The first thing that met my eye, when I got back to the Kid, was Eddie Duke's friend, the greatest doctor in the world. He was walkin' very fast away from the hotel and mutterin' to himself. I just had time to grab his arm, as he jumps in the buggy and reaches for the whip.
"Bah!" he snorts, jerkin' away from me. "The ignorant little pup!"
He whales Old Dobbin with the whip and leaves me flat.
I couldn't figure out what the Kid's education had to do with his health, so I beats it upstairs and all but fell over Eddie Duke. He's holdin' one eye and mumblin' somethin' about "roughnecks" and "ingratitude." I kept on through the crowd and into the Kid's room. Scanlan is still on the bed groanin', and beside him is the hotel clerk, thumbin' a almanac.
"Wait!" pants the clerk, as I come in. "I'll have it in a second." He turns over a lot more pages and then he hollers, "Ah! Here we are--what did I tell you? 'First Aid to the Injured.'" He clears his throat and the Kid looks up hopefully. "Number one," reads the clerk. "_'First send for a physician!'_" He drops the book and dashes for the door. "Don't do nothing till I get back!" he yells.
Scanlan starts to go after him, but moans and falls back on the bed.
"I wish I had a gun!" he snarls. "That big boob has been here fifteen minutes tellin' me all he was gonna do for me as soon as he found it in the book! He--"
"Didn't the doctor do no good?" I butts in, sittin' on the side of the bed.
"Eddie Duke's friend," I tells him. "The old--"
"Listen, Johnny!" he says. "I still got a wallop in my right! Don't kid me now or--"
"What d'ye mean kid you?" I asks him. "Didn't the doctor--"
"Doctor!" he interrupts me, slammin' down the pillow. "If that guy was a doctor, I'm Caruso! He comes in here where I'm practically dyin' and tries to sell me a book!"
"He sits down at the bed," explains the Kid, "and takes a big, black book out of what I figured was his medicine chest. He holds it up and asks me if I see it and I says I did, thinkin' I had passed the first test easy. Then he says he wrote the book himself and it's full of hope and cheer or dope and beer--to tell you the truth, I don't know which it was on account of the pain. Anyhow, I let him get away with it, and he tells me to think of how lucky I actually am alongside of the Crown's Prince of Germany--and then he begins to read from that book! It seems it's a novel about faith bein' stronger than pain. By this time, I seen that he was either nutty or tryin' to kid me, so I cut him off by askin' him when he's gonna fix up my arm. He says he's doin' it now, and when he gets through, he'll leave the book which will be a total of twenty-five bucks. When I come to, I ask him how long he had been a doctor, and he gets sore and claims he's a healer of the Mystic Sliders or somethin' like that, and what do I mean by callin' him a doctor? Then I called him a few other things so's he wouldn't have no kick comin' and gave him the bum's rush out of the room. Eddie Duke starts to moan about me maulin' his friend, and--well, get him to show you his eye!"