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windpipe. ‘It’s fate,’ I thought, ‘everything’s against me. We’ve certainly murdered Lidka now.’ And I added grimly to myself: ‘As soon as I get back to my room, I’ll shoot myself.’ Then the older midwife, who was evidently very experienced, pounced on the
feldsher
and tore the hook out of his hand, saying through her clenched teeth:
    â€˜Go on, doctor …’
    The
feldsher
collapsed to the floor with a crash but we did not turn to look at him. I plunged the scalpel into the trachea and then inserted a silver tube. It slid in easilybut Lidka remained motionless. The air did not flow into her windpipe as it should have done. I sighed deeply and stopped: I had done all I could. I felt like begging someone’s forgiveness for having been so thoughtless as to study medicine. Silence reigned. I could see Lidka turning blue. I was just about to give up and weep, when the child suddenly gave a violent convulsion, expelled a fountain of disgusting clotted matter through the tube, and the air whistled into her windpipe. As she started to breathe, the little girl began to howl. That instant the
feldsher
got to his feet, pale and sweaty, looked at her throat in stupefied horror and helped me to sew it up.
    Dazed, my vision blurred by a film of sweat, I saw the happy faces of the midwives and one of them said to me:
    â€˜You did the operation brilliantly, doctor.’
    I thought she was making fun of me and glowered at her. Then the doors were opened and a gust of fresh air blew in. Lidka was carried out wrapped in a sheet and at once the mother appeared in the doorway. Her eyes had the look of a wild beast. She asked me:
    â€˜Well?’
    When I heard the sound of her voice, I felt a cold sweat run down my back as I realised what it would have been like if Lidka had died on the table. But I answered her in a very calm voice:
    â€˜Don’t worry, she’s alive. And she’ll stay alive, I hope. Only she won’t be able to talk until we take the pipe out, so don’t let that upset you.’
    Just then the grandmother seemed to materialise from nowhere and crossed herself, bowing to the doorhandle, to me, and to the ceiling. This time I did not lose my temper with her, I turned away and ordered Lidka to begiven a camphor injection and for the staff to take turns at watching her. Then I went across the yard to my quarters. I remember the green lamp burning in my study, Döderlein lying there and books scattered everywhere. I walked over to the couch fully dressed, lay down and was immediately lost to the world in a dreamless sleep.
    A month passed, then another. I grew more experienced and some of the things I saw were rather more frightening than Lidka’s throat, which passed out of my mind. Snow lay all around, and the size of my practice grew daily. Early in the new year, a woman came to my surgery holding by the hand a little girl wrapped in so many layers that she looked as round as a little barrel. The woman’s eyes were shining. I took a good look and recognised them.
    â€˜Ah, Lidka! How are things?’
    â€˜Everything’s fine.’
    The mother unwound the scarves from Lidka’s neck. Though she was shy and resisted I managed to raise her chin and took a look. Her pink neck was marked with a brown vertical scar crossed by two fine stitch marks.
    â€˜All’s well,’ I said. ‘You needn’t come any more.’
    â€˜Thank you, doctor, thank you,’ the mother said, and turned to Lidka: ‘Say thank you to the gentleman!’
    But Lidka had no wish to speak to me.
    I never saw her again. Gradually I forgot about her. Meanwhile my practice still grew. The day came when I had a hundred and ten patients. We began at nine in the morning and finished at eight in the evening. Reeling with fatigue, I was taking off my overall when the senior midwife said to me:
    â€˜It’s the tracheotomy that has brought you