SAMANTHA SEES A DOCTOR.
I hadn’t been in London for more’n a short time before I wuz attacked with a queer feelin’ and pain in my back. It seemed to be the worst on my right shoulder blade. It wuz a pain and a soreness all together, and the surface indications pinted to more trouble if I didn’t tend to it.
Josiah rubbed it with assiduity and camphire, and in hours of solitude bathed it in anarky.
But to no purpose—it grew worse and worse, and I feared it wuz a bile, but didn’t know.
It kep’ me awake nights, and I spoze it made me fraxious and restless, for Josiah urged me warmly to have a young man, who wuz a doctor in the hotel, look at my back and see what ailed it.
And I sez, “I hain’t a-goin’ to have that young man foolin’ round my shoulder blades.” Sez I, “It would make me feel queer as a dog to think he wuz a-lookin’ at it through that eyeglass of hisen.” Sez I, “Neuralgy hain’t to be fooled with.”
“I thought you said,” sez he, “it wuzn’t neuralgy; you said it wuz sunthin’ mysteriouser.”
“Wall, so I do say,” sez I; “it is sunthin’ I d’no anything about. It is sore as a bile, and anarky don’t seem to relieve it a mite. If I had some good lobely and catnip,” sez I, “I believe I could make a poultice that would relieve it; but where would I git lobely and catnip here?” sez I.
“Wall,” sez he—willin’ creeter always when I am sick—“Martin and I had made a agreement to ride to Hyde Park this mornin’, and I shouldn’t wonder a mite if I could find some lobely and catnip growin’ there idegenus. I will look for some, anyway.”
“Catnip in Hyde Park!” sez I mournfully; “you might as well look for a angel at a dog fight, or a saloon in Paradise!”
“Wall,” sez he, “if I can’t find any myself, I’ll ask the policeman if he knows of any little corner or shady place where I’d be apt to find a few sprigs for you.” Sez he, “I’d go to Windsor Park for you in a minute if I thought I could git sunthin’ to relieve your pain—I’d go to Langly Marish.” (Marish is marsh writ long.) Josiah thought that he would spell his old marsh in the beaver medder “marish,” for style—Jonesville Marish—but I told him that that wuzn’t goin’ to make him any nearer the royal family, or make him act any more royal. I guess I broke it up.
But to resoom—
Sez I, “It is good of you to think on’t, but I wouldn’t want to tackle Victoria the first thing for catnip. I d’no as she has put up any more herbs than she wants to use herself—her family is big, and she has frequent calls for catnip, anyway.”
Sez he, “I wuzn’t a-layin’ out to tackle Victoria for it. I wuz a-goin’ to hunt round myself for it in the park.”
Sez I, “You’d only tire yourself out for nothin’; you wouldn’t find a sprig. And if you found any, I wouldn’t want you to pick it without Victoria’s consent—it would like as not be some she had saved for the children or grandchildren; no,” sez I, “I will suffer and be calm,” and I sithed.
“Wall,” sez he, “I’m goin’ to be minded in this matter—I am goin’ to have you see a doctor, and I hain’t a-goin’ to put it off another day. You might put it off too long, and then what would the world be to me? What would life be without Samantha?”
His tender tones touched my heart considerable, and I promised I would see a doctor that very day; so he went away, quite contented, with Martin.
THAT LITTLE DUDE DOCTOR, WITH HIS CANE AND HIS EYEGLASS.
Wall, after he had went away, and I wuz left alone with my promise, I rumineated in deep thought. And the more I thought on’t, the more I hated to have that little dude doctor, with his cane and his eyeglass, a-reconoiterin’ round my back and a-laughin’ at me, for all I knew—for I felt instinctively that he wuz one that would laugh at a person’s back, and I felt that in this case I should be the means of lurin’ him into that wickedness and deceit.
He looked conceited and disagreeable in the extreme, anyway, and I didn’t put any dependence at all on his jedgment.
But then my promise confronted me; what should I do? But as I mused I happened to think—besides this little dandy doctor, with his case of medicine, a-goin’ to and fro, I had noticed a tall, dignified, good-lookin’, middle-aged man a-goin’ up and down the halls with his case of medicine.
He usually went up the stairs as we wuz a-goin’ out—about 10 A.M.—and, thinkses I, here is a chance to keep my promise, and mebby git relief. For it stood to reason that I had ruther display my right shoulder blade to a middle-aged, sober man, with a wife and children and grandchildren, and other things to stiddy him down, than to a little snickerin’, supercilious young chap, who hadn’t any wife, or children, or any other trouble.
So I left my door on a jar, and waited for his comin’. I got my dress waist so’s I could slip it off in a minute, and throwed a breakfast shawl gracefully round my figger, and waited calmly the result.
Anon I heard a step approachin’, and I looked out, and I see that it wuz the young doctor. He had a posey in his buttonhole and he wuz a-hummin’ a light tune and a-swingin’ his cane in his right hand, and I felt more and more relieved to think it wuz not my fate to tackle him.
Anon a hall-boy went by slowly, a-bearin’ a pitcher of ice water; anon a chambermaid, and then I recognized a messenger’s slow, haltin’ step.
And then I see the doctor’s benine face, framed in gray hair and ornamented with whiskers of the same color, approachin’.
I folded my breakfast shawl closter around my form and advanced to the door, and sez I—
“Can I speak to you for a moment, sir?”
“Yes,” sez he.
Sez I, “I would like to employ you for a few minutes.”
“Yes,” sez he, a-enterin’ the room willin’ly, as if it wuz the way of his business, as doctors always do.
He looked round the room enquirin’ly as he entered, and as if mentally in search of sunthin’. And I spozed mebby it wuz to see if he could see signs of any other doctor’s medicine or sunthin’. And I spoke up, and sez I:
“I have had some trouble with my back lately, and I want you to look at it and see what is the matter;” sez I, “I want to know whether it is neuralgy or a bile.”
“I HAVE HAD SOME TROUBLE WITH MY BACK LATELY, AND I WANT YOU TO LOOK AT IT.”
He looked dretful surprised—I spozed he wuzn’t ust to havin’ a complaint so queer and mysterious.
And I rapidly made my preperations, and presented my left shoulder blade for his consideration.
And as I did so, I said anxiously—
“Is it a bile?”
I dreaded his answer. Neuralgy I felt I could face, but a bile seemed dretful if met by me on foreign shores, far from catnip and a quiet home.
Sez he, “I can’t tell what is the matter; if I were in your place I would have a doctor.”
Mekanically, and like sheet lightnin’, I seized the breakfast shawl and drawed its voluminous folds about my figger and faced him.
“Hain’t you a doctor?” sez I.
“No,” sez he; “I am a piano tuner. I thought you wanted me to tune an instrument,” sez he.
I sunk into a chair and waved my hand towards the door.
He bowed and vanished.
And I, a not knowin’ whether to laugh or to cry, I did both at the same time. I felt meachin’, and small, and provoked, and shamed, and tickled, and mad, and everything.
But anon I thought I must not let this contrarytemps (French) vanquish me. So I called on all the common sense I had, and all the rectitude I had, and I had a real lot of it when I got holt of all of it.
For I realized that my motives wuz as pure as rain water in a new cedar barrel, and so, bein’ dragged up to the tribunal of my own jedgment, I could not find myself to blame; so I determined to keep calm and not let the World or Josiah know what I had been through.
For it wuz a hard blow onto both my jedgment and pride, lookin’ on it with a nateral eye, and I felt that Josiah and the World would be apt to look at it through nateral eyes, and not through the rapt vision of jestice that made me say and say calmly that Josiah wuz the one to blame; for if he hadn’t extracted a promise from me, this contrarytemps would not have occurred.
These large-sized emotions lifted me up quite a good ways, and so I spoze it made the next notch up come easier to me. For as I sot there I moralized—I have been a-relyin’ on mortal ingregients to help me and a-leanin’ on a pardner’s jedgment.
Ingregients have failed, pardner’s jedgment has proved futile—futiler it did seem to me than anything ever had before sence the world begun, as futile as I have found ’em anon and oftener.
So sez I to myself, “What if I should branch out and try the faith cure—turn aside from doctors and pardners, reeds that have broke under my weak grasp?”
I will! I will!
So I at once made my preperations for faith cure. I het some Pond’s Extract in a little cup on the gas—I had brung a little contrivance from home that fitted the burner.
I het that extract as hot as I could bear it, and bathed that shoulder blade in the soothin’ mixture; I then wet a cloth in anarky, and rubbed it for a quarter of a hour by the clock; I then put on a strong poreus plaster I had by me, made from healin’ herbs; and then I het some more Pond’s Extract, and put in some tincture of wormwood—I had a little in a bottle—and I wet a woollen cloth in it and laid it over the blade. I then filled my hot-water bag with water and laid myself down on the bed, with the warm, soothin’ rubber bag pressed clost to the achin’ blade.
And then, havin’ completed these simple preleminaries, I leaned on the Faith Cure—I leaned heavy, and anon I felt that I had hit on the right plan. The pain grew lighter and lighter, my thoughts of the contrarytemps grew more peaceful and as if I could bear it. I felt that I could forgive Josiah, and then I knew nothin’ further for a long time.
Anon I seemed to be back in Jonesville; Philury and I wuz down in our back paster a-pickin’ rossberrys. The sun shone down warm as I stooped over the pink, laden boughs.
The crick under the hill tinkled melogiously—somebody wuz tunin’ it, I thought. It seemed to be playin’ melogious cords I had never hearn before. A bird flew out of the deep, green depths of Balcom’s woods; it flew up in front of me and lighted on my forward, and said—
“How do you feel, Samantha? Are you worse?”
I had layed there for five hours by the clock, and it wuz my own pardner’s hand on my forward that rousted me up.
“No,” sez I, “Josiah; I am much better than I wuz.”
“Did you git the doctor?” sez he.
That wuz a tender subject to me, but I wuz able to meet it. I sez—
“I thought I would try the Faith Cure, Josiah, and,” sez I, “I truly feel like a new creeter—the pain has almost all gone.” And it had, and from that minute I gained on it fast.
At bedtime I tried the Faith Cure agin, after goin’ through with the same simple preleminaries I had went through, and the next mornin’ the cure wuz almost complete, which made the trials that begun as soon as I opened my eyes some easier to bear.
I heard my pardner’s voice the first thing, out in the hall, through the half open door. I hearn him a-sayin’—
“Dum it all, don’t you never have day here? Is it always night?”
“It is day now,” sez the voice of a agitated chambermaid; “it is between 8 and 9 o’clock.”
“Pretty day!” sez Josiah. Sez he, “Look out of the winder and see if you can see daylight; a pretty day this is—dark as a stack of black cats, and darker, for you could see the cats if they wuz a inch from your nose.” Sez he, “We have been here three days, and I hain’t seen daylight yet.”
He had a air of blamin’ the girl, and I interfered and called him in; but the girl wuz waywised, and she said, “It is very unusual weather, sir—very unusual. We have never had such a fog before.”
They always say that, from Chicago and London to Egypt—they “never had it before.”
It always happens dretful onfortunate jest whilst you are there.
Josiah wuz jest preparin’ to blame the girl agin, I dare presoom to say, when I hearn another voice on the seen.
It wuz the voice of a Englishman that Josiah had got some acquainted with, and who had disputed warm with him about their two different countries, each one on ’em a-praisin’ up his own native land to the skies.
And Josiah made a derisive remark to him right there in that untoward place about his “dum climate.”
I wuz mortified, but couldn’t walk out and interfere, not bein’ dressed.
After passin’ a number of sentences back and forth, I hearn the Englishman say—
“This is a great country, sir—the sun never sets on it.”
And Josiah sez in a real mean axent—
“Good reason for that! the sun never rises on’t—it can’t go down where it hain’t riz! I hain’t seen a ray of sunshine sence I come to England!”
Thinkses I, “Dressed or ondressed, I’ve got to interfere,” and I hollered out agin, “Josiah—Josiah Allen!” And he see in my axent a need of haste.
And he come into the room, and I sez—
“Don’t run down a man’s country on a empty stumick, when it is as dark as pitch.”
And he sez, “Then I can’t run it at all.” His axent wuz pitiful.
And it wuz indeed a fearful time.
The winder presented a black, murky appearance, the gas wuz lit in the house and outside, and away from the light the streets wuz as dark as a black broadcloth pocket in a blind man’s over-coat.
We felt gloomy at the breakfast-table, but Martin sed we must be gittin’ round some. So we concluded to go to St. Paul’s Cathedral. So after awhile we ventered to sally out. We wuz about two hours a-goin’ a distance that ort to took us about fifteen minutes—a-movin’ on through the dense blackness, and not knowin’ what we wuz a-comin’ up aginst, or who, or when, or what.
It wuz a fearful time, very.
We went in two handsomes (though their handsomeness didn’t do us any good, for we couldn’t see a speck on’t). Josiah and I and Al Faizi went in one, and Martin and Alice and Adrian in the other. A strange and mysterious journey as I ever took, a-hearin’ anon or oftener a voice up on top of our vehicle a-shoutin’ out replies to the frenzied cries of cabmen on every side on him, and a not knowin’ who or what we wuz a-goin’ to run into, or be run in by. And the faint glow of the street lights a-shinin’ through the black mists like suns that wuz a-bein’ darkened, as the Skripters tell on.
It wuz a fearful seen; my Josiah wuz well-nigh prostrated by it, and sez he—
“If I ever git where the sun shines in the daytime agin, I’ll stay there.”
“So will I!” sez I, and I felt it, Heaven knows! I wuz fearful agitated.
Sez Josiah, as a loud, skairful cry from the top of our handsome wuz answered from others all round us—
“Jest think on’t, Samantha, how bright and pleasant it is this minute in our back yard to Jonesville; how plain you could see the side of the barn; how the sun is a-shinin’ down on the smoke-house, and hen-park, and leech barrel.
“Why did we ever leave them seens!” sez he.
“Why, indeed!” sez I.
Sez he, “Ury is mebby at this minute goin’ in to the house, happy creeter!” Sez he, “A-walkin’ out a-seein’ every step he takes; and Philury a-standin’ in the back door a-watchin’ him, and a-lookin’ at the Loontown hills milds off, and the Jonesville steeple.
“And we a-gropin’ along in perfect blackness at 12 M., and can’t see our noses. Why,” sez he bitterly, “my nose is a perfect stranger to me; it might be changed to a Roman or a Greecy one, and I not know it.”
“You’d feel the change,” sez I.
“I d’no whether I would or not. I feel all lost and by the side of myself,” sez he; “three more days of these carryin’s on would make my brain tottle.”
“Wall, it couldn’t tottle fur,” sez I. I said it to comfort him, but it wuzn’t took so—no, fur from it.
