Synopsis "Jess"
Excerpt: ...on the old bedstead in the little room," she said; "I am going for the doctor." Assisted by Mrs. Neville he was only too glad to take this advice, but long before the doctor arrived John had followed Jess's example, and gone off into a dead faint, to the intense alarm of Mrs. Neville, who was vainly endeavouring to check the flow of blood, which had now become copious. On the arrival of the doctor it appeared that the bullet had grazed the walls of one of the arteries on the inside of his thigh without actually cutting them, which had now given way, rendering it necessary to tie the artery. This operation, with the assistance of chloroform, he proceeded to carry out successfully, announcing afterwards that a great deal of blood had already been lost. When at last it was over Mrs. Neville asked about John being moved up to the hospital, but the doctor declared that he must lie where he was, and that Jess must stop and help to nurse him, with the assistance of a soldier's wife whom he would send to her. "Dear me," said Mrs. Neville, "that is very awkward." "It will be more awkward if you try to move him at present," was the grim reply, "for the silk may slip, in which case the artery will probably break out again, and he will bleed to death." As for Jess, she said nothing, but set to work to make preparations for her task of nursing. As Fate had once more thrown them together she accepted the position gladly, though it is fair to say that she would not have sought it. In about an hour's time, just as John was beginning to recover from the painful effects of the chloroform, the soldier's wife who was to assist her in nursing arrived. As Jess soon discovered, she was not only a low stamp of woman, but both careless and ignorant into the bargain, and all that she could be relied on to do was to carry out some of the rougher work of the sick-room. When John woke up and learned whose was the presence that was bending over him, and whose the cool hand that...
