Cherry Ames 22 Rural Nurse (12 page)

Fine, I’ll be there in fi ve minutes.” They sat on the porch so as not to disturb Aunt Cora. The rain had stopped and the moon shone. In low voices they discussed their diffi culties in fi nding a sample of the remedy for the Food and Drug man.

“Did he come today?” Cherry asked.

“Someone is coming tomorrow.” Hal sighed. “Federal Food and Drug in Des Moines wanted to send a man who’s versatile and skilled enough for this case, and that would be their resident inspector, a Mr. Collinge.

But
he’s
away on offi cial business.”

“Oh, no,” Cherry groaned.

“Oh, yes. However,” Hal said, “I was advised not to wait for him, but to get in touch with the next nearest resident inspector. He’s in Omaha, a Mr. Short. I fi nally was able to make contact with him at his home in Omaha this evening. And
he
promised to be in Sauk tomorrow.”

“Thank goodness!” Cherry said. “Is he fl ying?”

“Driving. It’s fastest because most direct. He has a staff car. He said he’d start tomorrow morning at six, and arrive around two in the afternoon.

“Now look, Cherry.” Hal leaned forward, thinking.

“I’d like to be able to tell Mr. Short where the drug is being manufactured, or distributed from, and fi nd him a sample of it. Seems to me that you and I ought
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to hunt up the pedlar at his shack in the woods and try to buy a jar of that concoction from him—that is, if he’d sell it to us. And maybe, for all we know, Snell or someone else is making the remedy at the shack, or distributing it from there.”

“Yes, we might at least learn something at the shack,” Cherry agreed. “We’d have time to go there before the Food and Drug man arrives at two.”

“Where in the woods does Snell live?”

“Somewhere around Muir, I heard,” Cherry said.

They compared notes and found they both had patients to see tomorrow morning not far from Muir.

They arranged to meet each other around ten thirty the next morning at the Muir grocery store, and fi t in the visit to the pedlar between their professional calls.

The rain started again the next day. As she made her rounds Cherry found the farm families worried about the heavy showers.

“ ’Course, it’s the twenty-fi rst of September, so we’re due for fall rains,” one farmer said to her. “But my Indian corn and oats are going to be ruined if this rain don’t let up.”

Cherry hoped the rain would not delay the Food and Drug inspector.

A little before ten thirty Cherry drove on to the village of Muir and waited in the general store for Dr. Hal.

As she waited, she sat on a box and chatted with the storekeeper who was willing enough to talk about Old Snell.

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“That old backwoods character!” the storekeeper said. “He cuts into my business a little bit, with the wild berries and salad greens he gathers. But his main business is herbs. He says he got the folklore from his ancestors. Some folks call him a regular old time herb doctor.”

“Is he?” Cherry asked. “Maybe Old Snell was the one who concocted the ginseng remedy.”

“
I
wouldn’t put any faith in a herb quack like him.

I heard he concocts a brew of toadskins and cherry wine.” The storekeeper made a face. “Though some folks believe he has a lot of old fashioned know-how about herbs. Been living in the woods by himself, all these years, so they fi gure he’s bound to’ve learned something.”

Cherry shrugged. “How can he learn about medicine out in the woods? It takes years of study and training.”

“Exactly so! It’s just as well for everybody’s health that Snell only peddles now and then.”

“He’s a recluse?”

“Yep. A real odd character.”

“Do you know an acquaintance of mine, named Floyd Barker?” Cherry asked the storekeeper.

“Sure, everybody knows Floyd. He drifts all over the countryside. Haven’t seen much of Floyd lately, though.”

Cherry wondered why not. “Do Floyd and Old Snell ever do business together?” she asked.

“Not as far as I know of. Floyd ain’t one to work.”

“Well, do Floyd and Old Snell know each other?”
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“Pro’bly, but I can’t swear to it.” The conversation lagged. Hal arrived. He asked the storekeeper for directions to Snell’s shack.

The storekeeper told them. He was curious about what the county medical offi cer wanted with Old Snell.

Dr. Miller did a quick, terse job of health educa-tion right there in the general store. The storekeeper listened and shook his head.

“That’s awful,” he said. “I’ve known Snell a long time, but I wouldn’t shield him. I’ll pass the word along, Doc.”

“Good. Thanks.” Cherry said thanks, too, and goodbye, and went outdoors with Dr. Hal.

They decided to take Cherry’s car, since it was smaller and could negotiate the woods more easily than Hal’s heavier car. Cherry drove.

The rain had stopped. Still it was dim on this dirt road through the woods. They watched for the turn-off among the trees which led to where Old Snell lived.

The rain had washed away any tire tracks, so they could not tell whether he or anyone else had driven through recently.

After the turnoff it was slow, bumpy going along a rough trail. The woods were silent except for birds darting over their heads. Then the pedlar’s shack came into view.

“Why, it’s not much more than a woodshed,” Cherry said.

“He’s probably got it fi xed up comfortably.” 112
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The shack was dark inside. They got no answer to their repeated knocking. They tried the door. Locked.

Cherry remembered having seen the pedlar on that one occasion drive off in a ramshackle car, but his car was nowhere among these trees. Hal walked around the shack, looking in its closed windows.

“He’s not here,” Hal said. “The place is closed up and locked up. He knows we’re after him, so we’re wasting our time here.”

“Any sign that he’s making the ginseng remedy in there?” Cherry asked.

They peered in the windows. The one room was dusty and deserted. They could dimly make out a cot, kitchen chairs and table, a cookstove, a pump. Nothing more, no jars or utensils or ginseng roots.

“I still think Snell or Floyd—or whoever it is—may be making the stuff at the abandoned farmhouse,” Cherry said.

“In that case let’s stay out of there, at least until Mr. Short arrives,” Hal said.

“Why? You think whoever’s in that house may be armed?” Cherry said. She had thought of that yesterday, but had pushed the idea out of her mind.

Dr. Hal hooted at her. “What do you think? He—

or they—are building up a lucrative trade out of this Nature’s Herb Cure. One patient admitted to me it costs fi ve dollars a jar. The ginseng and eggs they put into it cost them nothing, or next to nothing. Five dollars a jar! And they’ve been selling plenty of it around here
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and across the state line in Missouri. These fellows aren’t going to let you and me stop their racket if they can help it.”

“I can’t picture that lazy, easygoing Floyd being armed,” Cherry said. “If it is Floyd.”

“He owns a shotgun for hunting, doesn’t he?” Hal reminded her. Cherry nodded. “Probably the pedlar does, too. You know, I haven’t yet met this Floyd. Come on. Let’s get out of these woods.” Cherry took a last look at the deserted shack. “Do you suppose the pedlar’s hiding out in the old farmhouse?”

“Anything is possible. Come on. Get in the car.” Hal drove back to the grocery store where he had left his car. He wanted to stop at the Barkers’ and meet Floyd if possible. Or perhaps Jane would have some new information about Floyd. They still had plenty of time to spare before Mr. Short’s arrival, even allowing time for their patients.

Hal said to Cherry, as he drove, “Maybe we should leave it to the Food and Drug man to search the abandoned farmhouse. He’s a specially trained kind of detective—he’ll know better than anyone else how to obtain evidence and how to trap this medical kind of racketeer. The more I think about it, the more I feel we should leave it to experts.”

It was necessary for the Food and Drug Administration to analyze the remedy in order to determine whether it violated the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act.

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Cherry said, “For all we know, Food and Drug might inspect the old farmhouse and not fi nd a sample there, either.”

At Muir they stopped, Hal got into his car, and Cherry followed in hers. Presently they pulled up in front of the Barkers’ cottage. Floyd’s jalopy was not anywhere around.

They conferred for a moment before going in. They agreed to talk with Jane privately, out in the yard.

Mrs. Barker might just repeat something to Floyd, in all innocence. Even the parrot might repeat something.

Jane told them that the old pedlar had not once come by the Barkers’ cottage with his doubtful wares.

She was puzzled about this until Cherry and Dr. Hal told her more about Old Snell. Of course the last place Snell would come would be to a friend of the doctor and nurse! Jane was relieved to hear that the Food and Drug inspector was due today. They told her this in confi dence.

“If only I could get around more,” Jane said, “I might try to locate a sample for you. This ankle slows me down so!”

She said she had requested an additional week’s leave from her job in the East. One of her job prospects here was really shaping up. “But now this trouble about the old house—” Jane shook her head. “My mother and Bill keep writing to me, asking what’s the delay about the house and farm. I can’t bring myself to tell them of this ugly trouble.”

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And Cherry could not quite bring herself to tell Jane about her scary visit yesterday to the old farmhouse.

She talked instead about Floyd, whom all three of them by now suspected. Of what, exactly? They felt he was mixed up in the medicine racket, but could not pin down their suspicions to anything tangible. Jane made a bold suggestion: confront Floyd point-blank with questions about the remedy and see how he reacted.

Take him by surprise.

Cherry and Dr. Hal objected. “Floyd would simply deny that he knew anything,” Hal said, “and then cover up every trace of his activities. Besides, we have no proof that it’s Floyd who is behind the whole thing. We don’t know who makes the drug, or where. We can’t give Food and Drug even that much of a lead.” Cherry had been watching the time. It was growing close to noon. “Excuse us, now, Jane. We have to drive back to Sauk, back to work.”

On the chance that the Food and Drug inspector might reach Sauk earlier than two p.m., Cherry and Dr. Hal returned to the county health offi ce to receive him. They had plenty of medical reports to study—

“although I’d rather be visiting patients,” Cherry fretted, “and do the paperwork some evening.” As they came in, the clerk gave Cherry a telephone message. “Would you go right over to Mrs. Grisbee’s house? She called up a little while ago and said her husband is feeling sick all of a sudden. I advised her to call Dr. Clark, but she asked for you. She thinks you can give fi rst aid, or whatever.” 116
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“I’ll go right away.” Cherry turned to Dr. Hal. “I won’t miss seeing Mr. Short, will I?”

“Don’t worry, there’s time,” Dr. Hal said. “Besides, he’ll want to see
you
.”

Cherry left the offi ce with her nursing bag. She walked the three blocks to the Grisbees’ house. Phoebe Grisbee’s huge, out-of-date car was parked in front. It always reminded Cherry of a clumsy boat or a hearse.

Phoebe Grisbee let her in and took her upstairs. She found Mr. Grisbee, in the front bedroom, nearly green in the face, sitting weakly on the bed.

“Oh-h-h, I’m sick as a billy goat!” Henry Grisbee groaned. “Sick to my stomach—throwing up—

diarrhea. I don’t know what’s come over me!” Cherry questioned him. What had he eaten? Had he taken any medicine?

“We-ell, I did give Henry some remedy late yesterday afternoon,” Mrs. Grisbee said. She wiped his forehead. “I guess I’d better tell you the truth. Somebody talked me into giving Henry a dose—just a teeny trial dose—of that Nature’s Herb Cure. I never expected it to affect him like
this
!”

“So that’s what he took. After all our warnings!” Cherry was surprised to see the fake remedy act so fast, but apparently Henry Grisbee was more suscep-tible to
Salmonella
bacteria than other individuals. He groaned that he’d taken only a few drops, but that was enough to upset him.

“Where did you get the Nature’s Herb Cure?” Cherry asked. Phoebe Grisbee fl ushed and guiltily looked
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away. “You buy things occasionally from Old Snell,” Cherry persisted. “Did you buy this concoction from him, too?”

“Well, he was here,” Mrs. Grisbee admitted. “Late yesterday afternoon, after dark.” The old pedlar had come out of hiding! And he was selling
in town
! This was the fi rst time Cherry knew that he had tackled a town with the fake remedy. He’d fi nd many more customers concentrated in Sauk than out in open country. His presence in Sauk meant the racket was spreading to a new and larger location.

Spreading! What made the old pedlar so brazen?

And how could Mrs. Grisbee, who knew better, have been so foolish as to buy and use the dangerous stuff? Cherry asked her that. Mrs. Grisbee said defensively:

“Old Snell asked me not to be prejudiced, just to try it. He’s sold me other things that’ve done me good.

I’m an old customer, and he saw that Mr. Grisbee was feeling poorly, so he gave him one little dose free. Just to try it.”

“As a favor to you,” Cherry said dryly.

“Well,
he
did
me
a favor. He left his usual route and came into Sauk especially to bring me some things I wanted.” Cherry did not believe the pedlar’s altruistic tale. “As long as he made a trip especially for me,” Mrs. Grisbee went on, “I felt I ought to buy something extra, or at least do something for him. So when he asked me just to let Henry try this Nature’s Herb Cure, I did.” Mr. Grisbee muttered, “Some favor to me!” 118
CHERRY