"You’ll be all right out here, I suppose?" inquired the doctor kindly, while we waited for the reappearance of George. "I shan’t be long, you know. George is very quick. He knows exactly what I want." "Who is the poor chap?" I inquired. "I suppose you’d call him the mortuary attendant," said the doctor. "He’s really very skilful." "I was alluding," I explained, "to the other poor chap: to him who is to be the subject of this accomplished gentleman’s skill." "Oh," said the doctor. "Now let me see.... What did the widow tell me? Ah, I remember now. He was a retired policeman. And there’s George beckoning to me. I shan’t be long." The doctor took his stand within the open doorway through which George had entered. And I took my stand in the rain, and watched the doctor’s back and the shadow of George falling upon the ground-glass window-pane as he busied himself with congenial tasks. Now and then the doctor would address some speech to George and stick his head a little farther round the door-post, and the shadow of George would draw, as it were, a little closer to the window-pane. And after a certain time—a long time, it seemed to me—the light went out, and George and the doctor came forth, and George received five shillings and bowed us politely out. He also spat and uttered a parting _mot_. Said George— "He liked his little drop, Doctor—what?" *XL* *MRS. GLUCKSTEIN* It was one of those dull, dishonest days which open with a promise of rain and keep on promising all the time. The mothers and aunts in Doctor Brink’s dispensary sat in couples, brooding silently. Now and then, at long intervals, somebody would express herself in a rich, resentful snuffle or a limp oath; but, generally speaking, one just sat still and got damper. And those ladies who by virtue of seniority were from time to time admitted into the consulting-room carried their langour with them. Their fringes were straight and sticky, and they knew it, and hope had departed from them. They propped themselves up just anywhere, and slid their empty medicine-bottles out of one wet hand into another wet hand, and breathed hard, and pitied themselves, allowing the doctor to smile briskly and talk. By the time that closing time drew near the doctor himself was beginning to feel the heat, and we began to wonder whether anything would happen to _his_ fringe. But Mrs. Isodore Gluckstein came in, and refreshed him. Mrs. Gluckstein had four chins and a comprehensive bust, and no visible waist-line, and she moved with difficulty; but Mrs. Gluckstein had within her certain fires which were, as it might be, of the spirit, and burned, so to speak, with fierceness, and kept things moving. They re-curled the doctor’s fringe for him. Said Mrs. Gluckstein— "I vant you to eggshammun me, young men. I gut low-spirited."