The Worthington advance. [volume] (Worthington, Minn.) 1874-1908, 1900-02-23
Dr.. Dienich's Experience
BY Kennett F. Harris.

nR. DIENICH was not prospecting in
IL his practice. Day after day he
sat in the big easy chair in his Office
over the drug store and played check
ers with Hopkins, the photographer,
whose studio was across the hall. But
for once that he was called, the pho
tographer was called 20 times, and bust
ness was not particularly brisk with
the photographer. DR.. Dienich, who
was greasily corpulent, asthmatic and
bald, and whose dubious nose, crimson
veined and polished, proclaimed moth
ing more than the truth about him,
was wont to tell Hopkins that the pub
lie taste had become perverted. Peo-
pie, he said, preferred to call in lot
of empirical young chaps, fresh from
some cheap-John school, with a lot of
poppycock about meteorological cul-
lures and serums, and dude clothes and
tive-inch collars; they had no use for
men of experience and judgment. A
man that was any good at all might just
as we'll quit the business.
Complaining thus, the physician
would hoist himself out of his chair and
shamble over to his little dispensary,
which divided an old-fashioned mahog-
any bookcase with the medical library;
there he would pour some dark-brown
stuff into graduate glass and take the
dose without wincing. Returning to
his seat, he would bite off a large piece
of plug tobacco and proceed to tell
Hopkins of the palmy days when he
held county job of surprising soft
ness and snappiness. Also of his lu-
crative connection with two or three
life-insurance companies that had un-
fortunately failed, owing to the I'M
Timely demise of two or three of the in
sured. He was certainly practition
er of experiences, if not of experience,
supposing all these stories he told Hop
kins to be true.
Hopkins had a profound respect for
DR.. Dienich, both as a checker player
and as gentleman Of eminent scien-
titic attainments. Once he had been
afflicted with boil on the back of his
neck, and Doc Plofeld had monkeyed
with it for week 'thout helpin' it a
particle. Then he went to Doc Dienich,
an OF Doc just nach'ally fixed him up
some kind o. truck that knocked that
boil out in 24 hours. Therefore Hop
kins received DR.. Dienich's estimate of
public discrimination with entire con-
fidence.
'Why don't you try suthin' else,
Doc:' he asked of his friend one morn
ing. eff I had your edercation they
couldn't keep me down. I'd fool 'em."
'The American people like to be
,humbugged, Andy said DIR. Dienich,
with slow and solemn emphasis. 'They
like to- be humbugged. If I was one
of them smart little blatherskites like
Plofield, with a pointed beard and pat
ent-leather shoes, I'd be keeping the
spindles of a rubber-tire buggy hot,
I tell you; but l don't have to do it.
I've got money, and I don't have. to
practice unless 1 want to. Say, Andy,
you never heard of Ploield being called
on to give expert testimony before the
courts, did you? 1 guess not. I wish
I had all the money I've made that way
in my pocket right now, all the same"
81 guess they pay good fees said the
photographer.
II guess they do, if you're testifying
for the right kind Of people and you
testify good and strong-and positive"
replied DR.. Dienich, winking elaborate-
ly. "All the same, Andy, l ought to be
making money now. I don't know but
I'll do little humbugging myself"
The doctor was still in this reprehen-
sible state of mind when he looked over
the grease-spotted morning paper in
the perpetually soiled and sloppy res
taurant where he took his meals, and
saw this advertisement:
WANTED-PIIYSICIA WITH $500; A
snap for a wide-awake man; none but
regularly qualified need apply. H., room
426 Galen block.
THAT looks as if it might suit me, ~
unused DR.. Dienich. ~ snap! Well,
Il snap is something I haven't any par
ticular objection to. n wide-awake
mani Igucss I've cut my eyeteeth. 1t
won't cost anything to look into this,
anyway"
When DR.. Dienich entered room 426
he thought he must have made mis-
take. Five or six young women were
seated before as many desks, gathering
away on typewriters at a tremendous
\ rate. Two others were apparently sort
ing letters in alphabetical order at a
long table, while a boy read addresses
from a long slip to sharp-featured
man, who entered them in a book and
, called them back to the boy in high
pitched, monotonous tone of voice. 1t
was a scene of more than ordinary
business activity, and DR.. Dienich, look
ing thereon and concluding that no.
body connected with that establish
4 ,nent was likely to have snap, was
about to back out, when the sharp
featured man broke off in the middle
of an address, and with winning smile
asked what he could do for him.
II called to see about an ADVERTISE
ment in this mornings paper" said DR..
Dienich, hesitatingly.
- "Certainly," said the sharp-featured
man, reassuringly. ''That's all right;
you want to see our Mr.. Blevins. I'll