et me have a look at it," said the doctor. "Undo your shirt."

Mr. Flynn, with slow fingers, fumbled with the button at his neck and
looked hard at Mrs. Scutts.

"She can't bear to see me suffer," he said, in a feeble voice, as she
left the room.

He bore the examination with the fortitude of an early Christian martyr.
In response to inquiries he said he felt as though the mainspring of his
back had gone.

"How long since you walked?" inquired the doctor.

"Not since the accident," said Mr. Flynn, firmly.

"Try now," said the doctor.

Mr. Flynn smiled at him reproachfully.

"You can't walk because you think you can't," said the doctor; "that is
all. You'll have to be encouraged the same way that a child is. I
should like to cure you, and I think I can."

He took a small canvas bag from the other man and opened it. "Forty
pounds," he said. "Would you like to count it?"

Mr. Flynn's eyes shone.

"It is all yours," said the doctor, "if you can walk across the room and
take it from that gentleman's hand."

"Honour bright?" asked Mr. Flynn, in tremulous tones, as the other man
held up the bag and gave him an encouraging smile.

"Honour bright," said the doctor.

With a spring that nearly broke the bed, Mr. Flynn quitted it and
snatched the bag, and at the same moment Mrs. Scutts, impelled by a
maddened arm, burst into the room.

"Your back!" she moaned. "It'll kill you Get back to bed."

"I'm cured, lovey," said Mr. Flynn, simply.

"His back is as strong as ever," said the doctor, giving it a thump.

Mr. Flynn, who had taken his clothes from a chair and was hastily
dressing himself, assented.

"But if you'll wait 'arf a tick I'll walk as far as the corner with
you," he said, quickly. "I'd like to make sure it's all right."

He paused at the foot of the stairs and, glancing up at the palid and
murderous face of Mr. Scutts, which protruded from the back bedroom,
smiled at him rapturously. Then, with a lordly air, he tossed him five
pieces of gold.

End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Back to Back, by W.W. Jacobs

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