Doctor Trumble
Edward Trumble was born and raised in a small New England town in which the population was counted in the hundreds rather than the thousands. It was a place where everyone knew not only their next-door neighbors but the families on the opposite side of town as well.
Matthias Trumble, Edward's father, was the town's sole physician, and as such he was its first line of defense against sickness. He was a family doctor, what we today would call a general practitioner. Among his many duties as healer, he was often called upon to set broken bones, suture torn flesh, alleviate cold and flu symptoms, deliver babies and relieve pain. Matthias found great personal fulfillment in being a doctor. He mattered. He touched the lives of everyone in town. The physician did his job admirably, and only his most serious cases were sent to the county hospital, which was close to twenty miles to the south.
The humble, hard-working country doctor had dedicated his life to his noble profession and to the people of the small New England town. Thankfully, his personal needs were few. He owned a modest house where he and his wife raised their son, a small collection of books that he scarcely had time to read and a fine fishing pole with complete tackle box that was stored in his basement, still unused after thirty years.
It's hard to imagine a man like Dr. Trumble in our world of HMOs, malpractice suits, hi-tech medical testing equipment and highly specialized fields of medicine. In our time, health care has become a lucrative industry. We are used to huge pharmaceutical companies that have a pill for every ailment (and a few more to counteract the drug's side effects). Our hospitals have become medical centers, part of larger health care networks.
Dr. Trumble had never heard of computerized axial tomography or magnetic resonance imaging. His tools consisted mainly of a thermometer, a blood pressure cuff, a stethoscope and an otoscope. For years, he competently combated illness and injury with aspirin, penicillin, hot compresses, alcohol baths and occasionally a purgative. He never had to deal with health insurance companies or Medicare, and he never handed a patient a formal written bill, much less an estimate of charges before treatment. In short, Matthias Trumble belonged to a bygone era, one in which physicians, lawyers, teachers, clergymen, police officers and other people in positions of authority were respected and served as role models to young and old alike.
It was no wonder then that young Edward Trumble wanted to follow in his father's footsteps.
* * *
Edward Trumble unofficially began his medical career at an early age by serving as his father's helping hand throughout his teenage years. By the time he graduated from high school, he was as skilled as any trained nurse. The autumn after graduation, Edward left the small New England town and headed for Boston, where, like his father before him, he attended college and medical school. After serving his internship and residency at a city hospital, the novice doctor went home and joined his father's medical practice.
Things were not entirely the same when Edward returned from Boston, however. The young man had a few modern ideas of his own he wanted to implement. It was a doctor's responsibility, he strongly believed, to not only treat a patient's ills but also to actively maintain his or her wellbeing. It was a concept few people in the town had ever considered: preventative medicine.
"So you're saying the best way to care for a sick person is to keep him healthy in the first place?" Mayor Hudson Deevers mused when Edward first suggested the obese politician lose some weight. "I suppose that makes sense. But wouldn't that be putting you and your father out of business by keeping people healthy?"
"We can't prevent all diseases and injuries, no matter how hard we try," the doctor explained. "Besides, my father and I will still be kept busy. Preventative medicine involves regular physical examinations and inoculations."
The mayor gave the matter some thought and then added, "I think I get it. This preventative medicine would be like the police patrolling the town, making sure crimes are not committed so that they don't have to arrest anyone."
"Yes. That's an excellent comparison, Mayor Deevers."
"And if there's no crime, we will need fewer policemen."
"You're missing the point," Edward said, sticking to the mayor's analogy. "You still need the police to deter people from committing crimes."
"Then I don't see the benefits in preventative measures. If you need police in either case, then why change things?"
"In preventing crimes, you avoid having innocent people fall victim to the criminals. Likewise, if you prevent disease, the patients avoid pain and further complications."
A glimmer of understanding shone in the mayor's eyes.
Thus the idea of preventative medicine took seed and began to grow.
* * *
As time passed, Edward assumed more of his aging father's responsibilities. Soon their roles were reversed: the younger doctor was carrying the majority of the burden of the practice, and it was his father who took up the slack.
On his sixty-fourth birthday, Dr. Trumble eyed his son with pride.
"You've done well, my boy. I can look forward to my retirement, knowing my patients will be in capable hands."
When Edward made no attempt to dissuade his father from leaving the practice, the senior Dr. Trumble naturally assumed it was a matter of a loving son wanting to see his parent get some much deserved rest and enjoy what years he had left. Sadly, such was not the case. Young Dr. Trumble wanted his father to leave the practice because he felt the older man was no longer up to the job. He had become obsolete, and Edward was glad to see him go.
The son suppressed a gloating smile of satisfaction the first time he sat at the large mahogany desk in his father's spacious office. With his elderly parent at last reading his books and making good use of his fishing tackle, Edward was the only man in town who answered to the name Dr. Trumble. He not only accepted the mantle of responsibility that came with being the only physician, he eagerly grasped at it with both hands. It was a power he had coveted for a long time.
Sadly, as was too often the case with retirement, less than a year after old Matthias stopped working, his golden years were cut short when he suffered a fatal heart attack. The town mourned his death, but few people felt a sense of loss since they now had Edward to look after them.
* * *
Unlike his father, the young doctor chose not to marry. He had no time for a wife and children since he spent the better part of his day at work. It was his office, not his home, that was Edward Trumble's castle. It was where he looked out over his kingdom and, unchecked by his father, gave in to the temptation to play God.
The first patient to fall under Dr. Trumble's scrutiny was Miss Amelia Lewes, the high school principal's teenage daughter. Amelia was a pretty girl, and although she was not the best of students, she was popular with her peers. This popularity led to an unwanted pregnancy, which in turn brought her to Dr. Trumble's office.
"I expect you and the child's father will be getting married soon," the doctor announced imperiously after he broke the unwelcome news to the sixteen-year-old girl.
"Oh, no," Amelia cried, not in the least bit embarrassed by her shameful predicament. "I don't want to get married yet, especially to .... Well, I'm too young to get married."
"Although not the best course, adoption is a suitable alternative. I can recommend a home for unwed mothers in New Jersey. You can go away, have the baby and return after it's all over. I'm sure your parents can come up with a suitable explanation for your absence."
"Thank you, Doctor, but that won't be necessary. You see, I don't want to give my baby up. My parents will help me raise the child until I'm out of school and can get a job."
Dr. Trumble was appalled by the idea. In his neat, orderly world held together by Victorian morals and old-fashioned principles, unwed mothers simply did not raise children on their own, nor was it common for women to work out of the house. Daughters and sisters were supposed to marry and care for their husbands, children and homes. Edward knew the girl's parents were more free-thinking than most of the people in town and would probably allow their daughter to keep the baby. However, he feared that, given Amelia's popularity, such a decision would be disastrous. If she were to bear and raise an illegitimate child, other girls might do the same.
That would be the first step to the moral decay of this town, the doctor thought as he envisioned a steadily growing number of unwed teenage mothers marching through his office, wanting to keep their children. I'll have to nip this problem in the bud, use a little preventative medicine.
When Amelia lost her baby two days later, neither she nor her parents suspected the good doctor had a hand in her miscarriage.
* * *
In effectively diffusing the potential teenage pregnancy crisis, Edward got his first taste of God-like power, and in a short time he hungered for more. When twenty-three-year-old Ulysses Potts, the butcher's son, began an extramarital relationship with his father's Irish housekeeper, Dr. Trumble hinted to him that the pretty young immigrant had a sexually transmitted disease. This was a blatant lie, but Mr. Potts immediately broke off the affair and swore never to stray again. When Bertha Sturgis developed a taste for strong drink, Dr. Trumble told her she had the first symptoms of liver disease and urged her to avoid alcohol. The scare tactics worked, and Mrs. Sturgis embraced temperance.
Once Dr. Trumble began interfering in the lives of his patients, he found it impossible to stop. Where he was once a benevolent sovereign benignly ruling his beloved kingdom, he was now a malignant dictator who made people adhere to his own somewhat narrow moral code.
Eventually, though, Dr. Trumble was forced to do battle with forces beyond his control. Times were changing. Modern transportation was creating a more mobile society. Some families packed up their belongings and moved out of the small New England town that had been their home since birth, and, likewise, new families moved in. For the first time in the doctor's memory there were children attending the grammar school who were not delivered by a doctor named Trumble.
Since the new residents had no long-held loyalty to either Edward or his late father, it wasn't long before a new word crept into the town's vocabulary: specialist.
The word first reared its ugly head when Mrs. Martha Durrant, a pregnant woman who had moved into town from Pawtucket, Rhode Island, wanted an obstetrician to deliver her child and a pediatrician to care for it.
It's like Amelia Lewes all over again, the small-town physician thought forebodingly. If Mrs. Durrant goes to another doctor to have her baby, so might others.
"I assure you, I'm more than capable of taking care of you during your pregnancy," Edward insisted. "I've delivered more than a hundred babies who are now my patients themselves."
But there was nothing he could do to discourage the young woman.
"Doctor, I certainly don't mean to cast any doubt on your medical skills," Martha apologized. "I'm only worried that something might go wrong. I'd feel much more comfortable if my child were delivered in a hospital."
"Young woman," the doctor countered angrily, "I've delivered breach babies and performed caesarian sections. I'm prepared for any emergency."
"Just the same," the pregnant woman insisted, "I'd prefer to see an obstetrician."
Edward managed to control his anger and maintain a professional demeanor, but on the inside he was seething with rage.
How dare Martha Durrant seek the care of a doctor from outside our town? How dare she not have complete faith in my abilities? And what if other mothers decide to follow her lead? They could all start seeing obstetricians and taking their children to a pediatrician.
What would follow would be a domino effect. Soon the townspeople—his patients—would be going to all sorts of doctors for their ailments: neurologists, dermatologists, gynecologists, cardiologists and God only knows who else. There were no doubt dozens of other ologists lurking out there, waiting to undermine his authority, steal his patients and destroy his practice.
I can't allow this to happen, he thought.
Thus, he came to the terrible but inevitable conclusion that since the young woman refused to see reason, he had no other alternative: Martha Durrant must die.
I just have to do it in a way that looks like an accident.
* * *
Dr. Trumble waited in the cover of darkness for Martha Durrant's husband, Leonardo, the town milkman, to leave the couple's house and head for the dairy. When he was sure the young woman was alone, he crept across the yard and let himself in the back door.
He brought a can of kerosene with him and proceeded to sprinkle the accelerant on the living room and kitchen floors. He then emptied the remainder of the can at the foot of the staircase that led to the bedroom upstairs. Once the fire was started, the unsuspecting mother-to-be would have no means of escape.
With a mad, sardonic grin on his perspiring face, the doctor reached for the box of matches in his pocket.
"Don't strike that."
Edward dropped the unlit match and spun around, stunned by the voice.
"Who's there?" he cried.
"Put those matches away. You don't want to kill that woman."
Edward now recognized the voice. It was the same one that had read bedtime stories to him when he was a child and then later patiently explained the need for a physician to clean his hands and sanitize his instruments.
"Father!" he exclaimed with shock. "Is it you?"
"Yes, my son," Matthias's ghost confirmed.
"You're dead. I signed the death certificate myself."
"I had to come back," the specter explained. "I have to stop you from making a terrible mistake. I suppose you would think of it as preventative medicine."
"This is no mistake. Martha Durrant must die. She'll spoil everything if she goes to a specialist. She'll destroy my practice, the same practice you started long ago, the one we've both worked so hard to maintain."
The ghost sadly shook his head.
"It's not about you and me, son, or about the practice we built. You don't become a doctor so that people will revere you or to line your pockets with money. You become a doctor to serve your fellow man."
Edward was not about to listen to reason, though. He was beyond the point of logical thinking.
"After all I've done for the people of this town, this is how they repay me. Didn't I keep them alive and well? Didn't I heal their bodies and ease their pain? Didn't I stop foolish young girls from begetting illegitimate offspring? Didn't I keep married men and women from breaking their vows and endangering their immortal souls by engaging in illicit love affairs? Didn't I stop people from ruining their lives with strong drink?"
"Yes," the father agreed. "There is no denying that you did a lot of good for the people of this town, but you also overstepped your bounds. I've repeatedly overlooked your interference in your patients' lives, but this is simply too much. I can't allow you to commit murder."
"I am a doctor and a damned talented one at that," Edward stubbornly insisted. "I must therefore do what's right for the people of this town, and that means making sure no one destroys all the good deeds I have done in the past or jeopardizes all those I can do in the future."
"By killing an innocent woman and her unborn child?"
"You were the one who told me that sometimes it is necessary to amputate a gangrenous limb."
"Yes," the father said wearily, "and that a cancer must be cut out before it can destroy the rest of the body."
Edward suddenly felt his feet burning and looked down to see that the kerosene beneath him had ignited. In a matter of moments his trousers were ablaze.
"Father!" he screamed. "Help me!"
"I'm sorry, son, but I can't, for you are the cancer that threatens the wellbeing of your patients."
* * *
Many things have changed in the town during the decades since Dr. Trumble broke under the pressures of his job and tried to murder one of his patients. After the physician's charred body was laid to rest, his house and office were put up for sale. Eventually, an enterprising developer purchased the prime corner lot and erected a multi-story professional building on the property, one that was needed to meet the demands of the ever-increasing population of the burgeoning community.
Although old Matthias would have been delighted that the new medical building was named in his honor, Edward would surely have been horrified to know that the Trumble Health Center housed fourteen doctors of various specialties, both men and women of many different nationalities who forever changed medical care as the people of the once small New England town knew it.
The picture in the upper left corner is taken from "Before the Shot" by Norman Rockwell.
Salem once played a doctor on a his favorite soap opera, "Nine Lives to Live." The producers killed him off when it was time to renegotiate his contract.
