Unwanted Examination

Unwanted Examination

Postby Treadwell » Mon May 16, 2016 2:39 pm

Morning of 16 May, 216 A.R.

The Treadwell estate, Myrkentown.

A first floor wash room.


"Bill! I am in the middle of a bath, sir, mmph!"

"And I am your physician, my lord, and you are still healing from burns and falls. When better to study you than when you already have nothing on?"

"But--Bill!" A frown quivers Treadwellian jowls, hidden away behind the cloudy beard. "Hmph. What do you want?"

"I want to see those knees, and I want to inspect your belly and your back." Arms are offered for support. "Slowly, sir. Up, up!"

Standing from a sitting position is hard enough normally for Aloisius Treadwell. Doing so while dripping and sloshing water, halfway lathered in soap, is worse. But, in a few moments, there he stands in the tub once gifted him by his second wife, with its brass construction and its once lavish purple silk interior that has certainly seen better days. On Treadwell's rising, holding to the sides of the tub for balance, the red-bearded doctor offers an arm for further steadying while he studies baggy knees and healing flesh.

"You do know that I cannot properly tell anything about your knees, my lord."

"Eh?"

Doctor Jacobson gives a whufffff. "Your knees. Swollen all the time as they are. How do they feel?"

"They hurt, Bill."

"Can you walk, my lord?"

"You don't see my chair in here, do you, hm hm?"

"It would be foolish if it were. It is in the hall without, and your cane. . . ."

"Is right here, hanging from the tub! Now, might I continue my bath?"

"And the rest of you. . . Well. A man your age, attacked by a torch, should not be looking this healthy after only two weeks. Have you been abusing your magic, my lord?"

"Abusing!"

"Using, then. Now, softly down again. Careful, careful. . . There you are! Your wash rag, sir."

The doctor steps back from the tub when Treadwell is settled.

"A little daily, here and there."

"It isn't natural, my lord."

"I can do as I please, mmph mmph. New flesh grows as easily as new plants." A flush to the face, now, from this exertion of standing and sitting again. "Almost as easily, hm hm." Treadwell frowns as the doctor gives him a squinty-eyed shake of the head. "Fine! To be truthful, it exhausts me, and I improve very little!"

"That is why you have been asleep in your chair very much these two weeks."

"Oh, shush! I wish not to hurt, hm hm, and I will have what I wish!"

"I have salves for that, my lord."

"Hmph hmph. What is your verdict, sir?"

"I pass no sentence, Aloisius."

"Oh, pooh! You do as surely as you stand here!"

"I disapprove of your trying to hasten things, holy one. I fear you might go awry in your efforts, that you will tax yourself too much. And I fear you are trying to walk too far and too soon."

"And I disapprove of being confined, hm hm, to a chair forever."

"Not forever!" The doctor's head shakes vehemently. "Just another week or two, I think, and then we see how you are? A little walking about daily, yes, with your cane, but not many stairs, and no hills!"

The wash room is silent save the wheezing breaths of the two Tubbians until the sitting one gives a frantic flap-flapping of his hands toward the door.

"Go, mmph mmph. I will do as you ask, Bill, but that does not mean I enjoy it. I miss my bed, mmph."

"There is the one in the guest room you have been using, of course."

"And it is hardly as soft and comfortable as the one I share with Alice."

Shoulders shrug.

"Ring your bell there, by your soap, when you are finished. That will fetch one of your men or Gregory to help you out."

"I know quite well, mmph mmph, how to take a bath, sir."

Another dismissive snort escapes; another pairing of flappity-flapping hands sends Doctor Jacobson on his way.
"Looks like a table to me. Do you think it could hold up someone as bulbous as Treadwell?" -- Dr. Brennan, Myrken Wood Rememdium Edificium
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