THE TENTH TOE

By Doc Holliday

(transcribed by F. Paul Wilson)

 

 

I am thirty-five years old and will not see thirty-six.

I was not always this weak, wheezing, crumbling sack of bones you see before you, a man whose days can be numbered on the fingers of one hand. Nor was I always the hard-drinking gambler and shootist you read of in the penny dreadfuls. I started out a much more genteel man, a professional man, even a bit of a milquetoast.

I attended medical school but did not succeed there, so I became a matriculant at a nearby dental school, from which I managed to graduate. I was then a professional man, and proud of it. But I remained flawed—cursed with a larcenous heart. No amount of schooling, be it of the medical, dental, or (I dare say) divinity sort, can extract that stubborn worm. You are born with it, and you die with it, if not from it.

I am dying from it. It was that young professional man with the larcenous heart who led me to notoriety, and to this premature death from consumption.

Allow me to explain . . .

 

 

The first inkling I had of the curse was in the spring of 1878 while I was examining Mrs. Duluth.

Mrs. Duluths husband owned the Dodge City General Store and it was obvious (at least to me) that food was not in short supply on her supper table. She was fat. Truthfully, I have been in outhouses smaller than this woman. Everything about her was fat. Her face was fat and round like a huge honeydew melon. Her lips were thick and fat. Even her nose and ears were fat.

"Will this hurt?" she said as she lay back, overflowing my relatively new reclining dental chair. I hoped she wouldn't break its lift mechanism.

"Not a bit," I told her. "After all, this is 1878, not the Dark Ages. We are now blessed with the modern methods of painless dentistry."

"What do you plan to do?"

"I'm going to administer some sulfuric ether," I heard myself say. "And when you're unconscious, I'm going to rob you."

I saw her eyes widen and she must have seen mine do the same. I hadn't meant to say that. True, I had been thinking it, but I'd had no intention of verbalizing it.

"What. . . what did you say, Dr. Holliday?"

"I said I'm going to rob you. Just a little. I'll go through your purse and take some of your money. Not all of it. Just enough to make this exercise worth my while."

"I really don't think that's very funny, Doctor," she said.

I gulped and steadied myself with an effort. "Neither do I, Mrs. Duluth." And I meant it. What was coming over me? Why was I saying these things? "A joke. A dentist's joke. Sorry."

"I should hope so." She seemed somewhat mollified. "Now, about this tooth—"

"Who cares about that tooth. I'm interested in the third molar there with the big gold filling. I'm going to pop that beauty out and replace it with some garbage metal that looks like gold."

(What was I saying?)

"That is quite enough!" she said, rolling out of the chair. She straightened her enormous gingham dress and headed for the door.

"Mrs. Duluth! Wait! I—"

"Never mind! I'll find myself another dentist! One I can trust. Like that new fellow across the street!"

As she went down the steps, she slapped at my shingle, knocking it off one of its hooks. It swung and twisted at a crazy angle until I stepped out and rehung it.

 

 

JOHN HENRY HOLLIDAY, DDS Painless Dentistry

 

 

I loved that sign. It was making me rich. I could have made a good living just from the usual drilling, filling, and pulling of my patients' teeth, but that was not enough for my larcenous heart. I had to be rich\ And I was getting rich quickly from the gold I was mining—literally—from my patients' teeth. I'd found an excellent gold-like compound that I substituted for the real thing while they were out cold in the chair. It was nowhere near as good as gold, but no one had caught on yet. I had another couple of years before the replacement fillings started to fall apart.

Of course, my practice wouldn't last a couple of years if I treated all my patients like Mrs. Duluth. Luckily the waiting room had been empty. I closed the door behind her and stood there thinking. I admit I was somewhat shaken. What was wrong with me? I hadn't meant to say any of those things.

A short while later the widow Porter arrived with her daughter, Bonnie, who had a toothache.

Bonnie was sixteen and extremely buxom for her age. Her bosom was apparently growing at such a rate that the bodice of her dress could not keep pace. She was fairly bursting from it. The tortured seams appeared ready to split. From the way she carried herself, proudly erect with her bust thrust out at the world, I assumed that she was well aware of (and reveled in) the male gender's reaction to her proportions.

Bonnie had a cavity in her second lower left molar. As I leaned over her to examine the tooth more closely, she arched her back so that her breasts brushed against my arm. I straightened and looked at her. She stared back and smiled boldly. This was one of the most brazen young females I'd ever met! I was becoming (I hesitate to say it) aroused.

Teenaged girls were never my style. They tend to fall in love, which can be most inconvenient. But for a young thing of Bonnie's proportions, I realized that I might make an exception.

"She'll need a filling," I told her mother.

"Oh, dear!" the widow Porter said. "You mean you'll have to use the drill?"

"The drill?" Bonnie said, the simper suddenly gone out of her. "The drill?”

"Yes." I lifted the instrument from its hook and pumped the pedal to show her how the bit spun.

Her expression was horrified. "You're going to put that in my mouth?"

"Yes. But I'd really—"

I could feel my tongue starting to run off without me, but I refused to let it get away this time. I bit down to hold it in place but it broke free.

"—like to put something else in your mouth, if you know what I mean."

Not again! I seemed utterly helpless against this!

"Really?" Bonnie said, smiling again and thrusting her breasts out even further. "Like what?"

I wanted to shove my fist down my throat. Bonnie's mother, I could see, was thinking along similar lines.

The widow Porter shot to her feet and thrust her face to within an inch of mine.

“What did you say?"

I tried to pacify her.

"I'm sorry, Mrs. Porter. Perhaps you misunderstood me. Sometimes I don't make myself clear."

She backed off a little. Good. She was listening—even better. I knew I could smooth this over if my mouth would only let me. Just as her face began to soften, I felt my lips begin to move. I could do nothing but listen.

"What I really meant to say was that I'd like to drill her with a special tool I keep buttoned in my pants. As a matter of fact, I'd like to use it on both of you."

"Scoundrel!" she cried, and swung her heavy purse at me, missing my face by a fraction of an inch. "Bounder!"

She grabbed Bonnie by the hand and yanked her from the room. The girl flashed me a smile and a lascivious wink on the way out.

Sweating and gasping, I slumped against the door. I had lost control of my voice! Every thought that flashed into my brain was going straight out my mouth! What was wrong with me?

I was glad it was a slow day. I went to my office and poured two fingers of bourbon from the bottle I kept in the bottom drawer. I downed it in a single swallow. I looked at my framed degree from dental school hanging on the wall. I had counted on becoming wealthy here in Dodge. Now I was ruining it.

When I heard the front door open, I hesitated going out. It was frightening not to be able to control your words. But I had to defeat this malady. I had to overcome it by sheer force of will. I forced myself into the anteroom.

It was empty. I went into the drilling room and I found a familiar figure sitting in the chair. We played draw poker most nights over at the Forty- Niner Saloon. I wouldn't say we were friends in the truest sense of the word, but I was the closest thing he had to a friend besides his brother.

Wyatt Earp slouched in the chair, helping himself to my nitrous oxide.

Wyatt giggled. "Got a toothache, Doc!"

"Don't overdue that sweet air, Wyatt," I said. "I have to send all the way to Chicago for more."

The smile wavered off and on again. "You'll be going to Chicago and staying there if you try anymore funny business with Miss Bonnie Porter."

I remembered then that Wyatt had been keeping company with the widow Porter lately.

"I never touched her!"

"But you said some lewd and obscene things that I'd jail you for if you weren't a friend. She's a fine example of young Kansas womanhood and should not be exposed to such behavior."

"She's a tease waiting to blossom into a tart," I said.

Wyatt looked at me with a strange expression. He wanted to frown but the nitrous oxide wouldn't let him.

"I won't have you speak that way about the daughter of a woman for whom I harbor deep feelings."

"You harbor deep feelings for the daughter and you don't want anyone to get to Bonnie before you! And as for the widow Porter, your only deep feelings are for her bank account!"

His half-smile finally disappeared. "Hey, now wait a minute, Doc. I really love that woman!"

I laughed. "You must think I'm as stupid as you are!"

(What was I saying? Wyatt had four inches and a good hundred pounds over me! I wanted to vomit!)

"I think you might be a stupid dead man, Doc, if you don't watch what you're saying," he said menacingly as he straightened up from the chair.

I tried to stop myself but couldn't. My mouth ran on.

"Come on, Wyatt. You're fleecing her."

"It's true that I'm allowing her to invest in a couple of the mines that I own, but as a peace officer, I resent your implication that I'm involved in anything illegal."

"You're a disgrace to the badge, Wyatt. People laugh at you—behind your back, of course, because they know if they get on your wrong side they'll wind up in jail on some trumped-up charge, or backshot by your brother Virgil!"

He was stepping toward me, his right hand balled into a fist. I broke out in cold sweat and felt my bladder try to empty. I probably could have stopped him there with a few rational words, or even a quick confession of abject fear. I actually felt the words forming in my mouth as he raised his arm to punch me—

—and that was when the odor hit me.

Standing helpless before him as he loomed over me, I listened in horror as my voice said:

"God! You smell, too! Did it ever occur to you to take a bath before—?”

When I woke up on the floor, Wyatt was gone. I staggered to my feet. My jaw ached and my upper lip was swelling. When the room stopped tilting back and forth, I stumbled into the waiting room.

This was a nightmare! If I kept insulting everyone who came to my office, I'd have to close my practice. What would I do? I was already twenty-six and not good for much else besides gambling and shooting. I wasn't a bad shot. Maybe I could take over Earp's job when he left for Tombstone next year.

An odd-looking figure entered then. A skinny old squaw with a hooked nose and dark, piercing eyes set in a face wrinkled like a raisin. That was all I could see of her. The rest of her was swathed in a dusty serape. There was a small red kerchief around her head.

I knew her. Everybody in town knew her: Squaw Jones. She'd been married to an old white man, Aaron Jones, until he got drunk and trampled by a stagecoach a few years ago. Now she wandered in and out of town, selling charms and potions.

"I see Dr. Holliday has bad times," Squaw Jones said. "What is problem?"

"That's what I'm supposed to say!" I shouted. "I'm the doctor here!"

"Is your words? You say what wish to hide inside?"

I was shocked. "Yes! How did you know?"

"Squaw smell bad medicine when she pass."

"Bad medicine?" "You have curse."

"I am well aware of that!"

"Squaw Jones can help. Know of these things. You victim of curse of Untethered Tongue. Very bad medicine."

"You're serious? You're talking about a curse, like the evil eye or something like that?"

"Much worse."

"I feel bad enough already. Don't try to make me feel stupid, too!"

"You will see, Dr. Holliday," she said, reaching for the door handle. "You will see. And then you will come to Squaw Jones."

"I sincerely doubt it."

"Remember these words. When find man with missing piece, you find enemy."

"I haven't got any enemies!"

"It could be friend."

"I haven't got any of those, either! At least not after this morning!"

"Remember Squaw Jones," she said as she shuffled out the door. "You will need her."

That'll be the day, I thought. I didn't need an Indian. I needed another drink.

 

 

* * *

 

The next few days recapitulated the events of that morning: I insulted and alienated each member of a steadily dwindling flow of patients. But at least no one punched me.

As I sat and looked out the front window of my empty waiting room, I noticed Mrs. Duluth waddling along the boardwalk. She turned into the doorway of the new dentist who had come into town a few months ago. Dr. James Elliot. He had been starving. Now he had Mrs. Duluth. Glumly, I wondered how many other patients I was driving to him.

The waiting room door opened and there was Squaw Jones again.

"Squaw can come in?"

I motioned her forward. Why not? I had plenty of time on my hands.

Squaw Jones looked the same as she had days ago—a stick figure swathed in a dirty serape. Her bright, beady eyes swept the barren waiting room. I thought I detected a hint of a smile at the corners of her mouth, but it was hard to be sure amid all her wrinkles.