ever-ready black leather case and was out of the house on a run.
"I am suffering! I cannot sleep!" was Narodkine's thin, querulous greeting, and the physician smiled.
"I don't wonder," he replied tartly, with a comprehensive gesture which took in the whole of the bedroom.
For the windows were tightly closed, in spite of the warm spring air; every lamp—there were half a dozen of them—was lit; and the air was yet more hot and stuffy with the presence of the prince's peasants—big, hulking men who filled the atmosphere with a tang of tobacco and leather and raw; spirits.
The doctor was astonished, and a little angry, too, when he had finished examining the patient. He was in the habit of being called away from his house at all hours; but the prince's messenger had led him to believe that his master was on the very point of death, and there was really nothing the matter with him except a slightly congested head and a corresponding rise in temperature—an ailment cured easily with a little aspirin, a sound night's sleep, and, of course, fresh air.
