By stated course of procedure Horace Amlie, M.D., should now have been cited by the District Attorney to present his defense before the Judges of the County Court. The roster for the session, however, was abnormally crowded. The bench had no time to devote to a long-drawn, technical and non-criminal process. Upon suggestion from Albany they appointed a three-man medical commission to convene at Palmyra, take testimony and report its recommendations. The accused was well satisfied; at least, he would be heard by a jury of his peers.
An angry letter from Dr. John G. Vought caused him to change his mind.
A packed panel, my lad. I tried to get on it. Blocked by monkey-doodle politics in Albany. Someone is pulling the strings who does not like you. An ignoramus, a quack, and a doddering old sumph; that is the make-up of your precious commission. They intend to serve you for breakfast, fried and garnished.
Weather permitting, the commission would sit at the Eagle Tavern, March 15th, 16th and 17th. It was made up of Dr. Paul Bolger of Geneva, Dr. Thaddeus Smith of Rochester, and, to lend dignity and authority to two such dubious appointments, the old and respected Dr. Luke Avery of Oneida County in the chair. Inquiry convinced Horace that his friend’s forebodings were well-founded. Dr. Bolger, having proved a failure in the enlightened village of Geneva, was known to be looking about him for a more propitious field of activity (and why not Palmyra if there should be a vacancy?). Dr. Smith was an aging, blustering diploma-less graduate of a sixmonth road-course as aid to a regular physician. Dr. Avery was eighty-two years old.
As sponsor of the charges, Dr. Gail Murchison would act as prosecuting counsel. Back of it all, as Horace well knew, was Genter Latham. But how to prove it? And of what avail, if proved?
On the afternoon of the day before the hearing, a small, robustious, bristly man, his reddish hair and beard flecked with gray, stamped up the steps of Dr. Amlie’s office, kicked the mud and slush from his elegant boots, closed the door behind him with a bang, tossed his bear-coat upon a chair, and let out a lusty bellow.
“Pot-boy! Pot-boy!”
Dinty came in from the stockroom. She was in housework clothes, her hair was fluffily disordered, a slate pencil stood back of her ear, for she had been at her reckonings, and her azure eyes were wide and lovely with astonishment. Her natural assumption was that the author of the stentorian call was drunk. This inference was supported by the form of address adopted by the singular-looking person, upon seeing her.
“Chuckabiddy!” said he.
“Sir?”
“I want a drink.”
“This is not the inn, sir.”
“Listen, my ducky. My feet are damp. My nose is a freshet. I’m all a-shiver. I come to the house of a friend and the daintiest little kicksie-wicksie these old eyes have viewed for many a day advises me that this is not an inn.”
“A friend?” said Dinty, beginning to wonder.
“The gaudy shingle without advertises this to be the office of Horace Amlie, M.D.”
“Office hours, nine to eleven, two to four,” she pointed out.
“These young medicos are an easeful lot. Not as in my day.”
“Oh, my goodness me!” exclaimed Dinty in sudden enlightenment. “You must be the learned Dr. Vought.”
“You recognize me,” he said with satisfaction. “How?”
“By your gracious manners,” answered Dinty demurely.
He threw himself into a chair, roaring with laughter. “My reputation precedes me.”
“Your reputation for science, also, sir. Have you come to aid my husband?”
“Husband? At your age, child?” He regarded her short skirts and unruly hair with frank surprise. “Surely you’re not …”
“Mrs. Dr. Horace Amlie, at your service.”
“Pox and pestilence!” said the stubby little man, projecting himself from his seat. “And I took you for a pretty schoolgirl.” He made her a low and not ungraceful bow. “Apologia pro audacia mea. Have you the Latinity, ma’am?”
“So much as academy schooling gives.”
“Aut potio, out mors,” he roared. “Translate me that.”
“By the deed if not the word,” she returned and made for the kitchen.
Presently she was back with a jorum of steaming rum toddy. “That should save you from death, sir,” she said.
“We shall get along, you and I,” predicted the great Dr. Vought, a moment later, lifting his dribbling mustache from a draught that would have scorched the lining out of a less hardy throat.
By the time Horace got back, the two were fast friends and the visitor had acquired a shrewd notion of the local cabal.
“So, it’s Mr. Genter Latham that’s back of this,” he observed.
“There’s no doubt of it,” answered Horace.
“With Sir Pertinax McSycophant for his lackey. Our friend, Gail Murchison, M.D., save the mark! I’ve a rod in pickle for that sorry shyster.”
“He has a strong following.”
Dr. Vought snorted. “Our highty-tighty, high-and-mighty banking man might be due for a surprise, too. I have been making some investigations at home on my own account.”
“Into his financial operations?”
“Not exactly that. Wait and see.”
“Does this mean that you will assist me at the hearings?” asked Horace eagerly.
Dr. Vought thumped his chest, looking like a ruddy gorilla. “Is John G. Vought one to stand idly by and see the best pupil he ever taught set upon by a pack of medical wolves, and never lift a hand? Count upon me, my boy. I have visited Dr. Avery and demanded a public hearing.”
“What for?”
“To get that old fraud of a Murchison into the open.”
The lust of battle burned in his eye. Horace suspected that there would be more attack than defense in his method, that he would be as much concerned in holding up to contempt Murchison’s ineptitudes as in exculpating the defendant. Very well. Since the case was evidently forejudged, they would at least give the other side a fight.
The hearings were well patronized, Palmyra having a keen scent for a free show. Genter Latham was there, looking stern, and surrounded by satellites, with Honest Lawyer Upcraft at his elbow. His daughter did not attend. On the other side a small group of Horace’s supporters, made up chiefly of the smithy coterie, surrounded Silas Bewar. After the proceedings had opened, the Reverend Theron Strang arrived, pointedly went over to Horace to shake his hand and whisper a word of encouragement in his ear, then joined the blacksmith. Still later, Squire and Mrs. Jerrold entered. He gazed about him in painful indecision, but his wife plucked him imperatively by the sleeve and they seated themselves near the village mogul. Dinty, who was with her husband, clutched at his arm for a moment, before returning her attention to the jury which was to determine the future fate of the Amlies.
The chairman, a venerable and benign figure, divided his time between taking snuff to keep himself awake, and drowsing off between pinches. Dr. Bolger, a weasely, alert little man, entered squeaky notes on a slate. The rotund Thaddeus Smith fortified himself behind a rampart of volumes. Dr. Gail Murchison, ensconced at a special table, pored solemnly over a sheaf of papers.
Rapping for attention, Chairman Avery prepared to present the charges. Dr. Vought rose and addressed him deferentially.
“May I put a question, sir?”
“What is Dr. Vought’s status here?” The interruption came from Lawyer Upcraft.
“What’s yours?” snapped the redhead.
The lawyer ignored the question. Dr. Avery asked mildly,
“What is your question, Dr. Vought?”
“As medical counsel for the accused, am I permitted to call witnesses, sir?”
“For what purpose?” intervened Upcraft.
“Does the commission wish to know our purpose?” asked Dr. Vought pointedly.
The Chairman glanced uneasily at Mr. Upcraft. “It does,” he answered.
“Very good. To show prejudice. To prove that this persecution is engineered by a person outside the medical profession.” He slowly turned his body to face Genter Latham. “To support the honorable character of the accused.”
Three committee faces converged, to be joined by the hairy countenance of Dr. Murchison, and the parched, lean features of the Honest Lawyer.
“You may call such medical witnesses as you see fit,” decided the Chair.
“Since the prosecution enjoys the privilege of gratuitous legal advice from a lawyer privately retained, may we not avail ourselves of lay support?” inquired the Rochester man blandly.
“The point is, I think, well taken,” said the old gentleman, and Vought whispered in Horace’s ear, “He is going to be helpful if we can keep him awake.”
The Chair was speaking again. “In due order the Chair will determine the competency of witnesses, as called. I will now read the charges, duly filed against Horace Amlie, M.D., of Palmyra in Wayne County, State of New York, and subject to the authority of the medical body which I have the honor to represent.”
The indictment (drawn privately by Dr. Murchison with the aid of Lawyer Upcraft, and adopted in toto) was divided into eight heads.
Malpractice.
Soliciting patients away from established practitioner.
Self-advertising.
Advancing and supporting theories repugnant to medical science.
Ignorance prejudicial to the public weal.
Immoral associations.
Interference with private rights and infringement upon property.
Employment of dangerous medical methods.
“We plead innocence of one and all,” said Dr. Vought. “We demand confrontation with our accusers, both overt and” (again the deadly pause and stare at Genter Latham) “covert.”
“The commission will hear from Dr. Gail Murchison,” said the Chairman, and incontinently dozed off.
The prosecutor opened with a semi-tearful disclaimer of any personal bias against his young associate and one-time friend, Dr. Amlie, notwithstanding that gentleman’s notorious and baseless spite against himself.
“What says the learned Dr. Benjamin Rush?” inquired Dr. Murchison and answered himself, “That ‘physicians in all ages and countries riot upon each other’s characters.’ I have been the humble and unresisting victim of such riot at the hands of the accused. Far be it from me, however, to make that the basis of the witness which I am compelled, however reluctantly, to bear against my young and misguided colleague. No! Protection of the health and welfare of my fellow townsmen alone constrains me to this painful duty.”
“Was it protection of health and welfare that constrained you to maintain a nuisance in your back yard after Special Constable Amlie was relieved of his duties of guardianship?” inquired Dr. Vought mildly.
“I appeal to the commission for protection against such vile slurs,” cried the prosecutor in distress of soul.
Awakened by the poignancy of the cry, the Chairman feebly clutched his gavel and called Dr. Vought to order.
Dr. Murchison continued his discourse with frequent references to his notes. It was evident that he had compiled a complete dossier on Horace Amlie, covering the events since the young physician opened his office. The presentation took up the entire session.
“He’s a better lawyer than doctor,” murmured Vought in Horace’s ear. “But wait till I get at him.”
Horace replied that Upcraft had undoubtedly prepared the case and would be at hand to pull the wires of its further conduct.
“I’ll give him something to think about, too,” promised the other.
The second session was taken up by witnesses to Dr. Amlie’s civic offenses. Augustus Levering had surprised him “sniffing at my compost heap under cover of darkness, like a thief in the night, gentlemen; a thief in the night.” T. Lay’s three small offspring, although not patients of Dr. Amlie (“I wouldn’t have him and his newfangled foolishness in my house”) had been violently and illegally removed by him from a muck-pool where they were engaged in innocent play. He had barred from school the son of Michael Duryea because of a rash which had never been satisfactorily proven to be malignant, even though the child did die of it. He had invaded Simon Vandowzer’s freehold and had without warrant captured and removed flies and other winged insects therefrom. “My flies,” said Mr. Vandowzer grievously. Lie had wantonly threatened J. Evernghim in the matter of an alleged stench in his barnyard, which turned out to be nothing more unusual than a stray lamb, not very recently deceased. Among them they made him out to be a lawless invader of civic rights under the shallow pretext of conserving what he termed the public’s health. Dr. Murchison punctured that flimsy bubble.
“The public’s health!” he snorted. “The public’s got no health. Has the public got disease? If if hasn’t got disease, it hasn’t got health. Health and disease are private business between the licensed physician and his patient.” (Applause.)
Further testimony was adduced to show that Dr. Amlie had attended a performance of the farce, Tricks of the Times, and had, as Dr. Murchison put it, “laughed consumedly at its wicked and derisory slanders upon our noble profession” (Dr. Vought made a note); that he had stigmatized sundry valuable medical processes as “old wives’ superstition” and “legalized witchcraft”; and that he had publicly and contemptuously made reference to remedies which were embodied in the newly appeared work A Pharmacopoeia, as “panaceas and catholicons, the fruits and symbols of medical knavery.” His visits to the Settlement were brought out in the worst possible light, and the prosecutor hinted that in his private office, with immense stress upon the first word, he invited his female patients to disrobe for examination. (Dr. Vought, sotto voce: “How do you make your diagnoses? With a spyglass?”)
It was over at last, leaving the accused with hardly a shred of character wherewith to bless himself. Dinty leaned over to whisper in his ear, “You’re an awful villain, Doc, but I love you.”
Dr. Vought arose, paid his respects to the commission, and addressed Dr. Murchison.
“You have referred to a farce, Tricks of the Times, sir.”
“I have, sir.”
“Did you attend the performance?”
“I did not. I would not so demean myself.”
“Perhaps you are familiar with the subject of its sarcasms. I will read you a passage, descriptive of a species of M.D. which you may recognize as authentic.” He drew out a paper and read from it:
If one may believe his claims, he never loses a patient in any form or degree of fever, in croup, dropsy of the brain, or infantile flux. In his hands, even the pulmonary consumption is a manageable disease. Does he attend church of a Sunday? Through a servant or retainer he contrives to be called out once or twice in the session as if to administer to the wants of the sick, who must, we are thus led to suppose, incontinently die at once without his immediate care. He constantly exhibits himself in his gig or on horseback, hurrying from one quarter of the town to another, as if just called to apply the trephine, reduce a recent and painful luxation, control an alarming hemorrhage from a divided artery, of to minister in some other form of disease where delay and death would be synonymous terms. Thus, in the hands of such as he, are artifice and intrigue employed as substitutes for science and skill.
“What purpose has this wastage of the commission’s valuable time?” demanded Upcraft.
“A portrait,” replied Dr. Vought blandly. “Dr. Murchison ought to recognize it.”
“Sir!” shouted the amateur prosecutor, exhibiting pre-apoplectic symptoms, “do you presume to attribute …?”
“Excuse me,” interrupted his tormentor. “I have not completed the selection. I resume.” He continued:
And the treatments: Bleed, bleed, bleed; purge, purge, purge; sweat, sweat, sweat. For every affliction which he fails to understand—and where is to be found one that he does?—he falls back upon his favorite recourse, wherewith he and his kind have slain their thousands; pepper potions, lobelia pukes, and one-to-six of the henbane muck.
Up rose Upcraft. “If this diatribe be directed at our honored fellow citizen, I beg to point out that Dr. Murchison is not upon his trial here.”
“I propose, gentlemen of the commission,” retorted Dr. Vought, “to show that this process, from which the defendant now suffers, takes its rise from the physician whose pen-portrait I have just presented; from his rancor against a younger, abler and more honorable rival who has already alienated from him numbers of his important and profitable patients; further, that this malpractitioner is supported in his nefarious designs by a powerful local influence whose enmity Dr. Amlie has incurred in the pursuit of his duty as a medical man. Will Mr. Genter Latham take the stand?”
There was a moment of petrified silence, shattered by Genter Latham’s explosive, “No, and be damned to you!”
“You refuse?” The effect of surprise and disappointment were admirably feigned. “Surely, sir, you do not fear to submit to questioning which leads only to clarification.…”
“I fear nothing. I say to hell with you and your questions.”
“If you decline, I must seek further,” pursued the other. He stretched on tiptoe to scan the crowded room.
“What in tinkum is he up to?” whispered Dinty to Horace.
“I haven’t a notion,” he responded in the same tone.
The harsh voice inquired, “Is Miss Wealthia Latham present?”
“Oh, Doc!” shivered Dinty. “You put him up to this.”
“I tell you I didn’t! There’ll be hell to pay if he goes on.”
The silent tension of the room communicated itself to the Chairman to the extent of rousing him from torpor.
“What’s this? What’s this?” he said. “The young lady is not a competent medical witness.”
“Am I, then, confined to medical testimony?”
“For the present. Until the commission has reached a decision.”
“I bow to your authority, sir, and call Dr. Thaddeus Smith.”
“What do you want of me?” asked that gentleman distrustfully.
“You are a certificated practitioner of medicine in Rochester?”
“I am.”
“In April or May of last year were you visited in your office by a young lady who was at first reluctant to give her name?”
“I don’t know what you would be at,” blustered Smith.
“Look at Mr. Latham!” said Dinty under her breath. The magnate had hunched forward in his chair. “This is all new to him,” she continued.
“And to me,” muttered Horace.
“I am waiting,” said Dr. Vought.
“Don’t answer,” vociferated Lawyer Upcraft. “What is the purpose of this outrageous line of questioning?”
“Merely to establish,” answered the ever-bland Dr. Vought, “that Miss Latham, originally a patient of Dr. Murchison and afterward of Dr. Amlie, called professionally upon Dr. Smith; that the worthy doctor was thereby encouraged to hope for a profitable connection, or even for a foothold in Palmyra, should one of the two medical tenancies be vacated, which is, as I understand it, the purpose of this hearing. Self-interest in him is conjoined to revenge in Dr. Murchison, to operate to the prejudice of my client.”
While he was speaking, Lawyer Upcraft had crossed over to mutter in the witness’s ear. Dr. Smith now said with vast dignity, “I decline to answer a question which is improperly put to seduce me into violating a professional confidence.”
“Then I request an adjournment,” said Dr. Vought, having planted his barbs.
Horace could hardly wait to get him alone before asking, “What’s this about the visit to Smith?”
Vought nodded sagely. “It’s correct. Early last spring.”
“How do you know?”
“I have my ways,” chuckled the other.
“How much more do you know?” frowned Horace.
“Take the witness stand yourself. You haven’t told me the whole truth. What’s the row between you and Latham?”
Horace made no reply.
“Professional confidence again? Better tell me.”
“I think you know too much already.”
“I think I know it all,” returned the other crisply. “No thanks to you. Wouldn’t I have been a fool to come here without planning out my campaign! It began before I knew anything about your trouble; before you had any, I guess. It’s Smith. We’ve been watching him in Rochester. He’s been under suspicion for several years. Ladies’ relief.” He winked a wicked eye.
“An abortionist?”
“We lack full proof. He had a scare that made him cautious. Maybe that is why Miss Wealthia’s visit had no result. Or did it? She didn’t go there for her complexion, you know.”
Horace heaved a sigh of relief. “If you know that much, I can tell you the rest,” said he, and did.
Dr. Vought took full time to digest it. “It’s a nasty mess,” he pronounced. “You staked your reputation on December?”
“I did,” said Horace with a wry face.
“And you stick to it?”
“How in hell can I stick to December when it’s now March?”
“Don’t bark at me, young fella. You stick to it that she’s still in that condition?”
“I do.”
“Then she got rid of the first one.”
“The first one?” repeated Horace in a maze.
“Certainly, the first one. Ladies have been known to get pregnant twice. Even unmarried ladies,” twinkled the rubicund doctor.
“I’ll swear there’s been no tampering since last summer. I’ve had her watched.”
“Then what is your theory?” asked his senior curiously.
“You’ve had far more experience in that line than I. But couldn’t there be a delayed process?”
“Once in a blue moon. No, my boy; you’ll have to do better than that.”
“By the way,” said Horace, “I don’t remember any such passage in Tricks of the Times as the one you quoted.”
“Good reason why,” sniggered his mentor. “It isn’t there. I was saving up that blast for Murchison, waiting to find an opening, and when he gave me that one, I took it.”
“Why are you so hot on his trail? And why antagonize Smith? I don’t understand it,” complained Horace.
Dr. Vought became sober. “They’re going to strip you, my boy. May as well take the diploma down from the wall. We’re fungoed from the start. I’m building up a case of prejudice for appeal to the full board. We can’t stop this, but we might get you reinstated. It will take time, though.”
“How much time?”
He shrugged. “A year. Maybe more. Maybe two. Large bodies move ponderously.”
“And what am I to do in the meantime?” demanded Horace angrily. “Turn quack with a bell and a bottle and vend cure-alls from the tail of my cart?”
“There are other states. A New York writ runs only for the lands within its bounds.”
“Leave Palmyra?”
“If you can’t live here you must leave here.”
“Let Genter Latham brag he’s run me out of town? By God, I won’t!”
“Good lad! I wouldn’t, in your place. Stay and fight it out. I only hope you’re right.”
“I’m right.”
The other reflected. “Could I see this Latham wench?”
“Professionally? I don’t see how.”
“Not professionally. Not even to meet her. Observation, merely.”
“I’ll ask my wife. She knows Wealthia’s ways.”
Dinty reported that the girl would be attending the Missionary Society meeting at three o’clock the next afternoon.
The two doctors were free at that hour. The final session had closed with a single sitting, devoted to Dr. Murchison’s summing-up, a performance so lawyerish that the Upcraft coaching was apparent in every sentence. Dr. Vought’s rebuttal was a diatribe, vastly enjoyed by the audience but frowned upon by the commission, which then withdrew for a secret session, fortified by a liberal order from the taproom.
Mid-afternoon saw the visiting expert, escorted by his host, strolling down Main Street in casual enjoyment of the sights. As they dawdled along, Wealthia Latham, arm in arm with Happalonia Upcraft, passed them. They accelerated their pace to keep close behind the pair for a block. Dr. Vought’s scrutiny was unobtrusive but careful. He expressed himself as satisfied and in need of a pipe. Seated beside the Amlie fireplace, he asked abruptly,
“Who’s her lover?”
Horace’s eyes brightened. “Then you agree with my diagnosis?”
“I’ll stake my reputation on it. There’s something about the gait of pregnancy. I couldn’t describe it to a classroom, but I’d swear to it anywhere. Yes, lad, your town beauty has been carrying more than her prayer-book.”
“You think she’s still carrying it?”
“I hardly know what to think. Last April, you say?”
“All the evidence points to that date.”
“Except the final proof.”
“Which should have come in December.”
“Ah, yes. Too far overdue, eh? You didn’t say who the lover is.”
“He’s dead.”
Dr. Vought whistled. “It’s a pickle, ain’t it! No help from him, then. And where’s your proof?”
“I’ll get it,” answered Horace doggedly.
“How?”
“I don’t know. But I’ll get it.”
“As it doesn’t promise to prove itself, I reckon you’ll have to. Well, God speed you, lad.”
Before the commission caught coach from town, the gist of their report had leaked. They had recommended cancellation of Dr. Horace Amlie’s diploma and withdrawal of his privilege of medical practice within the bounds of New York State. Three weeks later, at the spring meeting, the State Medical Society adopted the report without change.
Horace Amlie was a practitioner without a practice.