The Road to Wellville by T.C. Boyle Page A

step, the Doctor couldn’t get the smell of him out of his nostrils, a sick working stench of mold and fermentation, of grease, bodily functions and filth. He smelled like a garbage scow. Worse: a meat wagon. “Lightbody, of course,” the Doctor exclaimed. “And how is your, uh, condition? Neurasthenia, isn’t it? And autointoxication? Yes? Combating both, I trust. Winning the battle of biologic living, eh?”
    He made as if to withdraw his hand, but Eleanor held him fast. “I know we’re supposed to think positively, Doctor, and I know you’re going to do wonders for him, for both of us, but I’ll tell you—I must tell you,” and here Eleanor’s voice dropped as she leaned confidentially toward the Doctor, “my husband is a very sick man.”
    “Well, yes,” the Doctor said, “of course, of course he is,” and suddenly he was his old self, a magneto of energy, sparks flying from his fingertips, the grand leonine head wagging majestically on his shoulders. “You’ve come to the right place, young man,” he said, disengaging himself from the wife to pump Will Lightbody’s limp and skeletal hand.
    All around them the room glowed with a cairn eupeptic health. Life, promise and progress burgeoned in every corner, from the gaggle of milk-sippingmillionaires lounging against the Corinthian columns to the tranquil uncorseted grandes dames, marchesas and housewives gliding in and out of the Palm Garden. The banana tree, in all its exotic glory, could be seen through the high arched portal, rising up from a thatch of palm, succulent and orchid in defiance of latitude and season alike, centerpiece of the Doctor’s own private jungle.
    Ignoring George—he could just cool his heels a minute—the Doctor turned to his secretary. “Mr. Dab, I want you to fetch a wheelchair for this gentleman and have Dr. Linniman see to him this evening. And the very best of your attendants—Murphy, find Murphy, will you? And Graves. I want Mr. Lightbody to have every comfort,” he went on, expansive, sagacious, the intrepid man of healing for whom no case was beyond hope, no colon too clogged, no stomach too sour, “and I’ll want to examine him personally first thing in the morning.”
    Eleanor fixed him with a look of surprise. The husband fidgeted. “Personally?” she echoed. A rare gift had been dropped in her lap, a boon from the gods. “But Doctor, that’s too kind of you … we know how very busy you are, and—”
    “You’ve suffered a great loss,” the Doctor began hesitantly, almost in the way of a fortuneteller or swami, but then his memory—that ironclad infallible airtight faculty that had held him in good stead all these many years—began to coil round the facts of the case.
Lightbody, Eleanor. Caucasian, female. Twenty … twenty-eight years of age. Peterskill, New York. Neurasthenia, autointoxication, loss of child.
Yes, yes, that was it. “Nothing can rectify that, I know, and you have—and will always have—my deepest regret and sympathy, both of you. But you must go on, and scientific eating and rest and fresh air will restore you, just as surely as it’s restored hundreds upon hundreds before you. You’ll see.” He paused, gazing into the wife’s eyes, deciding something. “And I’ll be supervising your case personally, too, my dear, of course I will.”
    A geyser of excitement seemed to shoot through her. Her lips trembled and her cheeks flushed; for a moment, the Doctor was afraid she was going to drop to her knees. “Oh, Doctor, Doctor,” she cried, and it was a chant, a prayer, a hosanna of thanksgiving and joy.
    He waved his hand: it was nothing. And now he turned to the husband. “And I can see that you’re suffering, young man—I can see it inthe sallowness of your skin, in the whites of your eyes, and, and—” Here he suddenly reached out, took hold of Will Lightbody by the lips and forced his fingers into his mouth like a horse trader. “Yes, yes, say ‘ah’… the coated