The Autobiography of a Quack [17]
on the other platform, a hundred feet away, was Stagers shaking his fist at me. He was beaten, and he knew it. In the end few people have been able to get ahead of me.
The retreating train was half a mile away around the curve as I screwed up the brake on my car hard enough to bring it nearly to a stand. I did not wait for it to stop entirely before I slipped off the steps, leaving the other passengers to dispose of themselves as they might until their absence should be discovered and the rest of the train return.
As I wish rather to illustrate my very remarkable professional career than to amuse by describing its lesser incidents, I shall not linger to tell how I succeeded, at last, in reaching St. Louis. Fortunately, I had never ceased to anticipate the moment when escape from File and his friends would be possible, so that I always carried about with me the very small funds with which I had hastily provided myself upon leaving. The whole amount did not exceed sixty-five dollars, but with this, and a gold watch worth twice as much, I hoped to be able to subsist until my own ingenuity enabled me to provide more liberally for the future. Naturally enough, I scanned the papers closely to discover some account of File's death and of the disclosures concerning myself which he was only too likely to have made.
I came at last on an account of how he had poisoned himself, and so escaped the hangman. I never learned what he had said about me, but I was quite sure he had not let me off easy. I felt that this failure to announce his confessions was probably due to a desire on the part of the police to avoid alarming me. Be this as it may, I remained long ignorant as to whether or not the villain betrayed my part in that unusual coroner's inquest.
Before many days I had resolved to make another and a bold venture. Accordingly appeared in the St. Louis papers an advertisement to the effect that Dr. von Ingenhoff, the well-known German physician, who had spent two years on the Plains acquiring a knowledge of Indian medicine, was prepared to treat all diseases by vegetable remedies alone. Dr. von Ingenhoff would remain in St. Louis for two weeks, and was to be found at the Grayson House every day from ten until two o'clock.
To my delight, I got two patients the first day. The next I had twice as many, when at once I hired two connecting rooms, and made a very useful arrangement, which I may describe dramatically in the following way:
There being two or three patients waiting while I finished my cigar and morning julep, enters a respectable-looking old gentleman who inquires briskly of the patients if this is really Dr. von Ingenhoff's. He is told it is. My friend was apt to overact his part. I had often occasion to ask him to be less positive.
``Ah,'' says he, ``I shall be delighted to see the doctor. Five years ago I was scalped on the Plains, and now''--exhibiting a well-covered head--``you see what the doctor did for me. 'T isn't any wonder I've come fifty miles to see him. Any of you been scalped, gentlemen?''
To none of them had this misfortune arrived as yet; but, like most folks in the lower ranks of life and some in the upper ones, it was pleasant to find a genial person who would listen to their account of their own symptoms.
Presently, after hearing enough, the old gentleman pulls out a large watch. ``Bless me! it's late. I must call again. May I trouble you, sir, to say to the doctor that his old friend called to see him and will drop in again to-morrow? Don't forget: Governor Brown of Arkansas.'' A moment later the governor visited me by a side door, with his account of the symptoms of my patients.
Enter a tall Hoosier, the governor having retired. ``Now, doc,'' says the Hoosier, ``I've been handled awful these two years back.'' ``Stop!'' I exclaimed. ``Open your eyes. There, now, let me see,'' taking his pulse as I speak. ``Ah, you've a pain there, and there, and you can't sleep; cocktails don't agree any longer. Weren't you bit by a dog two years ago?'' ``I was,'' says the Hoosier, in amazement.
The retreating train was half a mile away around the curve as I screwed up the brake on my car hard enough to bring it nearly to a stand. I did not wait for it to stop entirely before I slipped off the steps, leaving the other passengers to dispose of themselves as they might until their absence should be discovered and the rest of the train return.
As I wish rather to illustrate my very remarkable professional career than to amuse by describing its lesser incidents, I shall not linger to tell how I succeeded, at last, in reaching St. Louis. Fortunately, I had never ceased to anticipate the moment when escape from File and his friends would be possible, so that I always carried about with me the very small funds with which I had hastily provided myself upon leaving. The whole amount did not exceed sixty-five dollars, but with this, and a gold watch worth twice as much, I hoped to be able to subsist until my own ingenuity enabled me to provide more liberally for the future. Naturally enough, I scanned the papers closely to discover some account of File's death and of the disclosures concerning myself which he was only too likely to have made.
I came at last on an account of how he had poisoned himself, and so escaped the hangman. I never learned what he had said about me, but I was quite sure he had not let me off easy. I felt that this failure to announce his confessions was probably due to a desire on the part of the police to avoid alarming me. Be this as it may, I remained long ignorant as to whether or not the villain betrayed my part in that unusual coroner's inquest.
Before many days I had resolved to make another and a bold venture. Accordingly appeared in the St. Louis papers an advertisement to the effect that Dr. von Ingenhoff, the well-known German physician, who had spent two years on the Plains acquiring a knowledge of Indian medicine, was prepared to treat all diseases by vegetable remedies alone. Dr. von Ingenhoff would remain in St. Louis for two weeks, and was to be found at the Grayson House every day from ten until two o'clock.
To my delight, I got two patients the first day. The next I had twice as many, when at once I hired two connecting rooms, and made a very useful arrangement, which I may describe dramatically in the following way:
There being two or three patients waiting while I finished my cigar and morning julep, enters a respectable-looking old gentleman who inquires briskly of the patients if this is really Dr. von Ingenhoff's. He is told it is. My friend was apt to overact his part. I had often occasion to ask him to be less positive.
``Ah,'' says he, ``I shall be delighted to see the doctor. Five years ago I was scalped on the Plains, and now''--exhibiting a well-covered head--``you see what the doctor did for me. 'T isn't any wonder I've come fifty miles to see him. Any of you been scalped, gentlemen?''
To none of them had this misfortune arrived as yet; but, like most folks in the lower ranks of life and some in the upper ones, it was pleasant to find a genial person who would listen to their account of their own symptoms.
Presently, after hearing enough, the old gentleman pulls out a large watch. ``Bless me! it's late. I must call again. May I trouble you, sir, to say to the doctor that his old friend called to see him and will drop in again to-morrow? Don't forget: Governor Brown of Arkansas.'' A moment later the governor visited me by a side door, with his account of the symptoms of my patients.
Enter a tall Hoosier, the governor having retired. ``Now, doc,'' says the Hoosier, ``I've been handled awful these two years back.'' ``Stop!'' I exclaimed. ``Open your eyes. There, now, let me see,'' taking his pulse as I speak. ``Ah, you've a pain there, and there, and you can't sleep; cocktails don't agree any longer. Weren't you bit by a dog two years ago?'' ``I was,'' says the Hoosier, in amazement.