Red Pepper"s Patients.
by Grace S. Richmond.
CHAPTER I
AN INTELLIGENT PRESCRIPTION
The man in the silk-lined, London-made overcoat, holding his hat firmly on his head lest the January wind send its expensive perfection into the gutter, paused to ask his way of the man with no overcoat, his hands shoved into his ragged pockets, his shapeless headgear crowded down over his eyes, red and bleary with the piercing wind.
"Burns?" repeated the second man to the question of the first. "Doc Burns? Sure! Next house beyond the corner--the brick one." He turned to point. "Tell it by the rigs. .h.i.tched. It"s his office hours. You"ll do some waitin", tell ye that."
The questioner smiled--a slightly superior smile. "Thank you," he said, and pa.s.sed on. He arrived at the corner and paused briefly, considering the row of vehicles in front of the old, low-lying brick house with its comfortable, white-pillared porches. The row was indeed a formidable one and suggested many waiting people within the house. But after an instant"s hesitation he turned up the gravel path toward the wing of the house upon whose door could be seen the lettering of an inconspicuous sign. As he came near he made out that the sign read "R.P. Burns, M.D.,"
and that the table of office hours below set forth that the present hour was one of those designated.
"I"ll get a line on your practice, Red," said the stranger to himself, and laid hand upon the doorbell. "Incidentally, perhaps, I"ll get a line on why you stick to a small suburban town like this when you might be in the thick of things. A fellow whom I"ve twice met in Vienna, too. I can"t understand it."
A fair-haired young woman in a white uniform and cap admitted the newcomer and pointed him to the one chair left unoccupied in the large and crowded waiting-room. It was a pleasant room, in a well-worn sort of way, and the blazing wood fire in a st.u.r.dy fireplace, the rows of dull-toned books cramming a solid phalanx of bookcases, and a number of interesting old prints on the walls gave it, as the stranger, lifting critical eyes, was obliged to admit to himself, a curious air of dignity in spite of the mingled atmosphere of drugs and patients which a.s.sailed his fastidious nostrils. As for the patients themselves, since they were all about him, he could hardly do less than observe them, although he helped himself to a late magazine from a well-filled table at his side and mechanically turned its pages.
The first to claim his attention was a little girl at his elbow. She could hardly fail to catch his eye, she was so conspicuous with bandages. One eye, one cheek, the whole of her neck, and both her hands were swathed in white, but the other cheek was rosy, and the uncovered eye twinkled bravely as she smiled at the stranger. "I was burned," she said proudly.
"I see," returned the stranger, speaking very low, for he was conscious that the entire roomful of people was listening. "And you are getting better?"
"Oh, yes!" exulted the child. "Doctor"s making me have new skin. He gets me more new skin every day. I didn"t have any at all. It was all burned off."
"That"s very good of him," murmured the stranger.
"He"s awful good," said the child, "when he isn"t cross. He isn"t ever cross to me, Doctor isn"t."
There was a general murmur of amus.e.m.e.nt in the room, and another child, not far away, laughed aloud. The stranger furtively scrutinized the other patients one by one, lifting apparently casual glances from behind his magazine. Several, presumably the owners of the vehicles outside, were of the typical village type, but there were others more sophisticated, and several who were palpably persons of wealth. One late comer was admitted who left a luxuriously appointed motor across the street, and brought in with her an atmosphere of costly furs and violets and fresh air.
"Certainly a mixed crowd," said the stranger to himself behind his magazine; "but not so different, after all, from most doctors"
waiting-room crowds. I might send in a card, but, if I remember Red, it wouldn"t get me anything--and this is rather interesting anyhow. I"ll wait."
He waited, for he wished the waiting room to be clear when he should approach that busy consulting room beyond. Meanwhile, people came and went. The door into the inner room would swing open, a patient would emerge, a curt but pleasant "Good-bye" in a deep voice following him or her out, and the fair-haired nurse, who sat at a desk near the door or came out of the consulting room with the patient, would summon the next.
The lady of the furs and violets sent in her card, but, as the stranger had antic.i.p.ated in his own case, it procured her no more than an a.s.surance from the nurse that Doctor Burns would see her in due course.
Since he wanted the coast clear the stranger, when at last his turn arrived, politely waived his rights, sent the furs and violets in before him, and sat alone with the nurse in the cleared waiting room.
A comparatively short period of time elapsed before the consulting-room door opened once more. But it closed again--almost--and a few words reached the outer room.
"Oh, but you"re hard--hard, Doctor Burns! I simply can"t do it," said a plaintive voice.
"Then don"t expect me to accomplish anything. It"s up to you--absolutely," replied a brusque voice, which then softened slightly as it added: "Cheer up. You can, you know. Good-bye."
The patient came out, her lips set, her eyes lowered, and left the office as if she wanted nothing so much as to get away. The nurse rose and began to say that Doctor Burns would now see his one remaining caller, but at that moment Doctor Burns himself appeared in the doorway, glanced at the stranger, who had risen, smiling--and the need for an intermediary between physician and patient vanished before the onslaught of the physician himself.
"My word! Gardner Coolidge! Well, well--if this isn"t the greatest thing on earth. My dear fellow!"
The stranger, no longer a stranger, with his hand being wrung like that, with his eyes being looked into by a pair of glowing hazel eyes beneath a heavy thatch of well-remembered coppery hair, returned this demonstration of affection with equal fervour.
"I"ve been sitting in your stuffy waiting room, Red, till the entire population of this town should tell you its aches, just for the pleasure of seeing you with the professional manner off."
Burns threw back his head and laughed, with a gesture as of flinging something aside. "It"s off then, Cooly--if I have one. I didn"t know I had. How are you? Man, but it"s good to see you! Come along out of this into a place that"s not stuffy. Where"s your bag? You didn"t leave it anywhere?"
"I can"t stay, Red--really I can"t. Not this time. I must go to-night.
And I came to consult you professionally--so let"s get that over first."
"Of course. Just let me speak a word to the authorities. You"ll at least be here for dinner? Step into the next room, Cooly. On your way let me present you to my a.s.sistant, Miss Mathewson, whom I couldn"t do without.
Mr. Coolidge, Miss Mathewson."
Gardner Coolidge bowed to the office nurse, whom he had already cla.s.sified as a very attractively superior person and well worth a good salary; then went on into the consulting room, where an open window had freshened the small place beyond any possibility of its being called stuffy. As he closed the window with a shiver and looked about him, glancing into the white-tiled surgery beyond; he recognized the fact that, though he might be in the workshop of a village pract.i.tioner, it was a workshop which did not lack the tools of the workman thoroughly abreast of the times.
Burns came back, his face bright with pleasure in the unexpected appearance of his friend. He stood looking across the small room at Coolidge, as if he could get a better view of the whole man at a little distance. The two men were a decided contrast to each other. Redfield Pepper Burns, known to all his intimates, and to many more who would not have ventured to call him by that t.i.tle, as "Red Pepper Burns," on account of the combination of red head, quick temper, and wit which were his most distinguishing characteristics of body and mind, was a stalwart fellow whose weight was effectually kept down by his activity. His white linen office jacket was filled by powerful shoulders, and the perfectly kept hands of the surgeon gave evidence, as such hands do, of their delicacy of touch, in the very way in which Burns closed the door behind him.
Gardner Coolidge was of a different type altogether. As tall as Burns, he looked taller because of his slender figure and the distinctive outlines of his careful dress. His face was dark and rather thin, showing sensitive lines about the eyes and mouth, and a tendency to melancholy in the eyes themselves, even when lighted by a smile, as now.
He was manifestly the man of worldly experience, with fastidious tastes, and presumably one who did not accept the rest of mankind as comrades until proved and chosen.
"So it"s my services you want?" questioned Burns. "If that"s the case, then it"s here you sit."
"Face to the light, of course," objected Coolidge with a grimace. "I wonder if you doctors know what a moral advantage as well as a physical one that gives you."
"Of course. The moral advantage is the one we need most. Anybody can see when a skin is jaundiced; but only by virtue of that moral standpoint can we detect the soul out of order. And that"s the matter with you, Cooly."
"What!" Coolidge looked startled. "I knew you were a man who jumped to conclusions in the old days--"
"And acted on them, too," admitted Burns. "I should say I did. And got myself into many a sc.r.a.pe thereby, of course. Well, I jump to conclusions now, in just the same way, only perhaps with a bit more understanding of the ground I jump on. However, tell me your symptoms in orthodox style, please, then we"ll have them out of the way."
Coolidge related them somewhat reluctantly because, as he went on, he was conscious that they did not appear to be of as great importance as this visit to a physician seemed to indicate he thought them. The most impressive was the fact that he was unable to get a thoroughly good night"s sleep except when physically exhausted, which in his present manner of life he seldom was. When he had finished and looked around--he had been gazing out of the window--he found himself, as he had known he should, under the intent scrutiny of the eyes he was facing.
"What did the last man give you for this insomnia?" was the abrupt question.
"How do you know I have been to a succession of men?" demanded Coolidge with a touch of evident irritation.
"Because you come to me. We don"t look up old friends in the profession until the strangers fail us," was the quick reply.
"More hasty conclusions. Still, I"ll have to admit that I let our family physician look me over, and that he suggested my seeing a nerve man--Allbright. He has rather a name, I believe?"
"Sure thing. What did he recommend?"
"A long sea voyage. I took it--having nothing else to do--and slept a bit better while I was away. The minute I got back it was the old story."
"Nothing on your mind, I suppose?" suggested Burns.
"I supposed you"d ask me that stock question. Why shouldn"t there be something on my mind? Is there anybody whose mind is free from a weight of some sort?" demanded Gardner Coolidge. His thin face flushed a little.
"n.o.body," admitted Burns promptly. "The question is whether the weight on yours is one that"s got to stay there or whether you may be rid of it. Would you care to tell me anything about it? I"m a pretty old friend, you know."
Coolidge was silent for a full minute, then he spoke with evident reluctance: "It won"t do a particle of good to tell, but I suppose, if I consult you, you have a right to know the facts. My wife--has gone back to her father."