At the beginning of the last century, a very strange incident happened in the life of the famous Moscow doctor Snegirev. One evening, he shut the shutter in his office and began looking through the histories of the patients he had received that day.
While reading, the doctor sipped tea. And suddenly, very close to me, I saw a girl of about ten, dressed very poorly, in a chintz dress, which was torn in places with bright blue flowers. The girl was barefoot. A thin blond plait on her head was tied with a yellowed ribbon. The girl spoke nervously, quickly and loudly:
- Doctor, doctor, help my mother soon. She is so sick - she has a fever! Maybe she's dying … And my little brother is also very bad. I have lost my memory and lies so hot … Come to us, help mom and my brother, treat them.
- How did you get here, girl? Snegirev asked in bewilderment. - The door is on the latch. I ordered not to admit anyone. Where are you from? Yes, and I do not go to the sick, I already have too many patients who come.
- Well, I pray you come to us soon, otherwise it will be too late!
The girl grabbed a pencil from the table and on a sheet of white paper lying on the table wrote the address in large letters: alley, house number, surname … Snegirev glanced at the sheet, then looked up at the girl again, but it was not clear how she disappeared from his office.
- Girl, why are you hiding? Where are you?
He got up from the table and looked around all the corners in the office - empty, the girl was nowhere to be found. And the door is still bolted.
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Snegirev opened the door and called the man who served him.
“You let the girl in,” he said angrily. “And I didn’t tell you to see anyone. Now this girl seems to have fallen through the earth somewhere …
- Yes, I did not let anyone in, as you ordered! No girl came to you. It just seemed to you, doctor.
- How did it seem? I talked to her. She wrote me her address.
“I don’t understand what you’re talking about, professor. Your door was locked all the time. This, as you scientifically say, began your hallucinations from overwork.
Snegirev made the footman carefully examine his office. There was no girl in it.
“You see,” said the footman instructively. - You're getting sick. What appears to your eyes is that which is not really there. You need to be treated.
- Why are you annoying me! She was here. Here is the address, written in her hand.
- This … Someone else wrote it, but you forgot. And now it seems to you that it was written by a girl who has never been here. Let me pour you some more strong tea. I'm scared for your health.
- No, tell the coachman to mortgage the horse immediately. Out of curiosity, I will go to this address. I will fulfill the girl's request.
- What's the matter with you, sir? Where and why are you going?
- I already told you, go to the coachman so that the horse is ready at once.
A few minutes later, Doctor Snegirev was driving to the address written on a piece of paper, taking with him everything he needed to provide first aid. Here is the alley indicated in the note, and here is the house with the required number, which has grown into the ground with rotten, lopsided sides. Snegirev got out of the carriage and asked the old woman who was passing through the yard if she knew where such and such lived.
- Yes, here, in the basement, - replied the old woman, - but she hasn't been seen for a long time. And her kids, too, something not to see. Maybe they all left somewhere …
Doctor Snegirev went down the slippery wet stairs to the basement. There he found a half-open door. Stepping over the threshold, I entered a damp, semi-dark room. On the bed, covered with some kind of rags, lay an emaciated woman - very pale, with a mournful face. And next to her was a three-year-old boy. He was unconscious, tossed about in the heat.
- Whom do you want? the woman asked in surprise in a weak, barely audible voice. - How did you get here?
- I'm a doctor. I came to you and I will treat you.
- But who told you about our illnesses? After all, I have no one to take care of us. Nobody knows about our suffering.
- How - who said? - surprised, in turn, Snegirev. - Yes, your daughter said. She came to me in a cotton dress with blue flowers.
The patient's eyes opened wide. And Snegirev continued to say:
- Your daughter loves you so much that she begged me to come to you, although usually I do not go to the sick. She also wrote your address. Here is a piece of paper.
“Doctor,” the patient said barely audibly, “look there, in the corner, behind the curtain… Who’s lying there, look… After all, this is my daughter. It has already been two days since she died.
Snegirev, having pushed back the curtain, was literally dumbfounded.
On the bench was the same girl who had visited him an hour ago. She was in a chintz, in some places torn dress with blue flowers, and a thin plait tied with a yellowed ribbon hung from the bench to the floor.
This story received extremely wide publicity at one time in the medical circles of Moscow. She was heatedly discussed in all hospitals in the city.