DR. PARKMAN'S WAY
The next morning Dr. Parkman turned his automobile in the direction of
the University of Chicago. There was a very grim look on his face as he
sent the car, with the hand of an expert, through the crowded streets. He
had his do-or-die expression, and the way he was letting the machine out
would not indicate a shrinking back from what lay before him. He rather
chuckled once; that is, it began in a chuckle, and ended with the
semblance of a grunt, and when he finally swung the car down the Midway,
he was saying to himself: "Glad of it! I've been wanting for a long time
to tell that Lane what I thought of him."
Inquiries over the telephone had developed the fact that through some
shifting about, Dr. George Lane was temporary head of the department; it
was to Dr. George Lane then that Dr. Parkman must go with the matter in
hand this morning. That had seemed bad at first, for Lane was one man out
there he couldn't get on with and did not want to. They always clashed;
upon their last meeting Lane had said--"Really now, Dr. Parkman, don't
you feel that a broader culture is the real need of the medical
profession?" and Parkman had retorted, "Shouldn't wonder, but has it ever
struck you, Dr. Lane, that a little more horse sense is the real need of
the university professor?" He declared, grimly, as he finally drew his
car to a snorting stop at the university that he would have to try some
other method than "firing his soul," as Ernestine had bade him do. "In
the first place," he figured it out, "he has no soul, and if he had, I
wouldn't be the one to fire it with anything but rage." But the doctor
was not worrying much about results. He thought he had a little
ammunition in reserve which assured the outcome, and which would enable
him, at the same time, to "let loose on Lane," should the latter show a
tendency to become too important.
The erudite Lane was a neatly built little fellow, very spick and span.
First America and then England had done their best--or worst--by him.
Just as every hair on his head was properly brushed, so Dr. Parkman felt
quite sure that every idea within the head was properly beaten down with
a pair of intellectual military brushes, one of which he had acquired to
the west, and the other to the east of the Atlantic. "I suppose he's a
scholar," mused the doctor, as he surveyed the back of the dignitary's
head while waiting, "but what in God's name would he do if he were ever
to be hit with an original idea?"
"Ah, yes, Dr. Parkman, we so seldom see you very busy men out here. We
always appreciate it when you busy men look in upon us."
Now the tone did not appeal to Dr. Parkman, and with one of his quick
decisions he bade tact take itself to the four winds, leaving him alone
with his reserve guns.
"I always appreciate it," he began abruptly, not attempting to deny that
he was a busy man, "when people take as little of my time as possible. I
will try to do unto others as I would that others do unto me."
By the merest lifting of his eyebrows, Lane signified that he would make
no attempt at detaining the doctor longer than he wished to stay. He
awaited punctiliously the other man's pleasure, silently emphasising that
the interview was not of his bringing about. "Thinks I'm a boor and a
brute," mused Parkman.
"What I wanted to see you about," he began, "relates to Dr. Hubers."
"Ah, yes--poor Hubers. A remarkable man, in many ways. It is one of those
things which make one--very sad. We wanted him to go on with his
lectures, but he did not seem to feel quite equal to it."
"Huh!"--that might mean a variety of things. The tone of patronage
infuriated Karl's friend. "Jealous--sore--glad Karl's out of it," he was
interpreting it.
Then he delivered this very calmly: "Well, the fact of the matter is,
that among all medical men, and in that part of the scientific world
which I may call the active part--the only part of any real value--Karl
Hubers is regarded so far above every other man who ever set foot in this
university that all the rest of the place is looked upon as something
which surrounds him. Over in Europe, they say--Chicago?--University of
Chicago? Oh, yes--yes indeed, I remember now. That's where Hubers is.'"
"The professor," as Dr. Parkman frequently insisted on calling him,
showed himself capable of a rush of red blood to the face, and of a very
human engulfing of emotion in a hurried cough. "Ah, I see you are a warm
friend, Dr. Parkman," quickly regaining his impenetrable superiority, and
smiling tolerantly. "But looking at it quite dispassionately, putting
aside sympathy and all personal feeling, I have sometimes felt that Dr.
Hubers, in spite of his--I may say gifts, in some directions, is a little
lacking in that broad culture, that finer quality of universal
scholarship which should dominate the ideal university man of to-day."
Dr. Parkman was smiling in a knowing way to himself. "I see what you
mean, Professor, though I would put it a little differently. I wouldn't
call him in the least lacking in broad culture, but he is rather lacking
in pedantry, in limitations, in intellectual snobbery, in university
folderols. And of course a man who is actually doing something in the
world, who stands for real achievement, has a little less time to look
after the fine quality of universal scholarship."
Perhaps Lane would have been either more or less than human, had he not
retorted to that: "But as to this great achievement--it has never been
forthcoming, has it?"
The doctor had a little nervous affection of his face. The corner of one
eye and one corner of his mouth sometimes twitched a little. People who
knew him well were apt to grow nervous themselves when they made that
observation. But as no one who knew him chanced to be present, the storm
broke all unannounced.
"For which," he snarled out, "every cheap skate of a university professor
who never did anything himself but paddle other men's canoes, for which
every human phonograph and intellectual parrot sends out thanks from his
two-by-four soul! But among men who are men, among physicians who have
cause to know his worth, among scientists big enough to get out of their
own shadows, and, thank God, among the people who haven't been fossilised
by clammy universities out of all sense of human values--among them, I
say, Karl Hubers is appreciated for what he was close to doing when this
damnable fate stepped in and stopped him!"
The man of broad culture, very white as to the face, rose to his fullest
height. It should not be held against him that his fullest height failed
in reaching the other man's shoulder. "If there is nothing further," he
choked out, "perhaps we may consider the interview concluded?"
"No," retorted Parkman serenely, "the interview has just begun. It's your
business, isn't it, to listen to matters relating to this department?"
"It is; but as I am accustomed to meeting men of some--"
"Manners?" supplied the doctor pleasantly. "As I am accustomed to men of
a somewhat different type,"--he picked the phrase punctiliously,
manifestly a conservative, even in war--"I was naturally unprepared for
the nature of your remarks."
"Oh well, the unexpected must be rather agreeable when one leads so cut
and dried a life. But what I want to see you about," he went on, quite as
though he had dropped the most pleasant thing in the world, "is just
this. I want you to give the use of Dr. Hubers' laboratory, his equipment
and at least one of his assistants, to Dr. Hubers' wife, that she may get
in shape to work with him as his assistant, and enable him to carry on
his work and do those things, which, as you correctly state, are still
unachieved."
Now the delivering of that pleased Dr. Parkman very much. He scarcely
attempted to conceal his righteous pride.
"Really, now," gasped the head of the department, after a minute of
speechless staring, "really, now, Dr. Parkman, you astonish me."--"That's
the truth, if he ever spoke it," thought the doctor grimly."--Dr. Hubers'
wife, I understand you to say?"--and he of erudition was equal to a
covert sneer--"just what has she to do with it, please?"
"She has everything to do with it. In the first place, she is rather
interested in Dr. Hubers. Then she's a remarkable woman. Needs to
freshen up on some things, needs quite a little coaching, in fact; but in
my judgment the best way for Hubers to go on with his work--you didn't
think for a moment he was out of it, did you?--is for his wife to get in
shape to work with him. That can be arranged all right?" he concluded
pleasantly.
Then Dr. George Lane spoke with the authority in him vested. "It
certainly can not," he said, with an icy decisiveness.
"But why not?" pursued Parkman, innocently.
"Oh, now, don't misunderstand me, Professor. I didn't for a minute expect
that you were to give any of your valuable time to Mrs. Hubers. Hastings
is the fellow I'd like her turned over to. He's a friend of mine, and
he's in sympathy, you know, with Dr. Hubers' work. All you'll have to do
is to tell Hastings to do it," explained the doctor, expansively.
The head of the department quite gleamed with the pride of authority as
he pronounced: "Which you may be very certain I shall not do."
"No?" said Parkman, leaning over the desk a little and looking at him.
"You say--no?"
"I do," replied the man in authority, with brevity, emphasis and
finality.
Dr. Parkman leaned back in his chair and seemed to be in deep thought.
"Then the popular idea is all wrong, isn't it?"
"I am at a loss to know to what popular idea you refer," said the
professor, with a suitable indifference.
"Oh merely to the popular idea that this place amounts to something; that
it has let go of a little mediaevalism, and is more than a crude, cheap
pattern--funny what ideas people get, isn't it? Now there are people who
think the university here puts a value on individuality, that it would
actually bend a rule or two to fit an individual case, in fact that it
likes initiative, encourages originality, wouldn't in the least mind
having a few actual achievements to its credit."
"At the same time," goaded from his icy calm--"it does not propose to
make itself ridiculous!"
"And doing a rather unconventional thing, in order to bring about a very
great thing, would be making itself ridiculous, would it?"
"I fail to see how anything so preposterous could bring about good
results," said the man in authority, introducing into that a note of
dismissal.
"Do you?" replied Parkman, not yet dismissed. "Well, if you will pardon a
little more plain speaking, I will say that this is something I know a
good deal more about than you do."
"We have made other arrangements for the laboratory," and the professor
picked up a paper from his desk and looked it over, nice subtilties
evidently being lost.
"So? Going to give it to some fellow who will devote himself, after the
fashion of university men, to verifying other men's conclusions?"
Then Dr. Parkman rose. "Well," he said, "you've had your chance. You had
a chance to do something which would give this place an excuse for
existing. I'm sorry you weren't big enough to take it.
"I fear medical men may feel some little prejudice about this," he
remarked, easily--not in the least as though dealing in heavy ammunition.
"Hubers commands the medical men, you know. They care more for him than
for all the rest of the fellows out here put together. About that medical
school of yours," he said, meditatively, "that you're pushing so hard
just now,--to whom shall I tender my resignation as chairman of the
committee I'm on? And, at the same time, I'll just be released from the
lectures I was to give in the winter quarter. I'm entirely too busy to
spend my time on a place that doesn't care for anything but dead men's
bones. Lewis and Richmond will probably want to pull out too. Of course,"
he went on, seemingly to himself, "a thing like this will unfortunately
be noised about, and all doctors will be a little sore about your not
caring to stand by Hubers. But I suppose I had better see the president
about all that. He gets home next week? And, come to think of it, I'm
pretty close to a couple of members of the board. I operated on both
Lessing and Tyler. Both of those fellows have a notion they owe their
lives to me. That makes people feel rather close to one, you know. But
then, of course, you don't know--why should you? And, dear me--there's
that rich old patient of mine, Burley. Now isn't it strange,"--turning
genially to Lane, as if merely interesting him in a philosophical
proposition--"how one thing leads to another? I fear Burley may not be so
interested in making that gift to the new medical building, if he knows
I've cut loose from the place. The president will feel rather sore
about that, too,--you know how the president is about such things. But
then,"--shrugging his shoulders indifferently--"he needn't feel sore at
me."
Dr. George Lane was swallowing very hard. Though learned, he was not
dull. Word by word he had drunk in the bitter truth that this big, dark,
gruff, ill-mannered man was not to be put down with impunity. Call it
bullying--any hard name you would, there was no evading the fact that it
was power in sledge hammer strokes. "The professor" was just wise enough
to see that there lay before him the unpleasant task of retraction.
"Ah--of course, doctor," he began, striving for nonchalance, "do not take
this as too final. You see anything so unusual as this will have to come
before the committee. You did not present it to me--ah--very fully, but
the more I consider it, the more I am disposed to think it is a thing
we--may care to undertake. I--will present it."
"Oh, don't bother about that," said the doctor pleasantly. "I wouldn't
worry the committee about it, if I were you. I can get a down-town
laboratory all right. I simply thought I would give the university a
chance at the thing. It doesn't matter," he concluded, opening the door.
"Well now, I'll tell you, doctor," said Lane, and part of his face was
white, and part of it was red, "while you're out here, you would
better go up and see Hastings. I'm sure I can say--speaking for the
committee--that we will be very glad to have Mrs. Hubers here."
"I fired his soul all right," thought the doctor, grimly, as he walked up
to find Hastings. "Those little two by fours!"