Once or twice he made a mistake in diagnosis:  (he had never seen a case of measles before, and when he was confronted with the rash took it for an obscure disease of the skin;) and once or twice his ideas of treatment differed from Doctor South’s.  The first time this happened Doctor South attacked him with savage irony; but Philip took it with good humour; he had some gift for repartee, and he made one or two answers which caused Doctor South to stop and look at him curiously.  Philip’s face was grave, but his eyes were twinkling.  The old gentleman could not avoid the impression that Philip was chaffing him.  He was used to being disliked and feared by his assistants, and this was a new experience.  He had half a mind to fly into a passion and pack Philip off by the next train, he had done that before with his assistants; but he had an uneasy feeling that Philip then would simply laugh at him outright; and suddenly he felt amused.  His mouth formed itself into a smile against his will, and he turned away.  In a little while he grew conscious that Philip was amusing himself systematically at his expense.  He was taken aback at first and then diverted.

“Damn his impudence,” he chuckled to himself.  “Damn his impudence.”

CXVII

Philip had written to Athelny to tell him that he was doing a locum in Dorsetshire and in due course received an answer from him.  It was written in the formal manner he affected, studded with pompous epithets as a Persian diadem was studded with precious stones; and in the beautiful hand, like black letter and as difficult to read, upon which he prided himself.  He suggested that Philip should join him and his family in the Kentish hop-field to which he went every year; and to persuade him said various beautiful and complicated things about Philip’s soul and the winding tendrils of the hops.  Philip replied at once that he would come on the first day he was free.  Though not born there, he had a peculiar affection for the Isle of Thanet, and he was fired with enthusiasm at the thought of spending a fortnight so close to the earth and amid conditions which needed only a blue sky to be as idyllic as the olive groves of Arcady.

The four weeks of his engagement at Farnley passed quickly.  On the cliff a new town was springing up, with red brick villas round golf links, and a large hotel had recently been opened to cater for the summer visitors; but Philip went there seldom.  Down below, by the harbour, the little stone houses of a past century were clustered in a delightful confusion, and the narrow streets, climbing down steeply, had an air of antiquity which appealed to the imagination.  By the water’s edge were neat cottages with trim, tiny gardens in front of them; they were inhabited by retired captains in the merchant service, and by mothers or widows of men who had gained their living by the sea; and they had an appearance which was quaint