He had endeavored several times to get Catfish John to try this method, “but for some reason he didn’t want to do it.” His fees in John’s case had consisted of the entrée of the smoke-house that contained the fish which had become too dead to be peddled. He did not think much of the fish, but declared that he had got a large one there the week before, “an’ some of it was all right.”
Sipes once suggested to John that he smoke some fish “’specially fer the Doc,” and if he was not willing to do it, he would come up some day and do it himself. He would “smoke some that ’ud finish the Doc in a few hours.” John objected to this and thought that the “Doc ought to have the same kind o’ smoked fish that other people got.” Sipes replied that this was “pufectly satisfactory” to him.
After discoursing at length on some wonderful cures which he had effected, in cases that “the reg’lar doctors had given up,” and the “marvelous potentialities” of some of his secret herb extracts, and “saline infusions, even when given in small doses,” Doc would disappear in the gray landscape—probably absorbed in his reflections upon the “general cussedness of womankind” and the futility of medical schools.
I was always apprehensive when he went in John’s direction, but as the old fisherman looked comparatively well when I last saw him, it was evident that Doc had not yet operated.
“You know it’s far be it from me to knock anybody,” said Sipes one morning, “but this Doc Looney gives me a big chill. He’s always moseyin’ around, an’ never seems to be goin’ anywheres.
“Oncet ’e come here an’ borrowed a kittle. He took it off up the shore, an’ that night I seen ’im with a little fire that ’e’d built on the sand up next to the bluff, near some logs. He was roostin’ on one o’ the logs, studyin’ sumpen that was in the kittle. I sneaked up unbeknown, an’ watched ’im fer a long time. He kept puttin’ weeds an’ han’fulls o’ buds in the kittle an’ stirrin’ the mess with
a stick. Every little while ’e’d taste o’ the dope by coolin’ the end o’ the stick an’ lickin’ it. Before I seen ’im doin’ this I thought ’e might be mixin’ pizen. He was mixin’ sumpen all right, fer after a while ’e got the kittle offen the fire an’ let it cool a little; then ’e dreened it into a flat bottle through a little birch bark funnel, an’ hid the bottle under a log, an’ covered it up with sand. He took my kittle an’ stowed it in some thick brush, an’ went off up the ravine.
“He’s bin doctorin’ ol’ Catfish, an’ ’e’s always talkin’ ’bout operatin’ on ’im. There ain’t nothin’ the matter with the Catfish, ’cept ’e’s got cricks in ’is legs, an’ they bend out when ’e walks. All ’e needs to do is to set down instid o’ standin’ up, and ’is legs won’t bother ’im. He comes along ’ere oncet in a while, with that ol’ honey cart that ’e loads them much deceased fish into that ’e peddles. It ain’t no rose garden, an’ I always stay to wind’ard when ’e’s ’round. The next time ’e comes I’m goin’ to tell ’im wot I seen the Doc doin’. The first thing Catfish knows Doc’ll dope ’im with that stuff in the bottle, an’ then go after ’im with a knife. There ought to be a law aginst fellers like that. He’s full o’ bats, an’ ’e ought to be put som’eres where they could fly without scarin’ people.
“I never got my kittle back. I went an’ looked where I seen ’im hide it, but ’e’d got to it first, an’ I ain’t seen it since. The next time the Doc comes up ’ere fer a kittle ’e’ll git it out o’ the air, an’ ’e’ll recollect it the rest of ’is life.