“I remembered the hyoscine, of course, Sir John. The stock solution had been put out, but I saw you had prepared your own injection.”

“Yes, we won’t need the stock solution. Always use my own tablets—like to be sure of the correct dosage. Are we all ready?”

He went into the theatre.

“Well,” said Sister Marigold, “I’m sure the stock solution is good enough for most people.”

“You can’t be too careful, matron,” Thoms assured her genially. “Hyoscine’s a ticklish drug, you know.”

The sickly reek of ether began to drift into the room.

“I must say I don’t quite understand why Sir John is so keen on giving hyoscine.”

“It saves anæsthetic and it has a soothing effect after the operation. I give it myself,” added Thoms importantly.

“What is the usual dose, sir?” asked Nurse Banks abruptly.

“From a hundredth to a two-hundredth of a grain, nurse.”

“As little as that!”

“Oh, yes. I can’t tell you the minimum lethal dose—varies with different cases. A quarter-grain would do anyone in.”

“A quarter of a grain,” said Nurse Banks thoughtfully. “Fancy!”

CHAPTER FOUR

Post-Operative

Thursday, the eleventh. Late afternoon.

SIR JOHN WAITED in the theatre for his patient.

The matron, Jane and Nurse Banks came in with Thoms. They stood near the table, a group of robed and expressionless automata. They were silent. The sound of wheels. A trolley appeared with Dr. Roberts and the special nurse walking behind it. Dr. Roberts held the anæsthetic mask over the patient’s face. On the trolley lay the figure of the Home Secretary. As they lifted it on the table the head spoke suddenly and inconsequently.

“Not to-day, not to-day, not to-day, damn the bloody thing,” it said very rapidly.

The special nurse went away.

The reek of ether rose up like incense round the table. Dr. Roberts wheeled forward his anæsthetising apparatus, an object that, with its cylinders of compressed gases carried in an iron framework, resembled a gigantic cruet. A low screen was fixed across the patient’s chest to shut off the anæsthetist. Thoms looked at the patient curiously.

“He’s a striking-looking chap, isn’t he?” he remarked lightly. “Curious head. What do you make of it, Roberts? You’re a bit of a dog at that sort of thing, aren’t you? Read your book the other day. There’s insanity somewhere in the racial makeup here, isn’t there? Wasn’t his old man bats?”

Roberts looked scandalised.

“That is so,” he said stiffly, “but one would hardly expect to find evidence of racial insanity clearly defined in the facial structure, Mr. Thoms.”

The sister arranged the sterile coverings over the abdomen. With the head screened, the patient was no longer an individual. A subject for operation lay on the table—that was all.

Sir John took up a scalpel and made the first incision.

“Peritonitis, all right,” said Thoms presently.