Clifford Ashdown

“ Inns was scarcely fit for the society of men, let alone ladies. I bitterly reproached myself for managing him with so little tact; but regrets being useless, I stole downstairs at once, as I felt sure I should be wanted sooner or later. I could hear Inns growling in deeper and deeper bass, and just as I reached the door I heard the mother's voice. ”

“ When do you expect him back?"
"In a week for certain, I should say. Who shall I tell him called?"
"Oh, never mind, I want to surprise him. He always enjoyed a practical joke. I can easily run over, as I'm staying at Treacham for the present."
The stranger hardly looked the sort of man one would expect to indulge in practical jokes, and when he had taken his leave I could not help wondering how a man of such obvious refinement could have any serious liking for one of the stamp of Inns, although no doubt the monotony of shipboard has accounted for queerer friendships ”

“ Something fell, and Miss Innes screamed for help. I rushed in, to find Inns clutching his mother by the throat; and seizing an overturned chair, the first thing handy, I dealt him a crack on the head that would have fractured any ordinary skull. He was not even stunned, however, but fell plump, like a sack of grain, into the corner, where he made no attempt to rise, but lay growling and cursing at large. When I turned round Mrs. Innes and her daughter, both looking very pale, were clasping each other at the farther end of the room.
"Who is this man?" Mrs. Innes demanded ”

“ Inns takes it an' thrives on it. I've heard 'um say theer's nothin' like it."
I felt conscientiously indignant at this, and straightway attacked his pork dietary, telling him he would never get well until he took fresh meat, with plenty of vegetables, and especially lemons, or at least homemade lemonade. But I could see that neither Warkwell nor his wife believed me, and fearing they might construe my advice into an attack upon Inns, I rode away home in a much less cheerful frame of mind than when I arrived. ”

“ I may take a run over to Paris for a day or two while Adamson is finding someone to buy the practice. If you want to know anything just write to me, 'care of Adamson,' but I don't expect I shall be far away."
As he remarked, he certainly did not seem to be overworked. From the time I arrived in the late afternoon until we went to bed about eleven, no patients put in an appearance. Like the rest of the house, my bedroom was furnished with a Spartan simplicity which I put down to Inns's pronounced nautical tastes. ”

“ He's been getting rather fidgetty lately; talked of having a consultation. But there's no other doctor anywhere nearer than Treacham, and I ain't on speaking terms with the man there. The only other one who's bad is Warkwell, the old wharfinger. ”

“ The letter was very brief—only half a dozen lines or so; and he addressed it from Adamson's office. The housekeeper was clearing the breakfast table as I read it, and apologetically asked me for any news of Inns.
"Well, really, Mrs. Walsham, the doctor says nothing about himself, and only asks me about the patients."
"Ah, he'll be sorry to hear his dear mother and sister have been again. It seems so misfortunate 'tis always so." ”

“ I have never seen a consulting room that so successfully concealed its character as this, for the only thing at all professional about the place was a battered old wooden stethoscope up on the mantel. Inns was evidently a practitioner of the old school, who scorned new-fangled aids to diagnosis. ”

“ Inns. "Rather young, ain't you? I've never had a local what-d'you-call-it before, but anyone from Adamson's sure to be all right. Been expecting you all day. Come in."
Adamson, the agent, good fellow that he was, never left me long unemployed, so here I was at Hestford—Hestford on the Wash, about the last place that was created, I should say. As I cycled the couple of miles from the station, leaving my traps to follow, I wondered what on earth could have induced any man to settle in such an out-of-the-way corner. ”