"Incredible!" I cried. "I can understand that there might well be a type of men who assault their wives, but not, surely, a type of women who get assaulted." "That is because you know less about it than Nurse Wade," Travers answered, with an annoying smile of superior knowledge. Our instructress moved on to another bed, laying one gentle hand as she passed on a patient's forehead. The patient glanced gratitude. "That one again," she said once more, half indicating a cot at a little distance: "Number 74. She has much the same thin hair--sparse, weak, and colourless. She has much the same curved back, and much the same aggressive, self-assertive features. Looks capable, doesn't she? A born housewife!... Well, she, too, was knocked down and kicked half-dead the other night by her husband." "It is certainly odd," I answered, "how very much they both recall--" "Our friend at lunch! Yes, extraordinary. See here"; she pulled out a pencil and drew the quick outline of a face in her note-book. "THAT is what is central and essential to the type. They have THIS sort of profile. Women with faces like that ALWAYS get assaulted." Travers glanced over her shoulder. "Quite true," he assented, with his bourgeois nod. "Nurse Wade in her time has shown me dozens of them. Round dozens: bakers' dozens! They all belong to that species. In fact, when a woman of this type is brought in to us wounded now, I ask at once, 'Husband?' and the invariable answer comes pat: 'Well, yes, sir; we had some words together.' The effect of words, my dear fellow, is something truly surprising." "They can pierce like a dagger," I mused. "And leave an open wound behind that requires dressing," Travers added, unsuspecting. Practical man, Travers! "But WHY do they get assaulted--the women of this type?" I asked, still bewildered. "Number 87 has her mother just come to see her," my sorceress interposed. "SHE'S an assault case; brought in last night; badly kicked and bruised about the head and shoulders. Speak to the mother. She'll explain it all to you." Travers and I moved over to the cot her hand scarcely indicated. "Well, your daughter looks pretty comfortable this afternoon, in spite of the little fuss," Travers began, tentatively. "Yus, she's a bit tidy, thanky," the mother answered, smoothing her soiled black gown, grown green with long service. "She'll git on naow, please Gord. But Joe most did for 'er."