DOCTOR HISSONG'S OFFICE
"So you are going to school, Shawn?"
"Yes, sir, I promised Mrs. Alden."
"That's the best promise you ever made, and to the best woman that God
ever made."
Old Doctor Hissong sat in his big armchair, his spectacles tilted high
on his nose as he looked at Shawn, who was leaning against the
mantel-board. Old Brad, a negro who had been the doctor's servant for
many years, sat in a hickory chair near the back door. Brad, aside from
taking care of the doctor's office, gave some of his time to preaching,
although it was a matter of some speculation as to whether his general
habits warranted his ministerial fulfillments.
The old office was dingy with its medicine bottles ranging along the
shelves, and cobwebs and dust were in evidence all about them. Over in
the corner was a pair of saddlebags, and a pair of jean legging hung
over a chair. In another corner was a tall book-case, the glass front
broken out, and the books scattered about on the shelves. On the top of
the book-case was an object which had long been a source of discomfort
to Shawn and Brad--a grinning skull.
A doctor's office, in the old days, without a skull peering out from
some hidden recess, was not considered complete--it contributed a kind
of mysterious power to the man of medicine, and lent the impression that
he had dipped deeply into the science of healing.
"Look at the slate, Shawn."
Shawn went out and took down the slate which hung by the office door.
"Old man Stivers has been writing on the slate," said Shawn.
"Huh," said Brad, "I reckun he 'cided to cum an' git you to cum out an'
see his wife, now dat he done rin up a bill wid ole doc' Poleen, an'
carn't git him to cum no mo'."
"Yes, Brad, it's strange--the man who loses sleep and health to save
others has a hard time getting his pay. They look to the doctor mighty
anxiously in the hour of trouble, and in the hour of suffering and death
the doctor is a power of comfort."
"I see dat Bill Hugers scratchin' on de slate las' night," said Brad,
"yo' hain' gwine to see him no mo', is yo', wid him owin' yo' a big
bill?"
"Bill was one of my best friends when I made the race for the
Legislature," said the doctor.
Brad scratched his head. He recalled the time when the doctor went to
Frankfort as the representative of his county, and he remembered the
scuffling he had to do during the doctor's absence--the yearning for
many comforts which did not come. He recalled how the doctors picked up
old Hissong's practice while he was away, and he had not forgotten the
mean things they had said about him when he returned to be nursed
through a spell of "too much liquor."
"Yo' hain' never gwine run no mo', is yo', doc?"
"I can't say, Brad."
"Brad, didn't you hear somebody holler outside? Go out and see who it
is." Brad opened the door.
"Is the doc in thar?"
"Yes, sah, cum in."
A tall, double-jointed farm-hand came blustering into the room, his face
covered with a yarn comforter. He slowly unwound the rag and brought to
view the side of his face, swollen to a frightful size.
"Done busted me wide open; kin you pull her, doc?"
The old doctor examined the tooth and said, "You've got a tooth like a
hoss--fix the chair in the back room, Brad."
Brad brought a washpan and placed it beside the chair. Doctor Hissong
opened a drawer and brought forth an instrument that resembled a
cant-hook, one of those tools used in overturning logs. This tooth
extractor had a handle about six inches long, and a sort of steel hook
on the end, and it would draw the tooth, if the jawbone did not break.
The suffering patient looked on with an expression on his face anything
but pleasant.
"Looks like fixin' fer hog-killin', doc!"
"Well, I've known 'em to die under it," complacently said the old doctor
as he shuffled about. "Give him a drink, Brad, and put him in the
chair."
The patient stretched his long legs and rested his feet on a soap box.
"Fifty cents," said the doctor, as he approached with his instrument in
his hand.
"Hafter have it beforehand, doc?"
"Yes, sir, that's my rule, for nine cases out of ten are so mad when I
get through that they won't pay."
The money paid, the doctor carefully leaned over and fitted the hook
over the tooth.
"Clinch him, Shawn!"
"O-r-r-r-r-r-wow! leggo! leggo!"
"Choke him, Brad!"
All four of them were on the floor, the farm-hand had smashed the
wash-stand with his feet, and the water pitcher had gone with the ruins.
"Hold his feet, Shawn!"
Shawn jumped straddle-ways on the legs, and the old doctor made another
pull.
"H-l-l-u-p! H-e-l-l-l-u-p!"
Rising with the strength of a desperate man, the farmer dragged all of
them into the front room, but the old doctor did not lose his hold on
the tooth. The last remaining glass in the bookcase was smashed and the
lower sash of the front window caved in.
"Throw him, Brad!"
The tooth-key slipped off and the farmer let out a yell and tried to get
out of the door.
"Nail him, Brad!"
"I don't want that tooth pulled, doc."
"Yes, you do, and you had just as well make up your mind to get back in
that chair."
"By Gosh, you had better get a mule to kick it out!"
Brad and Shawn got him in the chair again and the doctor tried for
another hold on the tooth. The back of the chair gave way with a crash.
"What's that?" said the doctor.
"I think it wuz my backbone come uncoupled," said the farmer. Brad
grabbed him by the left leg and the struggling group went down in a
heap, but the doctor came up with a gleam of triumph on his face, and
holding aloft the terrible molar. Brad was panting, over by the door.
As the farmer turned to leave, he walked over to doctor Hissong and
said, "Doc, if you air as good at doctorin' other diseases as you air at
pullin' teeth, thar hain't much prospect of this community enlargin' her
population."
Doctor Hissong glanced over toward the bookcase where Shawn was
standing:
"Shawn, do you still want to be a doctor?"
"Not a tooth doctor," said Shawn.