"Mercedes Lackey - EM 3 - The Serpents Shadow" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lackey Mercedes)

hospital, admit patients, and treat them here.
"Congratulations, Doctor Witherspoon," he continued. "And may I
repeat that the results of your examinations are remarkable,
including those in surgery. I dare say your skills are equally
outstanding."
"Thank you very much, Doctor," she replied with feigned meekness and
gratitude; he swelled with self-importance, mistaking it for the
genuine emotion. "I hope I will succeed in surpassing your
expectations."
She rose. He did the same. She extended her right hand; he pressed it
once in token of farewell, released it quickly, then immediately
seated himself as she turned to leave. She was not important enough
for him to remain standing until after she was gone, nor worthy of
his time to be given a heartier handshake or more of his attention.
She closed the door of the office behind her, carefully and quietly,
then smiled-this time with real warmth-at the doctor's receptionist
and secretary, a young man with thin, blond hair, who had sincerely
wished her good luck on her way in. She met his questioning blue
eyes, and held up her signed certification in a gesture of triumph.
The young man nodded vigorously, clasped both hands above his head in
an athlete's gesture of victory, and gave a silent cheer. Maya's
companion, a plump, animated woman three years her junior, who was
seated in one of two chairs for visitors placed in this stuffy little
reception room, was a trifle less circumspect.
"Oh, Maya! Well done!" Amelia Drew said aloud, leaping up from her
chair to embrace her friend. Maya kissed her proffered cheek, waved
cheerfully at the secretary, and guided Amelia out the door and into
the hospital corridor before Amelia said anything that Doctor
Clayton-Smythe might overhear and interpret as unflattering.
Nurses in nun like uniforms hurried past, carrying trays and basins.
Young men, medical students all, arrayed in their medical black,
strode through the corridor like the would-be kings they all were.
Maya closed the reception-chamber door behind Amelia, and Amelia cast
off any pretense of restraint, skipping like a schoolgirl. "You did
it! You got the old crustacean to bend and give you your
certification!"
"Not a crustacean, my dear. That was a fat, grumpy walrus on his very
own sacred spot of beach." Maya's grimace betrayed her distaste. "It
was a narrower thing than I care to think about." She stepped around
an elderly charwoman scrubbing the floor on her hands and knees,
bundled in so many layers of clothing her true shape could not be
determined.
Amelia dodged a medical student on the run-probably late for a
surgery. "But your marks were so good. And the letters from the other
doctors at Royal Free Hospital-"
"I wasn't entirely certain of success, even with the highest of
examination results," she replied, as they traversed the polished oak
of the corridor, the starched frills of their petticoats rustling
around their booted ankles. Amelia's costume, severe, and plain, was
identical to Maya's but of dove-gray rather than stark black. Amelia