The Clarion | Page 3

ferocity.
Presently the line of purchasers thinned out. The Vitalizing Mixture
had exhausted its market. But only part of the crowd had contributed to
the levy. Mainly it was the men, whom the "spiel" had lured. Now for
the women. The voice, the organ of a genuine artist, took on a new
cadence, limpid and tender.
"And now, we come to the sufferings of those who bear pain with the
fortitude of the angels. Our women-folk! How many here are hiding
that dreadful malady, cancer? Hiding it, when help and cure are at their
beck and call. Lady," he bent swiftly to the slattern under the torch and
his accents were a healing effluence, "with my soothing, balmy oils,
you can cure yourself in three weeks, or your money back."
"I do' know haow you knew," faltered the woman. "I ain't told no one
yet. Kinder hoped it wa'n't thet, after all."
He brooded over her compassionately. "You've suffered needlessly.

Soon it would have been too late. The Vitalizing Mixture will keep up
your strength, while the soothing, balmy oils drive out the poison, and
heal up the sore. Three and a half for the two. Thank you. And is there
some suffering friend who you can lead to the light?"
The woman hesitated. She moved out to the edge of the crowd, and
spoke earnestly to a younger woman, whose comely face was scarred
with the chiseling of sleeplessness.
"Joe, he wouldn't let me," protested the younger woman. "He'd say 't
was a waste."
"But ye'll be cured," cried the other in exaltation. "Think of it. Ye'll
sleep again o' nights."
The woman's hand went to her breast, with a piteous gesture. "Oh, my
God! D'yeh think it could be true?" she cried.
"Accourse it's true! Didn't yeh hear whut he sayed? Would he dast
swear to it if it wasn't true?"
Tremulously the younger woman moved forward, clutching her shawl
about her.
"Could yeh sell me half a bottle to try it, sir?" she asked.
The vender shook his head. "Impossible, my dear madam. Contrary to
my fixed professional rule. But, I'll tell you what I will do. If, in three
days you're not better, you can have your money back."
She began painfully to count out her coins. Reaching impatiently for
his price, the Professor found himself looking straight into the eyes of
the well-dressed stranger.
"Are you going to take that woman's money?"
The question was low-toned but quite clear. An uneasy twitching beset
the corners of the professional brow. For just the fraction of a second,
the outstretched hand was stayed. Then:--

"That's what I am. And all the others I can get. Can I sell you a bottle?"
Behind the suavity there was the impudence of the man who is a little
alarmed, and a little angry because of the alarm.
"Why, yes," said the other coolly. "Some day I might like to know
what's in the stuff."
"Hand up your cash then. And here you are--Doctor. It is 'Doctor,' ain't
it?"
"You've guessed it," returned the stranger.
[Illustration: HELP AND CURE ARE AT THEIR BECK AND
CALL.]
At once the platform peddler became the opportunist orator again.
"A fellow practitioner, in my audience, ladies and gentlemen; and
doing me the honor of purchasing my cure. Sir," the splendid voice rose
and soared as he addressed his newest client, "you follow the noblest of
callings. My friends, I would rather heal a people's ills than determine
their destinies."
Giving them a moment to absorb that noble sentiment, he passed on to
his next source of revenue: Dyspepsia. He enlarged and expatiated
upon its symptoms until his subjects could fairly feel the grilling at the
pit of their collective stomach. One by one they came forward, the
yellow-eyed, the pasty-faced feeders on fried breakfasts, snatchers of
hasty noon-meals, sleepers on gorged stomachs. About them he wove
the glamour of his words, the arch-seducer, until the dollars fidgeted in
their pockets.
"Just one dollar the bottle, and pain is banished. Eat? You can eat a
cord of hickory for breakfast, knots and all, and digest it in an hour.
The Vitalizing Mixture does it."
Assorted ills came next. In earlier spring it would have been pneumonia

and coughs. Now it was the ailments that we have always with us:
backache, headache, indigestion and always the magnificent promise.
So he picked up the final harvest, gleaning his field.
"Now,"--the rotund voice sunk into the confidential, sympathetic
register, yet with a tone of saddened rebuke,--"there are topics that the
lips shrink from when ladies are present. But I have a word for you
young men. Young blood! Ah, young blood, and the fire of life! For
that we pay a penalty. Yet we must not overpay the debt. To such as