The Story of a Doctor's Telephone Part 43

"Your bill is eighteen dollars."

He heard a little gasp, then a delighted voice said: "I was afraid it would be a good deal more. And now Dr. Blank, I want to ask a favor of you."

"Ask away."

"I brought four dollars to town with me today to pay on my bill, but I want a rocking chair _so_ bad--I'm over here at the furniture store now--and there's such a nice one here that just costs four dollars and I thought maybe you'd wait a----"

"_Certainly_ I will. Get the rocking chair by all means," and he laughed heartily as he went out to the buggy. He climbed in and drove away, the smile still lingering on his face. At the outskirts of the town a tall girl hailed him from the sidewalk. He stopped.

"I was just going to your office to get my medicine," she said.

"I left it with the man there. He'll give it to you."

"Must I take it just like the other?"

"Yes. Laugh some, though, just before you take it."

"Why?"

"Because you won't feel like it afterward."

The girl looked after him as he drove on.

"He's laughing," she said to herself and a grin overspread her face as she pursued her leisurely way.

Ting-a-ling-ling-ling-ling-ling-ling!!!

"Must be something unusual," thought Mary as the doctor went to the 'phone.

"Doctor, is this you?"

"Yes."

"Come out to John Lansing's quick!"

"What's the matter?"

"My wife swallowed poison. Hurry, Doctor, for G.o.d's sake!"

In a few minutes the doctor was on his horse (the roads being too bad for a buggy) and was off. We will follow him as he plunges along through the darkness.

Because of the mud the horse's progress was so slow that the doctor pulled him to one side, urged him on to the board walk, much against his inclination, and went clattering on at such a pace that the doors began to fly open on both sides of the street and heads, turned wonderingly after the fleeting horseman, were framed in rectangles of light.

"What _is_ the matter out there?" The angle of the heads said it so plainly that the doctor laughed within himself as he thundered on. Now it chanced that one of the heads belonged to a Meddlesome Matty who, next day, stirred the matter up, and that evening two officers of the law presented themselves at Dr. Blank's office and arrested him.

"I don't care anything about the fine. All I wanted was to get there,"

he said, handing out the three dollars.

After the horse left the board walk the road became more solid and in about ten minutes the doctor arrived at his destination. Before he could knock the door was opened. The patient sat reclining in a chair, motionless, rigid, her eyes closed.

"What has she taken?" asked the doctor of the woman's husband.

"Laudanum."

"How much?"

"She told me she took this bottle full," and he held up a two ounce bottle.

"I think she's lying," thought the doctor as he laid his fingers upon her pulse. Then he raised the lids and looked carefully at the pupils of the eyes. "Not much contraction here," he thought. Turning to the husband who stood pale and trembling beside him, he said,

"Don't be alarmed--she's in no more danger than you are." He watched the patient's face as he spoke and saw what he expected--a faint facial movement.

"To be on the safe side we'll treat the case as if she had taken two ounces." He gave her a hypodermic emetic then called for warm water.

"How much?" asked the husband.

"O, a half gallon will do."

A big fat woman came panting through the doorway. "I got here as quick as I could," she gasped.

"We don't need you at all," said the doctor quietly. "Better go back home to your children, Mrs. Johnson."

Mrs. Johnson, not liking to be cheated out of a sensation which she dearly loved, stood still. Mr. Lansing came back with the warm water. A faint slit appeared under the eyelids of the patient. The doctor took the big cup and said abruptly, "Here! drink this!"

No response. "Mrs. Lansing!" he said so sharply that her eyes opened.

"Drink this water."

"I ca-an't," she murmured feebly.

"Yes, you can."

"I won't," the voice was getting stronger.

"You will."

"You'll see."

"Yes, I'll see."

He held the big vessel to her mouth. When the water began to pour down her neck she sprang to her feet fighting it off. He held the cup in his left hand while with his right he reached around her neck and took her firmly by the nose. Then he held the cup against her mouth and when it opened for breath he poured the life-saving fluid forcefully down. Great gulps of it were swallowed while a wide sheet of water poured down her neck and over her night-dress to the floor.

"That was very well done. Better sit down now."

The husband stood in awed silence. The fat woman shook her fist at the doctor's back which he beheld, nothing daunted, in the looking-gla.s.s on the wall. The patient herself sat down in absolute quiet. In a minute she began retching and vomited some of the water. The doctor inspected it carefully. Then he went to his overcoat on a chair, felt in the pocket and drew out a coil of something. It looked like red rubber and was about half an inch in diameter. He slowly unwound it. It was five or six feet in length. A subdued voice asked,

"What are you going to do now, Doctor?"