the length and the substance of Kit's shadow. Had not Thomas Roland said they would?

At dinner Sir Ormsby and Kennard talked about needlework pictures and Japanese ivories, and since Sorrell senior knew a good deal about needlework pictures, Kit was less voiceless than he might have been. He called Sir Ormsby "sir," with perfect naturalness, for to Kit the great man was eminently "sir." Later, they became less archaic, and talked "shop." Kennard was one of the pioneers of the new thoracic surgery, and while Sir Ormsby probed his methods and his results, Christopher sat and listened with the air of a young man who enjoyed every word of it; which he did. Later still, they arrived at hospital gossip, and it seemed to Kit that their gossiping concealed personal tendencies. Lawson was going to retire. Sandys would move up and become a senior. There would be a vacancy for an assistant surgeon.

Sir Ormsby, giving Kit one of his sidelong and shrewdly beneficent glances, supposed that Sorrell would apply for the post.

"A St. Martha's man. "One or two outsiders may be putting up."