Canal Town

by Samuel Hopkins Adams

  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, incon
tinently 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.”