He ate omelettes at farmhouse tables, stuck his arm down into damp beds, felt warm blood spatter his face when he bled a patient, listened to death rattles, scrutinized the contents of basins, and turned back plenty of dirty linen; but every evening he returned to a blazing fire, a well-set table, a comfortable chair, and a charming, fastidiously dressed wife, who smelled so sweet that he never really knew where this fragrance came from, or whether it wasn’t her skin that was perfuming her bodice.