"That"s what I mean. Apparently O"Farrell _did_ say something about more corpses smuggled out last week."
"Mr. Ellis," said the Doctor, annoyed at his slip, "I am not on the witness stand."
"Dr. Surtaine," returned the other in the same tone, "when you undertake an investigation for the "Clarion," you are one of my reporters and I expect a full and frank report from you."
"Bull"s-eye for you, my boy. You win. They did run those cases out.
Before we"re through with it they"ll probably run more out. You see, the Health Bureau has got it in for O"Farrell, and if they knew there was anything up there, they"d raise a regular row and queer things generally."
"What _is_ up?"
"Honestly, I don"t know."
"Nor even suspect?"
"Well, it might be scarlet fever. Or, perhaps diphtheria. You see strange types sometimes."
"If it"s either, failure to report is against the law."
"Technically, yes. But we"ve got it fixed to clean things up. The people will be looked after. There"s no real danger of its spreading much. And you know how it is. The Rookeries have got a bad name, anyway. Anything starting there is sure to be exaggerated. Why, look at that chicken-pox epidemic a few years ago."
"I understand n.o.body who had been vaccinated got any of the chicken-pox, as you call it."
"That"s as may be. What did it amount to, anyway? Nothing. Yet it almost ruined Old Home Week."
"Naturally you don"t want the Centennial Home Week endangered. But we don"t want the health of the city endangered."
""We." Who"s we?"
"Well, the "Clarion.""
"Don"t work the guardian-of-the-people game on me, my boy. And don"t worry about the city"s health. If this starts to spread we"ll take measures."
By no means satisfied with this interview, McGuire Ellis left the Certina plant, and almost ran into Dr. Elliot, whom he hailed, for he had the faculty of knowing everybody.
"Not doing any doctoring nowadays, are you?"
"No," retorted the other. "Doing any sickening, yourself?"
Ellis grinned. "It"s despairing weariness that makes me look this way.
I"m up against a tougher job than old Diogenes. I"m looking for an honest doctor."
"You fish in muddy waters," commented his acquaintance, glancing up at the Certina Building.
"There"s something very wrong down in the Twelfth Ward."
"Not going in for reform politics, are you?"
"This isn"t political. Some kind of disease has broken out in O"Farrell"s Rookeries."
"Delirium tremens," suggested Dr. Elliot.
"Yes: that"s a funny joke," returned the other, unmoved; "but did you ever hear of any one sneaking D-T cases across the county line at night to a pest-house run by a political friend of O"Farrell"s?"
"Can"t say I have."
"Or burying the dead in quicklime?"
"Quicklime? What"s this, "Clarion" sensationalism?"
"Don"t be young. I"m telling you. Quicklime. Canadaga County."
Not only had Dr. Elliot served his country in the navy, but he had done duty in that efficient fighting force, which reaps less honor and follows a more n.o.ble, self-sacrificing and courageous ideal than any army or navy, the United States Public Health Service. Under that banner he had fought famines, panic, and pestilence, from the stricken lumber-camps of the North, to the pent-in, quarantined bayous of the South; and now, at the hint of danger, there came a battle-glint into his sharp eyes.
"Tell me what you know."
"Now you"re talking!" said the newspaper man. "It"s little enough. But we"ve got it straight that they"ve been covering up some disease for weeks."
"What do the certificates call it?"
"Malaria and septic something, I believe."
"Septicaemia hemorrhagica?"
"That"s it."
"An alias. That"s what they called bubonic plague in San Francisco and yellow fever in Texas in the old days of concealment."
"It couldn"t be either of those, could it?"
"No. But it might be any reportable disease: diphtheria, smallpox, any of "em. Even that hardly explains the quicklime."
"Could you look into it for us; for the "Clarion"?"
"I? Work for the "Clarion"?"
"Why not?"
"I don"t like your paper."
"But you"d be doing a public service."
"Possibly. How do I know you"d print what I discovered--supposing I discovered anything?"
"We"re publishing an honest paper, nowadays."
"_Are_ you? Got this morning"s?"
Like all good newspaper men, McGuire Ellis habitually went armed with a copy of his own paper. He produced it from his coat pocket.