I saw the surgeon at the hospital, who remembered the case, and he explained to me that the boy when he left there might have lived a month or twenty years.

In any case he would always have to lie on his back.

It would be possible, he said, for him to use his hands--indeed, he believed during the last week or two of his stay in the hospital he had amused himself with drawing." "He was considered good at drawing at Bolsover," put in Jeffreys.
"So he may possibly have been able to earn a living of some sort.

The strange thing is that he does not appear to have written to any one.

He might have communicated with his former head-master, or some of his grandmother's friends at Grangerham, but he has not.