As though that were not enough for one day! My cup literally ran over when, in the evening, the telephone rang and there was a hurry call from the hotel across the way. Seizing my medicine-case, which I had heretofore been unnecessarily carrying in my walks about the city (in obedience to Dr. Wyeth, though I felt like a hypocrite in so doing), I flew down the stairs and across the street where I found the patient—a nervous, impressionable girl, whom I had no difficulty in quieting and relieving, at the same time alleviating her mother’s anxiety as well.
As I went through the hotel corridors I walked on air; my heart was beating tumultuously. I wanted to shout for joy. A band was playing in the street, making it harder still to maintain decorum until I could reach my friendly office—that office where I had spent so many lonely hours waiting for the door-bell to ring! that office which had this day witnessed my triple triumph!
A few evenings later the bell rang. In the waiting room stood a tall, lanky old chap.
“Hello, thar! Whar’s Doctor Sue?”
I told him Dr. Wyeth was out of town for a week or two and that I was taking her practice. He looked at me comically; his face underwent some kind of contortion which I suppose was a smile, as he said:
“Ye be? Wall, I vum! I don’t know just how that’ll strike Betsy. Ye—ye’re used to old wimmen? Ye’re jest a-studyin’ with Doctor Sue, I calk’late—No? Ye’re a full-fledged doctor, be ye? Wall, wall, no harm intended—I’m jest a-wonderin’ about Betsy—she’s kind o’ cantankerous.” He scratched his head and eyed me.
“Wall, ye may as well come along and see what ye can make out with her.”
Inquiring his name and where he lived, I said I would call as soon as my office hours were over.
“I’m Uncle Bill Gilmore—live in West U——. Ye git off the car at V—— Street, and ask the fust one ye meet whar Uncle Bill lives, and he’ll tell ye. Doctor Sue’s doctored us ever sen’ she hung out her shingle. Betsy sets great store by her—don’t know how she’ll cotton to you—ye mustn’t mind if she’s a leetle peppery.”
Off he went, and I, to maintain the dignity of my office hours, waited, though I could just as well have gone with him. “Betsy” “cottoned” to me all right, and thereafter they called me whenever Dr. Wyeth was out of town.