An Exciting Game. By Nancy Howe Wood.
It was when I was a struggling young physician in a small country town that I passed through an adventure which I would not care to repeat, although now I can plainly see its humorous aspect.
I had but shortly before graduated from a medical college, and was trying hard to get my living in a little village where there were two other older and more experienced doctors. I was becoming greatly disheartened, when one day, on my return from a visit to a poor woman of the village, I found an official-looking letter awaiting me. I opened it with some degree of excitement, and was astonished to find that it was an offer to me of the position of resident physician in the Blankville Insane Asylum, situated about two miles away. A salary was named which seemed a fortune to me, poverty-stricken as I then was. (I afterwards learned that the offer was made to me through the efforts of an influential friend.)
At first the letter gave me unlimited joy, and I shouted like a school-boy; but when I began to think what it would actually mean my heart sank. All my life I had had a nervous horror of insane persons, and if I should accept this offer I would be obliged to stay with them, eat with them, and live among them almost as one of themselves. At this thought I fairly shuddered, and was forced to confess to myself that I could never endure such a strain on my nerves, doctor though I was.
The next morning, however, when I again read the letter, the offer seemed so tempting that I said to myself: "Pshaw! I will not be conquered by an attack of nerves. Come, brace yourself up, man. Why, a few years at that salary will be enough to set you up for life!" Nevertheless, I determined to go up the following day, and look over the place before deciding on my final answer.
So early the next morning I presented myself at the asylum, all my nervousness gone. I was so politely shown about, and everything looked so orderly and well cared for, and the grounds without seemed so peaceful and quiet, that I was delighted with it all. My misgivings had almost vanished, and I had so nearly made up my mind to accept the lucrative offer, that I said to the smiling and complaisant guard who was acting as my guide:
"Tell the superintendent that if he will kindly allow me to stroll in the garden and think the matter over, I will give him my final answer within the hour." So saying, I began to pace up and down the flower-bordered walks.
I was by this time in such a well-satisfied frame of mind that I promptly dispelled the last remnants of my former nervousness.
I was just on the point of re-entering the asylum to say to the Superintendent that I gratefully accepted his offer when I was startled by the sound of crackling twigs behind me. Turning quickly, I found myself face to face with a man whom I supposed at first to be one of the guards. But as soon as I moved away from him to go toward the house he sprang forward with hand outstretched to clutch me, uttering an idiotic chuckle. Cold shivers chased up and down my back as the thought flashed upon me that it was an escaped patient! With a shriek I ran down the path at the top of my speed, my fear increased by the sound of pursuing steps behind me.
I doubled and turned on the track, striving to distance or elude my dreaded pursuer, but in spite of my frantic efforts, he kept closely at my heels. Finally in one of my windings I was confronted by the six-foot stone wall that surrounded the asylum on every side. Glancing backward, I saw that the maniac—as I now knew him to be—was almost upon me, and, making a desperate effort, I succeeded in reaching the top of the wall. For a moment I fancied myself secure: but my pursuer darted behind the shrubbery, and pulled out a small ladder, evidently used by the gardeners. Seeing him thus prepared to follow me, I hurriedly dropped to the ground outside, and scrambled to my feet just as the lunatic's head appeared above the top of the wall. Again I had only a short start before he was once more on my track.
And now began an exciting race "over brush, brake, and brier"; sometimes I stumbled over a protruding root and fell headlong, but was up again in a twinkling; sometimes my pursuer was so close upon me that I could easily hear his panting breath. At the end of the first mile and a quarter I thought myself done for, but my college training, which, luckily, I had not forgotten, stood me in good stead, and I desperately ran on.
"Oh," thought I, wildly, "where are the villagers? Isn't anybody near? But there was no road leading out of the village in that direction, and few people passed that way. At last, after years, it seemed to me, we entered the village, and tore at full speed down the main street. If I had longed before for some human soul to help me, I now as earnestly prayed that I might unobserved gain my own door, and so be safe. But no; some small boy, busily engaged doing nothing, soon raised the cry,
"Say, here comes the fresh young doctor a-tearing down the street like a steam-engine!"
Then, almost tired out, and seeing the door of a small house standing open, I dashed in, passed through the hall and dining-room, where the astonished family were sitting at dinner, and out into the back yard, where, completely exhausted, and utterly unable to run a step further, I dropped behind a barrel.
My hope had been that the people of the house would have understood my predicament and stopped the madman, but they evidently had not taken in the situation, or else he had been too quick for them, for from behind the barrel where I had concealed myself I could hear him come through the open doorway and search the yard for me.
And now I feared that my panting breath would betray me—and it did, for I heard his stealthy steps approach the spot where I lay quaking, and his ugly, leering face peered round at me, and he sprang forward and touched me, calling out, as I fell back almost fainting with terror: "Tag! You're it!"
In an instant the meaning of his words flashed over me, and I cursed myself for my foolish nervousness. The confounded fool had taken it for a game of tag!
By this time quite a little crowd of villagers had gathered around me, and the escaped lunatic was secured to wait for the arrival of his keeper, and I managed to reach my home, after being fortified by a glass of wine.
It was several days before my nerves recovered their usual steadiness, and it is perhaps needless to add that I did not accept the situation.