Her. But he was fair about
it all. He sent for the doctor. It was on this occasion that occurred
their first controversy.

The doctor did not object to the Turkish bath nor the manipulation by
the prize-fighter. "Be careful," he said, "when you come out--don't get
a chill--and it may help you. What he rubs you with won't hurt you, and
the rubbing is good in itself."

[Handwriting: illegible prescription]

"But why haven't your prescriptions made me well?" demanded Markham.

The doctor was placid. "Because we don't know enough about rheumatism
yet," he answered.

"Well, what excuse has your profession? You've been fooling about for
thousands of years and don't know yet the real cause of a common
ailment. What is rheumatism, anyhow?"

The doctor was conservative in his expression.

"It's a microbe," blurted out Markham. "I tell you it's a microbe! They
are holding congresses and town meetings and pink teas all over me!
There's a Browning Society meeting in my left knee just now, and that's
what makes the agony. How could there be such a skipping about from one
place to another, neither place diseased in itself, if there were not an
active, living agency at work? Tell me that!"

The doctor admitted that microbes might cause the trouble. But he had a
word or two to say about this individual case. There had been but a
little over three weeks of the agony. The case was a particularly bad
one, and he didn't mind admitting that the patient was particularly
intractable and doubting. Optimism had much to do with a recovery in
most cases of illness, and optimism was here lacking. But he would wager
a box of cigars that the patient was on his feet again within two weeks.
The wager was taken with great promptness, and then the patient was
loaded into a cab and sent off with the black prize-fighter.

What happened in that Turkish bath will never be told with all its
proper lurid coloring. The prize-fighter stopped at a drug store and
bought a mixture of cocoanut oil and alcohol. Markham took a bath in the
usual way, and then was taken by the demon controlling him into the
apartment for soaping and all cleansing and manipulation. Here occurred
the tragedy. One leg had become stiffened, and the prize-fighter
suddenly jumped upon it and broke it down, and Markham rolled off the
marble slab, almost fainting from the pain. Then he recovered and tried
to fight, but could do nothing, being a weak cripple, and was literally
beaten