I had
gripes of colic once, but the pain I had in my head was twenty times
worse, till you gave the opiate."
"That's the eyes," said Rockwell. "I had to lift a bit of bone, and the
eyes saw it and felt it, and cried out-shrieked, you might say. They've
got a sensitiveness all their own, have the eyes."
"It's odd there aren't more accidents to them," answered Ingolby--"just a
little ball of iridescent pulp with strings tied to the brain."
"And what hurts the head may destroy the eyes sometimes," Rockwell
answered cautiously. "We know so little of the delicate union between
them, that we can't be sure we can put the eyes right again when, because
of some blow to the head, the ricochet puts the eyes out of commission."
"That's what's the matter with me, then?" asked Ingolby, feeling the
bandage on his eyes feverishly, and stirring in his bed with a sense of
weariness.
"Yes, the ricochet got them, and has put them out of commission," replied
Rockwell, carefully dwelling upon each word, and giving a note of meaning
to his tone.
Ingolby raised himself in bed, but Rockwell gently forced him down again.
"Will my eyes have to be kept bandaged long? Shall I have to give up
work for any length of time?" Ingolby asked.
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