The Autobiography of a Quack and the Case of George Dedlow Part 6

I traveled in a leisurely way until I reached Boston. The country anywhere would have been safer, but I do not lean to agricultural pursuits. It seemed an agreeable city, and I decided to remain.

I took good rooms at Parker's, and concluding to enjoy life, amused myself in the company of certain, I may say uncertain, young women who danced at some of the theaters. I played billiards, drank rather too much, drove fast horses, and at the end of a delightful year was shocked to find myself in debt, and with only seven dollars and fifty-three cents left--I like to be accurate. I had only one resource: I determined to visit my deaf aunt and Peninnah, and to see what I could do in the role of the prodigal nephew. At all events, I should gain time to think of what new enterprise I could take up; but, above all, I needed a little capital and a house over my head. I had p.a.w.ned nearly everything of any value which I possessed.

I left my debts to gather interest, and went away to Woodbury. It was the day before Christmas when I reached the little Jersey town, and it was also by good luck Sunday. I was hungry and quite penniless. I wandered about until church had begun, because I was sure then to find Aunt Rachel and Peninnah out at the service, and I desired to explore a little. The house was closed, and even the one servant absent. I got in with ease at the back through the kitchen, and having at least an hour and a half free from interruption, I made a leisurely search. The role of prodigal was well enough, but here was a better chance and an indulgent opportunity.

In a few moments I found the famous Bible hid away under Aunt Rachel's mattress. The Bible bank was fat with notes, but I intended to be moderate enough to escape suspicion. Here were quite two thousand dollars. I resolved to take, just now, only one hundred, so as to keep a good balance. Then, alas! I lit on a long envelop, my aunt's will. Every cent was left to Christ Church; not a dime to poor Pen or to me. I was in a rage. I tore up the will and replaced the envelop. To treat poor Pen that way--Pen of all people! There was a heap more will than testament, for all it was in the Bible. After that I thought it was right to punish the old witch, and so I took every note I could find.

When I was through with this business, I put back the Bible under the mattress, and observing that I had been quite too long, I went downstairs with a keen desire to leave the town as early as possible. I was tempted, however, to look further, and was rewarded by finding in an old clock case a small reticule stuffed with bank-notes. This I appropriated, and made haste to go out. I was too late. As I went into the little entry to get my hat and coat, Aunt Rachel entered, followed by Peninnah.

At sight of me my aunt cried out that I was a monster and fit for the penitentiary. As she could not hear at all, she had the talk to herself, and went by me and up-stairs, rumbling abuse like distant thunder overhead.

Meanwhile I was taken up with Pen. The pretty fool was seated on a chair, all dressed up in her Sunday finery, and rocking backward and forward, crying, "Oh, oh, ah!" like a lamb saying, "Baa, baa, baa!" She never had much sense. I had to shake her to get a reasonable word.

She mopped her eyes, and I heard her gasp out that my aunt had at last decided that I was the person who had thinned her h.o.a.rds. This was bad, but involved less inconvenience than it might have done an hour earlier.

Amid tears Pen told me that a detective had been at the house inquiring for me. When this happened it seems that the poor little goose had tried to fool deaf Aunt Rachel with some made-up story as to the man having come about taxes. I suppose the girl was not any too sharp, and the old woman, I guess, read enough from merely seeing the man's lips. You never could keep anything from her, and she was both curious and suspicious.

She a.s.sured the officer that I was a thief, and hoped I might be caught.

I could not learn whether the man told Pen any particulars, but as I was slowly getting at the facts we heard a loud scream and a heavy fall.

Pen said, "Oh, oh!" and we hurried upstairs. There was the old woman on the floor, her face twitching to right, and her breathing a sort of hoa.r.s.e croak. The big Bible lay open on the floor, and I knew what had happened. It was a fit of apoplexy.

At this very unpleasant sight Pen seemed to recover her wits, and said: "Go away, go away! Oh, brother, brother, now I know you have stolen her money and killed her, and--and I loved you, I was so proud of you! Oh, oh!"

This was all very fine, but the advice was good. I said: "Yes, I had better go. Run and get some one--a doctor. It is a fit of hysterics; there is no danger. I will write to you. You are quite mistaken."

This was too feeble even for Pen, and she cried:

"No, never; I never want to see you again. You would kill me next."

"Stuff!" said I, and ran down-stairs. I seized my coat and hat, and went to the tavern, where I got a man to drive me to Camden. I have never seen Pen since. As I crossed the ferry to Philadelphia I saw that I should have asked when the detective had been after me. I suspected from Pen's terror that it had been recently.

It was Sunday and, as I reminded myself, the day before Christmas. The ground was covered with snow, and as I walked up Market street my feet were soon soaked. In my haste I had left my overshoes. I was very cold, and, as I now see, foolishly fearful. I kept thinking of what a conspicuous thing a fire-red head is, and of how many people knew me.

As I reached Woodbury early and without a cent, I had eaten nothing all day. I relied on Pen.

Now I concluded to go down into my old neighborhood and get a lodging where no references were asked. Next day I would secure a disguise and get out of the way. I had pa.s.sed the day without food, as I have just said, and having ample means, concluded to go somewhere and get a good dinner. It was now close to three in the afternoon. I was aware of two things: that I was making many plans, and giving them up as soon as made; and that I was suddenly afraid without cause, afraid to enter an eating-house, and in fear of every man I met.

I went on, feeling more and more chilly. When a man is really cold his mind does not work well, and now it was blowing a keen gale from the north. At Second and South I came plump on a policeman I knew. He looked at me through the drifting snow, as if he was uncertain, and twice looked back after having pa.s.sed me. I turned west at Christian street.

When I looked behind me the man was standing at the corner, staring after me. At the next turn I hurried away northward in a sort of anguish of terror. I have said I was an uncommon person. I am. I am sensitive, too. My mind is much above the average, but unless I am warm and well fed it does not act well, and I make mistakes. At that time I was half frozen, in need of food, and absurdly scared. Then that old fool squirming on the floor got on to my nerves. I went on and on, and at last into Second street, until I came to Christ Church, of all places for me. I heard the sound of the organ in the afternoon service. I felt I must go in and get warm. Here was another silly notion: I was afraid of hotels, but not of the church. I reasoned vaguely that it was a dark day, and darker in the church, and so I went in at the Church Alley entrance and sat near the north door. No one noticed me. I sat still in a high-backed pew, well hid, and wondering what was the matter with me.

It was curious that a doctor, and a man of my intelligence, should have been long in guessing a thing so simple.

For two months I had been drinking hard, and for two days had quit, being a man capable of great self-control, and also being short of money. Just before the benediction I saw a man near by who seemed to stare at me. In deadly fear I got up and quickly slipped through a door into the tower room. I said to myself, "He will follow me or wait outside." I stood a moment with my head all of a whirl, and then in a s.h.i.+ver of fear ran up the stairs to the tower until I got into the bell-ringer's room. I was safe. I sat down on a stool, twitching and tremulous. There were the old books on bell-ringing, and the miniature chime of small bells for instruction. The wind had easy entrance, and it swung the eight ropes about in a way I did not like. I remember saying, "Oh, don't do that." At last I had a mad desire to ring one of the bells. As a loop of rope swung toward me it seemed to hold a face, and this face cried out, "Come and hang yourself; then the bell will ring."

If I slept I do not know. I may have done so. Certainly I must have stayed there many hours. I was dull and confused, and yet on my guard, for when far into the night I heard noises below, I ran up the steeper steps which ascend to the steeple, where are the bells. Half-way up I sat down on the stair. The place was cold and the darkness deep. Then I heard the eight ringers down below. One said: "Never knowed a Christmas like this since Zeb Sanderaft died. Come, boys!" I knew it must be close on to midnight. Now they would play a Christmas carol. I used every Christmas to be roused up and carried here and set on dad's shoulder.

When they were done ringing, Number Two always gave me a box of sugar-plums and a large red apple. As they rang off, my father would cry out, "One, two," and so on, and then cry, "Elias, all over town people are opening windows to listen." I seemed to hear him as I sat in the gloom. Then I heard, "All ready; one, two," and they rang the Christmas carol. Overhead I heard the great bells ringing out:

And all the bells on earth shall ring On Christmas day, on Christmas day.

I felt suddenly excited, and began to hum the air. Great heavens! There was the old woman, Aunt Rachel, with her face going twitch, twitch, the croak of her breathing keeping a sort of mad time with "On Christmas day, on Christmas day." I jumped up. She was gone. I knew in a hazy sort of way what was the matter with me, but I had still the sense to sit down and wait. I said now it would be snakes, for once before I had been almost as bad. But what I did see was a little curly-headed boy in a white frock and pantalets, climbing up the stairs right leg first; so queer of me to have noticed that. I knew I was that boy. He was an innocent-looking little chap, and was smiling. He seemed to me to grow and grow, and at last was a big, red-headed man with a live rat in his hand. I saw nothing more, but I surely knew I needed whisky. I waited until all was still, and got down and out, for I knew every window. I soon found a tavern, and got a drink and some food. At once my fear left me. I was warm at last and clear of head, and had again my natural courage. I was well aware that I was on the edge of delirium tremens and must be most prudent. I paid in advance for my room and treated myself as I had done many another. Only a man of unusual force could have managed his own case as I did. I went out only at night, and in a week was well enough to travel. During this time I saw now and then that grinning little fellow. Sometimes he had an apple and was eating it. I do not know why he was worse to me than snakes, or the twitchy old woman with her wide eyes of gla.s.s, and that jerk, jerk, to right.

I decided to go back to Boston. I got to New York prudently in a roundabout way, and in two weeks' time was traveling east from Albany.

I felt well, and my spirits began at last to rise to their usual level.

When I arrived in Boston I set myself to thinking how best I could contrive to enjoy life and at the same time to increase my means.

I possessed sufficient capital, and was able and ready to embark in whatever promised the best returns with the smallest personal risks. I settled myself in a suburb, paid off a few pressing claims, and began to reflect with my ordinary sagacity.

We were now in the midst of a most absurd war with the South, and it was becoming difficult to escape the net of conscription. It might be wise to think of this in time. Europe seemed a desirable residence, but I needed more money to make this agreeable, and an investment for my brains was what I wanted most. Many schemes presented themselves as worthy the application of industry and talent, but none of them altogether suited my case. I thought at times of traveling as a physiological lecturer, combining with it the business of a pract.i.tioner: scare the audience at night with an enumeration of symptoms which belong to ten out of every dozen healthy people, and then doctor such of them as are gulls enough to consult me next day.

The bigger the fright the better the pay. I was a little timid, however, about facing large audiences, as a man will be naturally if he has lived a life of adventure, so that upon due consideration I gave up the idea altogether.

The patent medicine business also looked well enough, but it is somewhat overdone at all times, and requires a heavy outlay, with the probable result of ill success. Indeed, I believe one hundred quack remedies fail for one that succeeds, and millions must have been wasted in placards, bills, and advertis.e.m.e.nts, which never returned half their value to the speculator. I think I shall some day beguile my time with writing an account of the princ.i.p.al quack remedies which have met with success.

They are few in number, after all, as any one must know who recalls the countless pills and tonics which are puffed awhile on the fences, and disappear, to be heard of no more.

Lastly, I inclined for a while to undertake a private insane asylum, which appeared to me to offer facilities for money-making, as to which, however, I may have been deceived by the writings of certain popular novelists. I went so far, I may say, as actually to visit Concord for the purpose of finding a pleasant locality and a suitable atmosphere.

Upon reflection I abandoned my plans, as involving too much personal labor to suit one of my easy frame of mind.

Tired at last of idleness and lounging on the Common, I engaged in two or three little ventures of a semi-professional character, such as an exhibition of laughing-gas, advertising to cure cancer,--"Send twenty-five stamps by mail to J. B., and receive an infallible receipt,"--etc. I did not find, however, that these little enterprises prospered well in New England, and I had recalled very forcibly a story which my father was fond of relating to me in my boyhood. It was about how certain very knowing flies went to get mola.s.ses, and how it ended by the mola.s.ses getting them. This, indeed, was precisely what happened to me in all my efforts to better myself in the Northern States, until at length my misfortunes climaxed in total and unexpected ruin.

Having been very economical, I had now about twenty-seven hundred dollars. It was none too much. At this time I made the acquaintance of a sea-captain from Maine. He told me that he and two others had chartered a smart little steamer to run to Jamaica with a variety cargo. In fact, he meant to run into Wilmington or Charleston, and he was to carry quinine, chloroform, and other medical requirements for the Confederates. He needed twenty-five hundred dollars more, and a doctor to buy the kind of things which army surgeons require. Of course I was prudent and he careful, but at last, on his proving to me that there was no risk, I agreed to expend his money, his friends', and my own up to twenty-five hundred dollars. I saw the other men, one of them a rebel captain. I was well pleased with the venture, and resolved for obvious reasons to go with them on the steamer. It was a promising investment, and I am free to reflect that in this, as in some other things, I have been free from vulgar prejudices. I bought all that we needed, and was well satisfied when it was cleverly stowed away in the hold.

We were to sail on a certain Thursday morning in September, 1863. I sent my trunk to the vessel, and went down the evening before we were to start to go on board, but found that the little steamer had been hauled out from the pier. The captain, who met me at this time, endeavored to get a boat to ferry us to the s.h.i.+p; but a gale was blowing, and he advised me to wait until morning. My a.s.sociates were already on board.

Early next day I dressed and went to the captain's room, which proved to be empty. I was instantly filled with doubt, and ran frantically to the Long Wharf, where, to my horror, I could see no signs of the vessel or captain. Neither have I ever set eyes on them from that time to this.

I thought of lodging information with the police as to the unpatriotic design of the rascal who swindled me, but on the whole concluded that it was best to hold my tongue.

It was, as I perceived, such utterly spilt milk as to be little worth lamenting, and I therefore set to work, with my accustomed energy, to utilize on my own behalf the resources of my medical education, which so often before had saved me from want. The war, then raging at its height, appeared to offer numerous opportunities to men of talent. The path which I chose was apparently a humble one, but it enabled me to make very practical use of my professional knowledge, and afforded for a time rapid and secure returns, without any other investment than a little knowledge cautiously employed. In the first place, I deposited my small remnant of property in a safe bank. Then I went to Providence, where, as I had heard, patriotic persons were giving very large bounties in order, I suppose, to insure the government the services of better men than themselves. On my arrival I lost no time in offering myself as a subst.i.tute, and was readily accepted, and very soon mustered into the Twentieth Rhode Island. Three months were pa.s.sed in camp, during which period I received bounty to the extent of six hundred and fifty dollars, with which I tranquilly deserted about two hours before the regiment left for the field. With the product of my industry I returned to Boston, and deposited all but enough to carry me to New York, where within a month I enlisted twice, earning on each occasion four hundred dollars.

After this I thought it wise to try the same game in some of the smaller towns near to Philadelphia. I approached my birthplace with a good deal of doubt; but I selected a regiment in camp at Norristown, which is eighteen miles away. Here I got nearly seven hundred dollars by entering the service as a subst.i.tute for an editor, whose pen, I presume, was mightier than his sword. I was, however, disagreeably surprised by being hastily forwarded to the front under a foxy young lieutenant, who brutally shot down a poor devil in the streets of Baltimore for attempting to desert. At this point I began to make use of my medical skill, for I did not in the least degree fancy being shot, either because of deserting or of not deserting. It happened, therefore, that a day or two later, while in Was.h.i.+ngton, I was seized in the street with a fit, which perfectly imposed upon the officer in charge, and caused him to leave me at the Douglas Hospital. Here I found it necessary to perform fits about twice a week, and as there were several real epileptics in the ward, I had a capital chance of studying their symptoms, which, finally, I learned to imitate with the utmost cleverness.

I soon got to know three or four men who, like myself, were personally averse to bullets, and who were simulating other forms of disease with more or less success. One of them suffered with rheumatism of the back, and walked about like an old man; another, who had been to the front, was palsied in the right arm. A third kept open an ulcer on the leg, rubbing in a little antimonial ointment, which I bought at fifty cents, and sold him at five dollars a box.

A change in the hospital staff brought all of us to grief. The new surgeon was a quiet, gentlemanly person, with pleasant blue eyes and clearly cut features, and a way of looking at you without saying much. I felt so safe myself that I watched his procedures with just that kind of enjoyment which one clever man takes in seeing another at work.

The first inspection settled two of us.

"Another back case," said the a.s.sistant surgeon to his senior.

"Back hurt you?" says the latter, mildly.

"Yes, sir; run over by a howitzer; ain't never been able to stand straight since."

"A howitzer!" says the surgeon. "Lean forward, my man, so as to touch the floor--so. That will do." Then turning to his aid, he said, "Prepare this man's discharge papers."

"His discharge, sir?"

"Yes; I said that. Who's next?"

"Thank you, sir," groaned the man with the back. "How soon, sir, do you think it will be?"

"Ah, not less than a month," replied the surgeon, and pa.s.sed on.

Now, as it was unpleasant to be bent like the letter C, and as the patient presumed that his discharge was secure, he naturally allowed himself a little relaxation in the way of becoming straighter.

Unluckily, those nice blue eyes were everywhere at all hours, and one fine morning Smithson was appalled at finding himself in a detachment bound for the field, and bearing on his descriptive list an ill-natured indors.e.m.e.nt about his malady.