TREEHE HAD come to know why; but seeing the nurse and the resident physician near the bed, he stood still by the doorway, leaning tightly on the
wall. His eyes settled on the cast that covered his right knee, then strayed across to Bed 30. The patient there had been living in a cast, his body must have burned now from itch and heat. The
nurse would give the patient thin sticks with which to scratch his hidden skin. Oftentimes, the patient would call the doctor, the intern, the nurse, the attendant, and ask when they would break
the cast. He had been asking for months. One morning, when the heat rolled into the ward in big waves, the patient cried, “Break it! Break it! I’d rather die! I want to... die!”
and pounded the cast with his frail hands. The nurse on duty rushed to Bed 30. The a
