A Second Coming

CHAPTER V

THE OPERATION

The students crowded the benches. Some wore hats and gloves, and carried sticks or umbrellas; they had the appearance of having just dropped in to enjoy a little passing relaxation. Others, hatless and gloveless, wore instead an air of intense pre-occupation; they had note-books in their hands, and spent the time studying anatomical charts in sombre-covered volumes. Many were smoking pipes for the most part; the air was heavy with tobacco smoke. Nearly everybody talked; there was a continual clatter of voices; men on one side called to men on the other, exchanging jokes and laughter.

In the well below were the tables for the operator and his paraphernalia. Assistants were making all things ready. The smell of antiseptic fluids mingled with the odour of tobacco. Omnipresent was the pungent suggestion of carbolic acid. A glittering array of instruments was being sterilised and placed in order for the operator's hand. The anæsthetists were busy with their preparations to expedite unconsciousness, the dressers with their bandages to be applied when the knives had made an end.

There was about the whole theatre, and in particular about the little array of men upon the floor in their white shrouds, who were occupied in doing things the meaning of which was hidden from the average layman, something which the unaccustomed eye and ear and stomach would have found repulsive. But in the bearing of those who were actually present there was no hint that the work in which they were to be engaged had about it any of the elements of the disagreeable. They were, taking them all in all, and so far as appearances went, a careless, lighthearted, jovial crew.

When the operator entered, accompanied by two colleagues, there was silence, or, rather, a distinct hush. Pipes were put out, men settled in their seats, note-books were opened, opera-glasses were produced. The operator was a man of medium height and slender build, with slight side-whiskers and thin brown hair, which was turning gray. He wore spectacles. Having donned the linen duster, he turned up his shirtsleeves close to his shoulders, and with bare arms began to examine the preparations which the assistants had made. He glanced at the instruments, commented on the bandages, gave some final directions to an irrigator; then each man fell into his place and waited. The door opened and a procession entered. A stretcher was carried in by two men, one at the head and one at the foot. A nurse walked by the side, holding the patient by the hand; two other nurses accompanied. The patient was lifted on to the table. The porters, with the stretcher, withdrew. The nurse who had held the patient's hand stooped and kissed her, whispering words of comfort. The operator bent also. What he said was clearly audible.

'Don't be afraid; it will be all right.'

The patient said nothing. She was a woman of about thirty years, and was suffering from cancer in the womb.

Anæsthetics were applied, but she took them badly, fighting, struggling against their influence, crying and whimpering all the time. Force had to be used to restrain her movements on the table. When she felt their restraining hands, she began to be hysterical and to scream. A second attempt was made to bring about unconsciousness; again without result. The surgeons held a hurried consultation as to whether the operation should be carried out with the patient still in possession of her senses. It was resolved that there should be a third and more drastic effort to produce anæsthesia. On that occasion the desired result was brought about. Her cries and struggles ceased; she was in a state of torpor.

The body was bared; the knife began its work…

The operation was not wholly successful. There had been fears that it would fail; but as, if it were not attempted, an agonising death would certainly ensue, it had been felt that it was a case in which every possible chance should be taken advantage of, and in which the undoubted risk was worth incurring. The woman was still young. She had a husband who loved her and children whom she loved. She did not wish to die; so it had been decided that surgical science should do its best to win life for her.

But it appeared that the worst fears on her account were likely to be realised. The operation was a prolonged one. The resistance she had offered to the application of the anæsthetics had weakened her. Soon after the surgeon began his labours it became obvious to those who knew him best that he had grave doubts as to what would be the issue. As he continued, his doubts grew more; they were exchanged for certainties, until it began to be whispered through the theatre that the operation, which was being brought to as rapid a conclusion as possible, was being conducted on a subject who was already dead.

The woman had died under the surgeon's knife. Shortly the fact was established beyond the possibility of challenge. Reagents of every kind were applied in the most effective possible manner; medical skill and experience did its utmost; but neither the Materia Medica nor the brains of doctors shall prevail against death, and this woman was already dead.

When the thing was made plain, there came into the atmosphere a peculiar quality. The students were very still; they neither moved nor spoke, but sat stiffly, with their eyes fixed on the naked woman extended on the oilskin pad. Some of those faces were white, their features set and rigid. This was notably the case with those who were youngest and most inexperienced, though there were those among the seniors who were ill at ease. It was almost as if they had been assisting at a homicide; before their eyes they had seen this woman done to death. The operator was a man whose nerve was notorious, or he would not have held the position which he did; but even he seemed to have been nonplussed by what had happened beneath his knife. His assistants clustered together, eyeing him askance, and each other, and the woman, with the useless bandages hiding the gaping wound. His colleagues whispered apart. They and he were all drabbled with blood; each seemed conscious of his ensanguined hands. All in the building had come full of faith in the man whose fame as a surgeon was a byword; it was as though their faith had received an ugly jar.

While the hush endured, One rose from His place on the benches, and stepping on to the operating floor, moved towards the woman. An assistant endeavoured to interpose.

'Go back to your place, sir. What do you mean by coming here?'

'You have done your work. Am I not, then, to do Mine?'

The assistant stared, taken aback by what seemed to him to be impudence.

'Don't talk nonsense! Who are you, sir?'

'I am He you know not of-a help to those in pain.'

The assistant hesitated, glancing from the Speaker to his chief. The Stranger drew a sheet over the woman, so that only her face remained uncovered. Turning to the operator, He beckoned with His finger.

'Come!'

The surgeon went. The Stranger said to him, pointing towards the woman:

'Insomuch as what you have done was done for her, it is well; insomuch as it was done for your own advancing, it was ill. Yet be not afraid. Blessed are the hands which heal men's wounds, and wipe the tears of pain out of their eyes. Better to be of use to those that suffer than to be a king. For the time shall come when you shall say: "As I did unto others, so do, Lord, unto me." And it shall be done. Yet do it, not for the swelling of your purse, but for your brother's sake, and your payment shall be of God.'

And the Stranger, turning, spoke to the students on the benches; and their eyes never moved from Him as, wondering, they listened to His words.

'Hearken, O young men, while I speak to you of the things which your fathers have forgotten, and would not remember if they could. You would go forth as healers of men? It is well. Go forth! Heal! The world is very sick. Women labour; men sigh because of their pains. But, physicians, heal first yourselves. Be sure that you go forth in the spirit of healing. Where there is suffering, there go; ask not why it comes, nor whence, nor what shall be the fee. Heal only. The labourer is worthy of his hire; yet it is not for his hire he should labour. Heal for the healing's sake, and because of the pain which is in the world. God shall measure out to the physician his appointed fee. Trouble not yourselves with that. The less your gain, the greater your gain. There is One that keeps count. Each piece of money you heap upon the other lessens your store. I tell you that there is joy in heaven each time a sufferer is eased, at his brother's hands, of pain, because it was his brother.'

When the Stranger ceased, the students looked from him at each other. They began to murmur among themselves.

'Who is this fellow?'

'What does he mean by preaching at us?'

'Inflicting on us a string of platitudes!'

And one, bolder than the rest, called out:

'Yours is excellent advice, sir, but in the light of what's just occurred it seems hardly to the point. Couldn't you demonstrate instead of talk?'

The Stranger looked in the direction from which the voice came.

'Stand up!'

The student stood up. He was a young man of about twenty-four, with a shrewd, earnest face. In his hand he held an open note-book.

'Always the world seeks for a sign; without a sign it will not believe-nor with a sign. What demonstration would you have of Me?'

'Are you a doctor, sir?'

'I am a healer of men.'

'With what degree?'

'One you know not of.'

'Yet I thought I knew something of all degrees.'

'Not all. Young man, you will find the world easy, heaven hard. Yet because there are many here like unto you, I will show to you a sign; exhibit My degree.'

The Stranger turned to the operating surgeon.

'You say that the woman whom you sought to heal is dead?'

'Beyond a doubt, unfortunately.'

'You are sure?'

'Certain.'

'Of that you are all persuaded?'

Again there came murmurs from the students on the benches:

'What's he up to?'

'Who's he getting at?'

'Throw him out!'

The Stranger waited till the murmuring was at an end. Then He turned to the woman, and, stooping, kissed her on the lips.

'Daughter!' He said.

And, behold, the woman sat up and looked about her.

'Where am I?' she asked, as one who wakes from sleep.

'Is all well with you?'

'Oh, yes, all's well with me, thank God!'

'That is good hearing.'

Then there was a tumult in the theatre. The students stood up in their places, speaking all together.

'How's he done it?'

'She must have been only shamming.'

'It's a trick!'

'It's a plant!'

'It's a got-up thing between them.'

Insults were hurled at the Stranger by a hundred different voices. In the heat of their excitement the students came streaming down from their seats on to the operating floor. They looked for the man who had done this thing.

'Where is he?' they cried. 'We'll make him confess how the trick was done.'

But He whom they sought was not there. He had already gone. When they discovered that this was so, and that He whom they sought was not to be found, but had vanished from before their eyes, their bewilderment grew still more. With one accord they turned to look at the woman.

As if alarmed by the noise of their threatening voices, and the confusion caused by their tumultuous movements, she had raised herself upon the operating table, so that she stood upright before them all, naked as she was born. And they saw that the bandages had fallen from off her, and that her body was without scratch and blemish, round and whole.

'It's a miracle!' they exclaimed.

A great silence fell over them all, until, presently, the surgeons and the students, looking each into the other's faces, began to ask, each of his neighbour:

'Who is the man that has done this thing?'

But the woman gave thanks unto God, weeping tears of joy.

CHAPTER VI

THE BLACKLEG

The foreman shrugged his shoulders. He avoided looking at the applicant, an undersized man, with straggling black beard and dull eyes. Even now, while pressing his appeal, he wore an air of being but slightly interested.

'You know, Jones, what the conditions of employ were-keep on the works.'

'But my little girl's ill!'

'Sorry to hear it; but you don't want to have any trouble. You heard how they treated your wife when she came in; they'd be much worse to you if I was to let you out. They're pretty near beat, and they know it, and they don't like it, and before they quite knock under they'd like to make a mark of someone. If it was you, they might make a mark too many; they're not overfond of you just now, as you know very well. And then where will you be, eh? How would your little girl be any better for their laying you out?'

Jones turned to his wife, a sort of feminine replica of himself. She had her shawl drawn over her head.

'You hear, Jane, what Mr. Mason says?'

Mrs. Jones sighed; even in her sigh there was a curious reproduction of her husband's lack of interest.

'All I know is that the doctor don't seem to have no great 'opes about Matilda, and that she keeps a-calling for you, Tom.'

'Does she? Then I go! Mr. Mason, I'm a-goin'.'

'All right, Jones, go! Don't think that I don't feel for yer, 'cause I do, but as to coming back again, that's another matter. Mind, we can do without yer, and we don't want no fuss, that's all. Things have been bad enough up to now, and we don't want 'em to be no worse.'

Outside the gates there was a considerable crowd. Among the crowd were the pickets and a fair leaven of the men on strike; but a large majority of the people might have been described as sympathisers. Unwise sympathisers they for the most part were; more bent on striking than the strikers; more resolute to fight the battle to the bitter end. The knowledge that already surrender was in the air angered them. They were in an ugly temper, disposed to 'take it out of' the first most convenient object.

As Mrs. Jones had made her way through them towards the gates she had been subjected to gibes and jeers, and worse. She had been pushed and hustled. More than one hand had been laid rudely on her. Someone had thrown a shovelful of dirt with such adroitness that it had burst in a shower on her head. While she was still nearly blinded she had been pushed hither and thither with half good-humoured horse-play, which was near akin to something else.

Tom Jones was an unpopular figure. He was one of the most notorious of the blacklegs, in a sense their leader. He had persisted in being master of his own volition; asserted his right to labour for whom he pleased, at whatever terms he chose. Such men are the greatest enemies of trades unions. Allow a man his freedom, and unionism, in its modern sense, is at an end. It is one of the questions of the moment whether the good of the greatest number does not imperatively demand special legislation which shall hold such men in bonds; which shall make it a penal offence for them to consider themselves free.

Word had gone round that Jones's little girl was ill; that the doctor had decided she was dying; that Mrs. Jones had come to fetch him home to bid the child good-bye. By most of those there it was unhesitatingly agreed that this was as it should be; that Jones was being served just right; that he was only getting a bit of what he ought to have, which, it was quite within the range of possibility, they would supplement with something else.

It was because of Jones and his like that the strike was failing, had failed; that they were beaten and broken, brought to their knees, in spite of all their organisation, of what they had endured. Jones! It was currently reported that the idea of giving the blacklegs food and lodging on the premises, and so rendering the wiles of the pickets of no avail, was Jones's. At any rate, he had been among the first to fall in with the proposition, and for many days he had not been outside the gates. Jones! Let him put his face outside those gates now and he would see what they would show him.

When the gates were opened, and Mrs. Jones had entered, they waited, murmuring and muttering, with twitching fingers and lowering brows, wondering if the prospect of being able to bid his dying child good-bye would be sufficient inducement to him to trust himself outside there in the open. And while they wondered he came.

Again the gate was opened. Out came Jones; close behind him was his wife. Then the gate was shut to with a bang.

He was known by sight to many in the crowd. By them the knowledge of who he was was instantly communicated to all the rest. He was not greeted with any tumult; they were too much in earnest to be noisy. But, with one accord, they cursed him, and their curses, though not loudly uttered, reached him, every one. He stood fronting the array of angry faces, all inclined in his direction.

The three policemen, who kept a clear space in front of the works, and saw that ingress and egress was gained with some sort of ease, hardly seemed to know what to make of him, or of the situation. They glanced at Jones, then at the crowd, then at each other. All the morning the people had been gathering round the gate, the number increasing as the minutes passed. Except that they could not be induced to move away, there had been little to object to in their demeanour until now. As Jones appeared with his wife they formed together into a more compact mass. Another shovelful of dust was thrown by someone at the back with the same dexterity as before, so that it lighted on the man and the woman, partially obscuring them beneath a cloud of dust. That same instant perhaps a dozen stones were thrown, some of which struck both Mr. and Mrs. Jones, the rest rattling against the gate.

It was done so quickly that the police had not a chance to offer interference. They had been instructed to make as little show of authority as possible, to bear as much as could be borne, and, until the last extremity, to do nothing to rouse the rancour of the strikers. In the face of this sudden assault the trio hesitated. Then the one nearest to the gate held his hand up to the crowd, shouting:

'Now, you chaps, none of that! Don't you go making fools of yourselves, or you'll be sorry!' He turned to the Joneses. 'You'd better go back and try to get out some other way. There'll be trouble if you stop here.'

Tom Jones asked him stolidly, gazing with his lack-lustre eyes intently at the crowd:

'Which other way?'

'I don't know-any other way. You can't get this way, that's plain- they mean mischief. Back you go, before you're sorry.'

The constable endeavoured to hustle the pair back within the gate. But Jones would not have it.

'My child's dying; this is the nearest way to her. I'm going this way.'

The officer persisted in his attempt to persuade him to change his mind.