Akron daily Democrat. [volume] (Akron, Ohio) 1892-1902, 1899-05-06
DOCTOR
MARLIN.

He was not Dr. Marlin, however, but
Mr.. Van Maerlen of Dutch Guiana. when
he first descended upon Little Pcddlington
some 90 years ago as student in its we'll
known technical school, armed with let
/ tiers from his fathers Boston agent that
admitted him to Little Peddlington' S first
tociety. And the first society of Little
| Peddlington was really high society in
! those days. Its young men were gentle
men of wealth and leisure, who made the
grand tour in the English style and con-
I tracted high life debts ON a corresponding
J scale. The young ladies We're sent to New
/ York for their finishing" and acquired a
/ cosmopolitan polish by tiirtations with her
/ Britannia majestyS swell officers, who
would seem 10 have been more sociable in
those anterailway days than they are now,
. away off there in Canada.
III this society Van Maerlen shone He
had been TO Europe and could hold his own
with the Travelled beauS He was tall and
darl, and distingue looking and said ma
dame in Il fascinatingly foreign way for
the ladies' No one of them ever fell in
loye with him, however, strange to say, or,
rather, no. il was not strange, for there
was something more than tropical, more
than racial about Van Macrleu from the
first. something mongrei and uncanny
His eyes and hair were too black, his teeth
were too white. his cynicism was too Gym
ical TO admit of any warmer liking than
the sort one has for caviarc or olives-a
dilettante taste rather than an emotion.
Then there was his nose, the most extraor-
dinary nosc, not in the style of Cyrano de
Bergerac, but in the style of Kosciusko-
that is to say, nose which had started
out to be one kind of u nose and then sud-
denly became another-a nose shapely
enough and regular enough in its aquiline
order till the tip was reached, but there
turning abruptly and sharply upward,
precisely as if some malicious fairy had
pressed hard finger on it in its owners
babyhood 1t was bold, not to say a
brazen, thing for man with such mark
upon him to do what Van Maerlcn pres
emily did, and right there, too in that lit
tie town where everybody knew everybody
else, if not to speak to, at least by sight,
noses included
The rich Dutch planter father had sent
this son to Little PeddIington' institute
to become civil engineer in order to
have the big plantations down there in
Dutch Guiana run on scientific principles.
but, instead of studying, the son spent the
four years course carousing with the rich
and idle young men with whom his let
tiers had thrown him. And when the four
years were up instead .of a diploma the
fathers reward was u big bundle of 1. o.
U. s to pay.
Naturally the father was furious, but he
came nobly to the scratch, sending on the
money TO pay the prodigal's debts of
'.honor." along with the peremptory COM
mand that the prodgal himself should re-
turn on a certain ship sailing out of Bos
ton or never. Instead of paying his debts
with the money sent him he gambled it
away. After which he made his exit from
Little Peddlington's social swim on a
purse made up by the coterie of young
men with whom he had caroused and who
had had enough of him to be willing to
pay u good round sum to get him off their
hands ON that now or never ship from
Boston for Dutch Guiana.
A year later one of those purse makers,
a busy young doctor with IL wife and the
beginnings of Il family to work for, was
sitting with them at his supper table
when Van Maerlen stalked in unheraldcd
antl4ssnannouneed.- ------------------
'.You, Van Maerlcn?" cried the aston
ished doctor
If you please, doctor, my name is Mar
lin now; DR.. Marlin.
The real doctor was an easy going man.
He accepted the situation and allowed
Marlin to stay on in his house and help
him in his office. where the latter thus got
a certain knowledge of the profession
whose title he'had assumed, but though
Marlin was careful to go out as little as he
could before dark and though he avoided
all Van Maerlen's former haunts it was
inevitable that some time that should hap
pen which did. The real doctor was a
busy man. He hatn mu,h time for GO
ing around with the boys but he was
popular with them, and the greatest ele-
CANT amoug them was an intimate at his
house, SO finally one day this gentleman
dropped in as he had way of doing, self
invited, to "a mcal.
'Gibbetts. " said his host blandlv, "Jet
me introduce DR. Marlin Dr. Marlin,
Mr.. Gibbetts''
Gibbets bowed, glanced, started, stared
But he had not made the grand tour
half dozen times for nothing He was
man of the world, and he sat him down
without further ado and proceeded to
make himself agreeable to DIR. Marlin
along with the others. Perhaps he enjoy
ed the new ''doctors'' cheek, as the real
doctor had. At any rate, before the meal
was over he put it to the test, boldly, de-
liberately, but nicely, like the gentleman
he was
''Dr. Marlin, he said, looking across
the table full into the unmistakable face,
with its unmiStakable nose that no beard
could cover or disgnise, "haven't had the
pleasure of meeting you somewhere be
fore?''
The real doctor and his young wife
could hear their own heart beats in the
pause that ensued, during which the
quondam Van Maerlen stared as deliber-
ately and as broadly back at the man he
had known and who had known him so
well:
''.No, sir; do not recollec6 ever having
had the honor of meeting sou before"
OF course there were only two things
for Gibbetts to do after that-give the lie
or accept the situation as the real doctor
had. And of course he accepted the situa-
tion, and the rest of the old set followed
suit in much the same spirit, which was
really a very fattering spirit for so small
n place as Little Peddlington-a spirit
quite cosmopolitan and cynical and anus
ed. And DR.. Marlin is living there yet,
though almost all the others are dead, Elk
ing out a scanty living with his assumed
profession and borrowing from the real
doctors son, who is looking forward with
~r ~.