TALES OF THE ROAD.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1611, 30 November 1912, Page 6

TALES OF THE ROAD.

' THE CALL FOR THE DOCTOR, I

(By Will Lawson.—All Rights Eeserved.)

It was a wild night, across the high lands the blizzard screamed, bringing with it enow aiul Blect, mingled with driving rain. In the townships and homesteads, ivhich stood bravely out in the open plain or snuggled into the shelter of buslx or gully, it'was a. night for largo log fires. The doctor had finished a long day's work; in his car he had been out in the storm over bad roads, visiting his. most urgent oases. And as he sat by the fire that glowed on the red bricks, lie prayed that none of them would want him till the morning came. His wife had retired to her room, where she could sleep undisturbed by any sudden ringing of the telephone bell. The doctor was waiting for eleven o'clock, when the telephone exchange closed. After that, his wire was left connected with tbe outlying hamlets and homesteads, so that if he was wanted they could call for him direct. But it was understood that only urgent calls were to be made, after eleven. A quiet, sweet-toned voice in the uproar of tlie gale, his clook chimed eleven, and a few minutes later the doctor put down his pipe and went to bod. And it seemed to him,. lying tihere in the firelight, that the bellow of the wind became louder and fiercer.

It waa nearly two o'clock when the telephone awoke him. The instrument stood on.the tablo by his bedside; sleepily he took up the receiver and answered: , . "This.is Munson's," the voice in the wire said. •

"Yes." Munson's was 20 miles away, in the teeth of the storm. Can. you come out right away, doctor? My boy ij bad." "What's wrong?" "Terrible pains, and can't keep anything down.' "How long has he been like that?' "All day; but he's worse now." "All right; it's a dog's night, but I'll I oome," said the doctor, grulfly, and put the reoeiver down. He. hardly ever, refused a call;, in the case of children never. Tie little clook perched above the reil fire said' "Two" in oweet, precise tones, and the wind screamed and boomed in the chimney. When the doctor had switched on the electric lamps of his car and set her busy heart throbbing, the night lost half 'its menace. But when he swung into tho road, with his powerful lamps sending their vivid ■ beams a quarter _of a mile ahead of him, the windscreen quivered ' and strained tto the violent onslaughts of the wind. The night seemed to press close in to tho path cut out by .the lamps; when the car had passed it mado haste to remove all traces of their radiance; only the red tail-tamp leered with' a blood-shot eye. There was no traffic on the road, which, here and there, was covered by water for a few inches, while beneath the bridges could be heard the thunder of hurtling torrents. Sometimes the lamps glared for a moment on a little cluster of sheep or cattle, sheltering behind bush or in deep gullies; then as the oar lurched round the curve, the greedy night swallowed them up again. The speedometer, needle fluttered between 25 and 30 mile, an hour, and the instrument carefully kept tally of the miles that lay behind the red tail-lamp; the cax-clock ticked off the moments that elapsed while scienco clove a swift, bright way through, one of Nature's blackest 6torms. * But the doctor, thought of nothing save the strip of road that he could see; and he drove the big ear all he knew. . At last he came ' to Munson's. . The house stood black and silent as he strode up to the kitchen door. No welcoming voice and guiding lantern were there. Pushing the door open, he stepped inside. A lamp was burning, turned low, and Munson sat in a deep armchair. The fire was nearly out, and Munson was sound asleep. ' At the doctor's entrance, he woke. ..and rofe to his feet. "That you, doctor? Thought you'd never come, and I. dropped off. The boy's easier, now, sleeping a bit." "Where is he?"' the doctor asked. Munson led the way, with the lamp. "Where's his mother?" The doctor was quietly examining the lad. "Oh! she's gone to bed, pretty dead beat." "Humph!" After a silence that seemed long to Munson, the farmer asked^. "Anything bad; doctor?" The doctor did not reply, just .stood looking at the boy, and thinking , fast and furiously. In th© quietuess> the mother came into the room, having hastily attired herself in a wrapper. The doctor bowed gravely to her; then he led the way out of tho room, leaving the patient sleeping After giving the mother 6ome instructions, the doctor said to Munson: ■ r "Better get your horse and come, into town for some medicine I'll have ready for you. I'll leave it on the hall table; just come in and get it yourself, - will 3< Munson looked at his wife in consternation; the same emotion was mirroied in her face. • un' "What!" he exclaimed, "on a night like this, doctor? It's not fit for a dog to be out." . ~ , The doctor was opomne the door. "So I found, Munson, he agreed. "So I found." Then he passed from the light and warmth into the bitter storm. With the car bowling homewards before the wind, his annoyance found vent in a short laugh. ' . "Nothing wrong with the boy, only a touch of colic, but I don't see why Munson shouldn't have a taste of this as well as me," he muttered. "He's one of the kind who think midnight is the same as noon to a doctor, ana he never thinks of paying my bill. Lefs see, it's .£SO now and been due for three years." In the raw dawn an oilskin-clad rider pulled up at the dootor's door and, quietly entering, took tho bottle from the hall table. Remounting, he turned to face the storm, and swore a little as the rain drove into his face. But the doctor did not hear anything; he was sleeping the sleep of a tired man and the hours came and went, with only the little sweet-tonwl timepike to count them, which it did precisely, in a calm, quiet way that made the storm seem futile.