In the fifteen minutes it took Frank Linniman to trot down to the Post Tavern and back, the Doctor fielded two more questions. The first was from a gentleman in the rear (Mr. Abernathy, wasn’t it? Gout, consumption and nerves?) who wanted to know of the dangers of tight-lacing among fashionable females who unnaturally constricted their midsections to achieve the “wedding ring” waist. The Doctor repeated the question for the benefit of those up front who might not have heard, and then, after stroking the white silk of his beard a moment, shot an admonitory forefinger into the air. “My dear sir, I can tell you without exaggeration that if the number of deaths recorded annually as a result of just such frivolous tight-lacing were properly recorded, you would be truly appalled. As a medical intern at Bellevue, I had occasion to be present for the autopsy of one such unfortunate woman—a woman, I might add, not yet out of her twenties. In any case, we found to our astonishment that her organs had been totally disarranged, the liver pushed up into the lungs and the intestines so effectively blocked they might just as well have been stoppered with a cork.” He shook his fine head wearily and let out a sigh that could be heard in the back row. “A pity,” he said, his voice cast low. “I tell you, it brought tears to my eyes.”
The second question was from a tall and very striking young woman in the fifth row, whose skin, unfortunately, had a faint greenish cast to it. (Muntz, Miss Ida; greensickness, autointoxication.) She rose, visibly excited at the thought of all those curious eyes upon her, and cleared her throat. “Doctor,” she asked in a plaintive, demure voice, “could you please give us your opinion of cigarette smoking, as practiced in private, of course, among young ladies of today?”
Dr. Kellogg furrowed his brows. He was furious, incensed, a tower of righteous strength and indignation. He paused to let his gaze fall upon the recidivist cigar and cigarette smokers among the audience. “Madame—or should I say Mademoiselle? Mademoiselle Muntz, I have only this to say, and it applies equally to both sexes. Tobacco”—and here the Doctor let a long shudder run through him—“tobacco destroys the sex glands.”
Someone gasped. Miss Muntz sank into her seat, stricken. The Doctor held his stony gaze. “And that,” he said, “is a medically proven fact.”
It was at this moment that Dr. Linniman dashed through the rear door, an air of breathless urgency about him, two identical packages wrapped in white butcher’s paper held out before him in offering.
“Ah,” the Doctor exclaimed, pushing at his spectacles, “Dr. Linniman.” And then he lifted his head to address the audience at large. “And now, to return, if we may, to Mrs. Tindermarsh’s query regarding porterhouse steak and its value as a food source—” He broke off here to lean forward and give Dr. Linniman, who now stood before him, these further instructions: “Frank, would you examine the scales, please, weigh the respective samples and prepare slides of a precisely equal portion of each? Thank you.”
A murmur from the audience. A few titters, a spatter of applause.
“Ladies and gentlemen, I am about to provide you with a pair of demonstrations that should, I would fervently hope, forever turn you away from such a disgusting and unnatural food as this. I say ‘disgusting’ because of its high bacterial content—a content I will show to be equal to or greater than that of barnyard ordure—and I say ‘unnatural’ because this flesh food is an innovation and corruption of modern man, whose ancestors have been proven by such eminent researchers as Von Freiling in Germany and Du Pomme of the Pasteur Institute to be exclusively frugivorous. And, too, I will assert that such foods are in fact ‘sinful,’ as Mrs. Tindermarsh would have it, not only in the sin occasioned by the taking of the lives of our fellow creatures—and I would think that the piteous bleats of those blameless herds led to slaughter would ring in the ears of any flesh eater the moment his head hits the pillow at night—but in the very greatest sin of all, and that is, of course, in polluting the temple of the human body.”
The audience was hushed now, sitting rapt and motionless in the orthopedically correct chairs the Doctor had himself designed. Someone—was that Mr. Praetz, of Cleveland?—suppressed a cough.
“Frank?” The doctor swiveled round briskly to where Dr. Linniman had joined him at the rear of the small stage. “Are we ready?”
A plain deal table stood just behind him; on it, conspicuously displayed, were the beefsteak from the Post Tavern and the grainy pungent sample from the livery stable. Between these two exhibits, Dr. Linniman had set up a matching pair of microscopes and a small naked incandescent bulb for illumination. “Yes, sir,” he answered. “All ready.”
“Good.” Turning once more to the audience, Dr. Kellogg flashed a toothy smile and rubbed his hands together with relish. “Now, we’ll need a disinterested party as observer—do I have any volunteers? No? How about you, Miss Muntz?”
A little gasp, a titter, and there, in the fifth row, was Miss Muntz, coloring prettily.
“Don’t be shy, Miss Muntz—this is all in the interest of science.”
There were murmurs of encouragement, and in the next moment Miss Ida Muntz was clutching the sides of her skirts and making her way up the aisle, where she daintily mounted the three steps to the podium.
“Now, Miss Muntz,” the Doctor began, and he momentarily lost his train of thought as he saw how she towered over him—she was pretty, yes, and she gave them something to look at, greensickness and all, but he should have thought to choose someone with a little less legbone, for God’s sake. He fumbled a moment, uncharacteristically, and repeated himself: “Miss Muntz. Miss Muntz, I would like you to examine the slides beneath these identical microscopes and describe to us what you see, remembering that only Dr. Linniman knows which of these specimens is Mrs. Tindermarsh’s beefsteak and which the, well”—laughter from the audience—“the waste product of an animal very much like the one sacrificed for the venal tastes of the gourmands at the Post Tavern.”
The moment was exquisite: the girl bent prettily over the microscope, the men leaning forward in their seats for a better look, the women smiling secret smiles, the Doctor, as ever, conscious of his control, his benevolence, his wisdom—shepherd to his flock. “And would you describe for us what you see in the first exhibit, my dear?”
“Um, it’s black—or no, now I see …”
“Yes?”
“Tiny things. Moving. Like, like bits of straw or rice—only alive.”
“Good, very good, Miss Muntz. Those are bacteria”—the Doctor turned to face the audience now—“and they are truncated, like bits of rice, as you say, because they are unfriendly bacteria, the B. welchii, B. coli and Proteus vulgaris we so often find in the stool of our incoming patients here at the Sanitarium. And could you accurately count the bacteria for us, Miss Muntz?”
She turned her head now, looking up at him out of a bright crystalline eye, and gave a little cry of surprise. “Oh, no, Doctor—there are so many hundreds and hundreds of them.”
“And now, Miss Muntz, would you do us the great favor of examining the sample beneath the second microscope?”
A flutter of skirts, a quick reassuring touch-up of the coiffure and millinery, and Miss Muntz was bent over the second microscope.
“Would you describe what you see now, Miss Muntz?”
“Yes, Doctor, it’s … it’s much the same thing—”
The audience breathed out, a ripple that became a tidal wave.
“And could you count the bacteria in this sample?”
“Oh, no, Doctor—”
“But would you say that there are fewer or more than in the first sample?”
Her eye still affixed to the aperture of the lens, Miss Muntz tugged unconsciously at a loose strand of hair and let her voice drop reflectively. “This one is, is more cluttered. A lot more.”
“Would you say there were half as many more in this sample?”
“Oh, yes,” Miss Muntz breathed, taking her eye from the lens and straightening up to face the Doctor and the crowd ranged myopically behind
him. “Yes, at least, Doctor—at least half as many more….”
“Very good. And now, Dr. Linniman, would you please reveal to the audience the identity of each of these slides?”
Frank’s face was perfectly composed—wonderful, wonderful, thought the Doctor, a rush of triumph building in him. How he loved this life! “The first slide—”
“Yes?”
“—this is the sample from the livery stable.”
At this, the audience erupted. There were hoots of laughter, cries of surprise and wonderment, and finally a sustained applause that echoed through the Grand Parlor like the steady wash of sea on shingle. It was a long moment before the Doctor, beaming and with both hands uplifted, was able to calm them. “I urge you,” he called out above the dying clamor, “to step up individually once we’re done here tonight, and confirm for yourselves Miss Muntz’s observations. And thank you, Miss Muntz—you may step down now—and thank you, Dr. Linniman.”
A moment drifted by, the crowd still abuzz, as Dr. Linniman helped the young lady from the stage, saw her to her seat and himself found a place in the front row. The Doctor could feel the pulse of the audience declining ever so slightly from the peak to which he’d brought it, and he knew now that they were vulnerable, putty in his hands: it was time for the pièce de résistance. “Ladies and gentlemen,” he cried, “I thank you for your attention. I’ll let you draw your own conclusions from what you’ve just seen,” he added slyly, “but we have a problem here … what to do with Mr. Post’s porterhouse steak.” He held up a hand to silence the incipient laughter. “I propose a second small illustration of the Sanitarium’s principles….” Dr. Kellogg again looked pointedly to the rear of the auditorium. Those in front began to crane their necks. “Is Dr. Distaso ready?”
A gruff, French-accented bark of assent rose from the back of the room, and there was Dr. Distaso, the distinguished bacteriologist Dr. Kellogg had lured away from the Pasteur Institute in Paris, leading his ward for the evening up the aisle. This was an ancient, foul-smelling and fouler-tempered chimpanzee by the name of Lillian, an animal the Doctor had acquired from a circus some years earlier and kept around the San for just such a moment as this. When the audience caught sight of Lillian, who was usually confined to a cage in one of the back laboratories, there was a universal cry of approbation. Several of them actually got to their feet for a better look, and a pair of matrons in one of the middle rows clapped their hands like schoolgirls. The Doctor focused on one man in particular (Jennings, Bigelow; chronic flatulence, partial loss of hearing), who was laughing so hard his eyes were damp and his face seemed swollen to twice its size. Amidst the pandemonium, Dr. Kellogg took Lillian’s leash from Dr. Distaso and led her up onto the stage, where, knowing her routine as well as Frank Linniman knew his, she clambered atop a stool in the far corner and gave the Doctor her undivided attention. Raising his hands high above his head, Dr. Kellogg called for quiet.
It took them even longer to settle down this time, but when they’d quieted somewhat, the Doctor raised his voice and gave a quick little speech about the evils of meat and how contrary to man’s nature it was to consume it. “By way of illustration,” he said, “I am going to give our simian cousin here—Lillian, that is, and she certainly doesn’t resemble anyone on my side of the family”—a pause for laughter—”I’m going to give her a choice between Mr. Post’s finest beefsteak and the contents of this bag,” and he drew a brown paper bag out from behind the podium. “Let’s see which she prefers.”
The Doctor backed away from the podium and slipped on a pair of gloves that had been laid out for him on the table. He then hefted the dripping slab of meat, held it out briefly for all to see, and casually tossed it to Lillian. The chimp was adept. She snatched it from the air in a spidery hand and brought it to her nose, uttering a low coughing sound and folding her lips back over her teeth. The audience stirred, poked one another, hummed with laughter. Perplexed, Lillian touched the tip of her tongue to the surface of the meat, made a face of gargoylelike disdain, and then suddenly, and rather violently, flung the thing back at the Doctor, who caught it neatly. Setting the steak down, he extracted a banana from the bag. With a cry of “Voilà!” he threw it to the chimp, who immediately peeled and ate it. “Hoo-hoo,” she murmured, turning her chocolate eyes on him with a look of pure and abiding love.
Dr. Kellogg tossed her another, and all at once the audience was on its feet, cheering, whistling, faces animated; ills, aches, twinges and conniptions all but forgotten. The applause was thunderous. Dr. Kellogg bowed deeply, and as Lillian greedily plunged the second banana into the rictus of her mouth and his patients cheered mightily, he waved his way out the door and into the hallway, floating on the exhilaration of the moment.
Outside, amongst the potted palms and bathed in the gentle glow of the electric lamps, stood his secretary, Poultney Dab. Dab had been waiting patiently, a sheaf of papers clutched awkwardly in one hand, a briefcase in the other.
“Hear them, Poult? We taught them a thing or two tonight they won’t soon forget, eh?” The doctor was already hurrying up the hall with his short brisk strides, throwing the words back over his shoulder at Dab’s large and anxious face. “See that Lillian gets an extra ration tonight and that the new man, what’s his name, Murphy? changes her litter—he’s been remiss about that—and I’ll need a second copy of the trustees’ report, as I think I told you, and oh, yes, there’s been a complaint of cooking odors on the fifth floor—Mrs. Crouder’s room, five-nineteen, I believe—and I want you to have Sturman look into it, and be prepared to take dictation in my office at eleven P.M. sharp, will you?”
Dab was a short large man with an unfortunate waddle; the more he hurried after his Chief, the more pronounced it became. “Dr. Kellogg,” he was saying, his voice harsh and breathless, and there seemed to be some sort of urgency stuck in the craw of it, “Dr. Kellogg—”
The Doctor pulled up short in the middle of the wide gleaming corridor that stretched five hundred thirty feet from the Grand Parlor to the lobby, the corridor set in the spotless Italian marble he’d chosen himself, and spun round to face his secretary. Over Dab’s shoulder he could see the people filing out of the Grand Parlor, a parade of the distinguished, the celebrated and the wealthy. A group of nurses passed by, beautiful girls all, smiling shyly. “Evening, Doctor,” they murmured. “Evening, girls,” he replied grandly. “And now, Poult, what in God’s name is it that’s got you so worked up?”
But the doctor didn’t have to wait for his secretary’s response: there it was, slouching indolently against the wall not ten feet away, there it was, staring him in the face. All at once his mood shattered like a windowpane. He could feel the rage take hold of him. “How dare you!” he choked, storming up to the ragged figure propped against the wall. “Haven’t I told you—”
But the figure moved and spoke and cut him off. The words seemed to come from deep inside him even as the sparkling audience flowed through the doors of the Grand Parlor and made their way in a knot toward them; the words spat themselves out like a curse, twisted by the unshaven lips, forced from the stinking rags and the feverish eyes: “Hello, Father. Aren’t you going to introduce me?”
Chapter 2
Scavengers
of the
Sea
Ignoring the dainty little three-pronged fork, Charlie Ossining lifted the oyster to his mouth, tipped the shell forward and with a quick practiced pursing of the lips, allowed it to become one with himself. Before him, atop a bed of crushed ice, lay eleven others,’ glistening with the juice of life. He lingered over the second, garnishing it with a dash of cocktail sauce and a squeeze of lemon before sending it off to bed with its brother, the moment settling round him in a warm gastric glow as he took a leisurely sip of his Pommery & Greno ’96, and contemplated the snug green neck of the bottle peeking out from its icy cradle. This was living, all right, he thought, patting his lips with a swath of snowy linen and letting his gaze fall idly over the gli
ttering depths of the car.
Outside, the scenery beat by the windows, as cold and cheerless as an oyster’s gullet—did oysters have gullets? he wondered briefly before downing another—but here, in the softly lit grip of the diner, it was all mahogany and crystal. Amazing, really. You’d hardly think they were rocketing along at nearly forty miles an hour—the car barely trembled, the champagne clinging to the rim of the glass even as the potted palm swayed serenely over the table. He could feel the vibration of the rails, of course, but it was nothing, a distant throb, as if threads of silk were pulling him gently through the bleak countryside.
He was halfway through the plate of oysters—six shells denuded, six to go—when the Negro waiter pranced up the aisle, a pair of menus clutched to his chest, a cadaverous-looking couple following in his wake. Casting a quick look round him, Charlie saw to his dismay that his was the only table for four occupied by a single diner, and saw further that they were headed straight for him. So much for solitary pleasures.
“’Scuse me, sir,” the Negro said, dipping his head in extenuation, and then he drew out the chair opposite Charlie for the lady (thirtyish, too pale, too thin, nice eyes, a three-tiered hat built up like the Tower of Pisa with artificial fruit, lace, ribbon, assorted gewgaws and a pale little dead bird with glass eyes perched atop a wire twig) and the chair beside her for the man (too much nose, unruly hair, dressed up like a prince on his way to the opera). Charlie took an immediate dislike to them, but then he softened a bit, always willing to make concessions for the rich.
The Road to Wellville Page 2
