"Good morning, Mrs. Welman," he said.

"Good morning, Dr. Lord. This is my niece. Miss Carlisle." A very obvious admiration sprang into Dr. Lord's transparent face. He said, "How do you do?" The hand that Elinor extended to him he took rather gingerly as though he thought he might break it.

Mrs. Welman went on: "Elinor and my nephew have come to cheer me up."

"Splendid!" said Dr. Lord, "Just what you need! It will do you a lot of good, I am sure, Mrs. Welman."

He was still looking at Elinor with obvious admiration.

Elinor said, moving toward the door, "Perhaps I shall see you before you go, Dr. Lord?"

"Oh - er - yes, of course."

25

She went out, shutting the door behind her. Dr. Lord approached the bed, Nurse O'Brien fluttering behind him.

Mrs. Welman said with a twinkle, "Going through the usual bag of tricks, Doctor: pulse, respiration, temperature? What humbugs you doctors are!"

Nurse O'Brien said with a sigh, "Oh, Mrs. Welman. What a thing, now, to be saying to the doctor!"

Dr. Lord said with a twinkle, "Mrs. Welman sees through me, Nurse! All the same, Mrs. Welman, I've got to do my stuff, you know. The trouble with me is I've never learned the right bedside manner."

"Your bedside manner's all right. Actually you're rather proud of it." Peter Lord chuckled and remarked, "That's what you say!" After a few routine questions had been asked and answered, Dr. Lord leaned back in his chair and smiled at his patient.

"Well," he said, "you're going on splendidly." Laura Welman said, "So I shall be up and walking round the house in a few weeks' time?"

"Not quite so quickly as that."

"No, indeed. You humbug! What's the good of living stretched out like this, and cared for like a baby?"

Dr. Lord said, "What's the good of life, anyway? That's the real question. Ever read about that nice medieval invention, the Little Ease? You couldn't stand, sit, or lie in it. You'd think anyone condemned to that would die in a few weeks. Not at all. One man lived for sixteen years in an iron cage, was released, and lived to a hearty old age." 26

Laura Welman said, "What's the point of this story?" Peter Lord said, "The point is that one's got an instinct to live. One doesn't live because one's reason assents to living. People who, as we say, ‘would be better dead' don't want to die! People who apparently have got everything to live for just let themselves fade out of life because they haven't got the energy to fight."

"Go on."

"There's nothing more. You're one of the people who really wants to live, whatever you say about it! And if your body wants to live, it's no good your brain dishing out the other stuff."

Mrs. Welman said with an abrupt change of subject, "How do you like it down here?"

Peter Lord said, smiling, "It suits me fine."