It was easy to diagnose periostitis, and prescribe tincture of iodine.

"That will cost about a franc," she observed.

"Very likely."

"I think I'll wait."

Next day the pain was worse instead of better. She would give anything
to obtain relief--anything!

"Anything?" I inquired. "Then you had better have a morphia injection. I
have had numbers of them, for the same trouble. The pain will vanish
like magic. There is my friend Dr. Theophile Fornari----"

"I know all about him. He demands five francs a visit, even from poor
people like myself."

"You really cannot expect a busy practitioner to come here and climb
your seventy-two stairs for much less than five francs."

"I think I'll wait. Anyhow, I am not wasting money on food just now, and
that is a consolation."

Now periostitis can hardly be called an amusing complaint, and I would
have purchased a franc's worth of iodine for almost anybody on earth.
Not then. On the contrary, I grew positively low-spirited when, after
three more days, the lamentations began to diminish in volume. They were
sweet music to my ears, at the time. They are sweeter by far, in