by B. TRAVEN
Now I said the same thing all doctors say: “This is a very serious case, but I shall do my very, very best and I’m sure we can pull him through.”
At that very moment the two armed men came in to see how I was doing.
“Where is my medicine chest?” I asked.
One of the two bolted immediately into the main room and returned with my cardboard box.
What I was to do with it, I did not know at that moment.
However, I was sure a good idea would come to my mind. By all means I had to do something, for I had been dragged here as a doctor and I was expected to behave and act like one. So I had no other choice but to please these people. No doubts puzzled my senses as to what would happen to me should I fail.
It was obvious by now that the two men with guns were in the room for no other reason than to watch my performance, and because they didn’t let go of their guns I was convinced that any minute they might point their guns at me and order: “You goddamn gringo, you save that boy at once and if he isn’t up and around in ten minutes you’ll lie next to him deader than a curbstone.” Such things really happen to doctors in the Republic and since I had been brought here to work as a doctor, there was no reason they should make an exception with me.
An able-bodied doctor, one who has studied medicine successfully, can now and then, if lucky, prolong the expiring of a dying human for a good length of time. And if it finally happens he can still excuse himself by saying that against the will of God nothing can be done. So often are people made to believe that cheap explanation without questioning it that perhaps they will believe me, too, I thought. After all, these good people are Christians, good Christians with lots of rosaries, and are well supplied with all kinds of images of saints as I can see all around me.
Now I started working.
“Do you have Cafion in the house?” I asked the woman with an expression on my face as serious as that of a clergyman anointing and blessing a corpse.
“Yes, we’ve got a full bottle of it.”
“Three tablets and one glass of water.”
I dissolved the tablets in the water and let the boy swallow the mixture. He took it perfectly without anything going into his windpipe.
Quietly I sat down, smoked a cigarette and asked for another shot of tequila.
After about ten minutes had gone by I examined the lad again and I discovered that the medicine had had an excellent effect. The heart had begun to beat more strongly. Though the tablets could easily have stimulated the heart so violently that it might have stopped beating altogether, I had luck—which, by the way, every doctor needs if he wants to be a successful one.
Of course I knew quite well that a real doctor would have done everything I did entirely differently. For that reason he has a license and a partnership in an undertaker’s establishment. I, however, had to do with the knowledge and medicines that were at my disposal. I couldn’t make a camphor or adrenaline injection in the heart because I had no tools for it nor camphor either.
By now the heart was beating strongly and satisfactorily but the boy refused, sternly refused, to wake up. I couldn’t find anything on his head. I slapped his cheeks, palms and wrists. No success.
Now I untied my medicine box. All people present saw the contents of course. However, I could not make out whether or not they were surprised at the different kinds of medicines in my box because no one made a single sound of surprise. They might have thought that the fishhooks in the box served to fish objects out of stomachs—the scorpions perhaps that fall into the big earthen vessels from which people take their drinking water. The broken rusty pocketknife might, in their opinion, serve to amputate feet or arms or to take out an appendix. In any case, the respect toward me and the confidence in my abilities as a medico did not seem to grow less, but, as I could see and feel, increased immensely.
I took a tube of mentholatum half used up and smeared a thick layer of it in the fellow’s nose to help him breathe more easily. Now I asked whether they had ammoniac in the house. They had a little bottle of it and after having given him a few strong doses he sneezed and woke up. Vigorously I now fanned air at him and soon he began to breathe deeply, almost normally. But when he came to, he began to sigh pitifully as if from the bottom of his very being.
Now I knew what was wrong and what I had not been told. If I spoke frankly of what I now knew, then to be sure there would easily happen what I had expected since someone had knocked on my door. The knowledge I had gained in a roundabout way had made me a very unwanted witness. And that almost surely could be reason enough for the men to snuff me out.
I looked at the boy’s aunt. Tears were in her eyes and I knew that she spoke seriously of her feeling toward the boy as though he were her own. The boy would perhaps recover without my help, yet not in less than two days. And in the meantime the soldiers would come, and he who could not get away safely would be shot right outside at the gate. No doubt he would be shot.
Again I looked at the woman who questioned me with her eyes. I don’t want to say that I acted because of exaggerated philanthropy. That would be incorrect. Besides I don’t want to appear better and nobler than I really am. To tell the truth, I am very much like any other ordinary man—endowed with wickedness, baseness, but also with an earnest willingness to help my fellow creatures. In this case, out of sheer curiosity, I decided to find out what would happen to me if I did what I considered the most stupid and dangerous thing.
I looked steadily at the man with the machete and said in a short and loud voice: “Where then is that goddamn hole? How can I bring him around if you don’t tell me where he got the shot?”
All present, even the old woman, were startled, uttered short exclamations, paled, and looked with fright in their eyes from one to the other until they all focused their eyes on me. The uncle regained his composure first and said to the other two men in a tone as if he was ready to give up everything: “I told you before, but you didn’t want to believe me, we can’t bamboozle that cabron of a gringo. The hell of it is he’s a doctor through and through.”
Now I didn’t wait any longer. Resolutely I pulled the blanket back, looked quickly at the boy’s chest and stomach and there I noticed a heavy blood stain on the petate. Examining the poor lad closer I discovered two gun wounds, one in his thigh, the other in his left calf. The latter was not serious. A bullet had just grazed it. In contrast, the shot in the thigh had caused a heavy wound. Doubtless the bullet was out, for I noticed two holes, one where the slug had gone in and one through which it went out again. Judging from the size of the holes, it must have been a forty-five apparently fired from an automatic, the kind only the army is allowed to use. The bone was not damaged but the bullet had obviously torn several veins, which was the cause of so much loss of blood and it was also the reason for the weakened condition of the chap. The whole leg was sticky with dry blood and a light crust had already begun to form around the wounds. Very dirty rags had been used for a hasty bandage. The only danger for the youngster consisted in the possibility of an infection and, as a possible aftermath, gangrene.
Now, the blood of the Indians in general is very healthy; an infection sets in only when all and every ordinary precaution has been disregarded. I ordered them to boil quickly some old linen rags. Strange as it was, so I thought, they had plenty of packages of clean cotton. In my box I carried a few sterilized, still unused gauze bandages. First I washed the wound with hot water and soap. Then I took a very strong disinfectant from my medicine box, the kind that had saved tens of thousands of American soldiers during the war. This stuff I poured undiluted directly into the wound and the poor boy practically jumped high up. He must have felt as if someone had pierced him with a red-hot iron right through the wounds. But he could be sure that this would save him. I let it dry, put some Bismuth-Jodoform over it and bandaged the whole with gauze. He sighed deeply but now with a definite expression of relief. I gave him a four-finger-high dose of tequila and within a few minutes he had
fallen asleep soundly and quietly.
I imagined what question would come up now. So I said right away and without waiting: “When you put him on a horse tomorrow morning to make his getaway, it will be highly advisable to apply a bandage made of an old rubber hose or rubber belt or elastic braces to avoid another bleeding, for then he easily might bleed to death.”
I showed the men how to apply that safeguard, told them to boil each new bandage before using it, gave them the rest of my powders and disinfectants, asked for another tequila and bade them good night. I shook hands with all of them—the boy’s aunt bent down and kissed my hand—and then I made my way to the door.
I surely must have given them the impression that what I saw and did here was to me a daily occurrence. But the truth is, I now expected any moment that one of the men would say: “Wait a minute, mister gringo, you just wait a minute, you cannot go away like that. We first got to have a word with you before you leave this neighborhood. And we got to have that word outside, you understand. Best place is behind the vegetable patch.”
The fact that I did not say a word as to how the boy might have got his wounds or even let on that I knew they were gunshots, the fact that I behaved as if I were a bandit myself and a close friend of the family and that it was immaterial to me what my neighbors thought of me and I of them as long as they left me alone, all this quite obviously upset their plans and made them puzzle. And so as to lay still more emphasis on all this, I said nonchalantly: “Should he get worse you may call me any time. I will be only too glad to be of help to you.”
By appearance the last words decided the outcome. No one will slay the only doctor in the vicinity; because of his not being licensed he has no professional duty to inform the authorities of gunshot wounds he has attended.
However, it was not so easy to get away. When I had reached the door, the uncle said: “Excuse me, mister, but we cannot let you go home alone, something might happen to you on the way and besides you might not find your way back. You may easily lose your way in the underbrush. We brought you here and it would be impolite not to see you back home.”
And so I saw before myself the prospect of marching again at night through underbrush, with three men, two carrying guns and the other a machete. Three men who would be happier to have one certain man less in this world, one who knew too much for their comfort, even though they might have a good opinion of this doctor and his willingness to help. Only one of them needed to entertain such a thought, and before the other two could prevent it, it would be all over.
Sharply and significantly I looked at the aunt. Out of politeness she had not taken her seat again, but was waiting instead to do so until I had left the house. She contemplated me with gratitude in her eyes. As if by a sudden impulse she now came close, took my hands, kissed them again and with a smile on her lips went to a little cupboard, took out a jar of honey and gave it to me, saying: “This is very good for baking little cakes. It doesn’t make them taste so dry. Tomorrow I’ll send you two dozen eggs and a few pounds of good beef. And again many, many thanks for coming.”
“No hay porqué, señora, not worth mentioning. By the way, when the boy wakes up give him a good strong meat broth with two, or better still, four eggs whisked in. It will put him fast back on his feet. Good night, señora.”
The woman knew very well what might happen to me on the way back home should the men feel that their safety was at stake. But I had won her sympathy and thankfulness. She, as I learned later, played a more important part in the business than what would be guessed from the surface and from what her honest appearance covered.
Reflecting on the look of this sweet, sweet home where even a huge heavily framed picture of the Pope in full regalia was not missing and where a candle before an image of the Virgin was burning day and night, I could tell who was in command. Since this woman doubtless was more intelligent than any of the men I had met so far, I also knew who was the brain of the enterprise. There is not much difference between an intelligently led band of robbers and certain types of banking institutions whose presidents ride in custom-built cars. Today as always the best mask behind which to cover deeds and misdeeds successfully is still an innocent appearance, a plain face, and an ostentatious display of believing in God and in the holiness of His servants. And that smart and intelligent woman, when she told me in the presence of those men: “I’m sending you in the morning meat and eggs,” was in effect saying: “Woe to these mugs if you are not safe and sound at your house tomorrow to enjoy what I’m sending you.”
The men understood the command. And they also understood the doctor had to be preserved for the good of the flourishing business.
We arrived peacefully at my bungalow. When we parted with a well-meant “buenas noches,” I felt three pesos pressed into my hand by the uncle. “Please, take this, mister, for a small reimbursement.”
“Excuse me,” I said, “I don’t ever take anything from my friends for assistance which I give for purely humane reasons and I’ll always do the same whenever an opportunity presents itself.”
For a while he held the three pesos in his hand, most likely believing that it was only out of politeness that I refused the money and that in the end I would take it anyway. He, like everyone else in the village, knew how badly I could use three pesos. But again I resolutely said: “You don’t want to offend me, do you, señor?”
“Definitely not,” he answered, “most definitely not,” while at the same time replacing the three pesos in his pocket. Then he added: “Let me see, maybe I can send you two more fellows tomorrow who want to study the English language.”
“That’s better,” I said. “Tomorrow morning I’ll come to see how your boy is getting along.”
“Well, well,” he muttered, “I don’t know, but if you insist, all right by me.”
Next morning about nine or so I went to see the lad. Scarcely had I passed the last house of the village when I met the uncle and immediately I had the feeling that he had been waiting for me because he did not want me to come to his house in daylight. I was not even sure that I would find the house again. In fact one week later when I tried to find it out of pure curiosity, I lost my way so completely that it took me hours to get on the trail back to the village and then only with the help of a man I met in the bush. During that eventful night I had been taken through underbrush and thickets in such a way that while I thought I knew where we were going I only learned later that I had been wrong all over.
The uncle told me the boy had been up very early and had gone away with the others.
“We put the bandage on as you told us to and everything went very fine. The wound is healing already. And here are the meat and the eggs the woman promised you last night. And, by the way, mister, you’d better not talk much about all this in the village. You know people might think there was a sort of brawl or what have you and that would give the boy a bad reputation. He’s going to get married, see. You understand that, don’t you, mister?”
“I understand perfectly,” I said. “I’ve no reason to talk about anything. Not anything at all. But I would very much like you, please, to buy for me the medicine I used up last night when you get to town.”
“Of course, of course, it will be a pleasure,” he said and took the note on which I had scribbled the name of what I wanted, and we parted.
When I got home two men were sitting at my door steps. They wanted to learn English and they paid me ten hours in advance.
Early in the morning, two days later, I noticed that the village was surrounded by soldiers. Nobody was allowed to leave the village, but those coming from the outside could come in. A few houses were searched and on the main square all men, women and children were questioned by officers of the district police.
I soon learned what had happened.
A few nights ago bandits had attacked a hacienda, bound the owners and had taken all the money they could lay their hands on. Thirty thousand pesos had been stolen. Every child of course knew
that this was a lie. No owner of any hacienda would ever have that much money in his house. Two thousand pesos might have come closer to fact.
The soldiers, all Indians themselves, had traced the bandits to this village. Since the place was rumored to be a nest of bandits, the soldiers would have come here anyway.
I walked slowly toward the center of the plaza to watch what was going on, when a man from the village stopped me and said: “There’s not much to see. They’ll soon go away again without having caught any bandit. They are only looking for an hombre who helped a wounded bandit to get away. When they find that man, the soldiers will shoot him immediately after he has dug his own grave at the cemetery. The officers say that men like these are by far more dangerous to mankind than the bandits themselves.”
“What did the man do, how did he help the bandit to make his getaway?” I asked. “Bandits are big and clever enough to help themselves.”
“This is a different case,” the man said. “It happened this way, you see. At the hacienda that was robbed a young bandit was shot in the leg, maybe he got two shots. He bled profusely, but his friends got him away, and they reached this village. Someone had seen them carry the wounded man on horseback. Where they took him, nobody knows. Then they got hold of a doctor, not a real one, you know, but as you know, señor, one who can do just as well. Now you see, yesterday morning the man, actually a mere boy, was well enough to ride away. The bandits were seen by peasants working in the bush, but the doctor who cured the boy was not with them. They would not have gotten away. The soldiers would have found the boy and then found out who he was, to what family he belonged, and so they would have caught the whole gang.”
“Highly interesting,” I said. “And now it seems there isn’t much hope to catch them?”
“Very little. Since they know that the wounded boy escaped, they are only looking for the doctor who cured him and helped him get away. The officers say that the doctor lives in this village. They have surrounded the whole place so now he cannot get out. They are searching all the houses and as soon as they find the medicine they will know right away who he is. Then they will shoot him on the spot.”