The Fourth Case, Continued.

A light rap came about the door. Dr.P deftly turned off the machine and strode to the entrance of his cabin. In the darkness he barely made out the face of the first mate, whom he kept at bay by opening the door only enough to peer out of. The first mate’s face was flushed and damp with sweat. “The, the captain, sir. He’s calling for you. you see he has taken a turn for the worst, its his fever you see.”

“how long has he been ill? I was never informed about this.”

“Just since this morning, sir.” The mate wiped his face with his bare hand, “You see that’s why he didn’t come show you to your room and all himself, otherwise he would, the captain is such a fine and good-“

“I don’t want to hear his eulogy just yet, “ the dr. interrupted, “ Leave me alone and let me gather my instruments, I will tend to the captain myself.”

The muffled cries of gratitude from the first mate came from behind the closed door as the doctor put various implements into his black leather bag. Unnamed, some uninvnented instruments in immaculate steel and bleached bone. Teeth and stone, these few were actual artifacts, they had been pilfered from an exhibition of the arcane in London. The doctor had attended as a personal guest of Lord Whitechild. In the exhibition hall during a long intermission, the Lady Whitechild had been so enamored by the doctor’s profundity and wit, she never noticed that amid his grand gestures the artifacts had disappeared into his waistcoat. How well they had served him, this one in particular he called his monkey’s fist if a monkey had been born with razors on its knuckles and teeth between it’s fingers. And it’s companion he named the devil’s centipede, which was obvious to whoever had looked at it. He utilized them once to remove an infected appendix from an honest to goodness pygmy chieftain who had such surprising strength that he had to be held down by four jungle guides.

The sea had begun to grow restless.

A splash of saltwater met the doctor’s face as he exited onto the deck.

Several men were batting down in preparation for a great storm, and the ship herself swayed uneasily.

Dr.P found the captain lying in his bed surrounded by several young attendants who saw to it that he was fanned sufficiently, one was applying a compress to the captain’s chest.

Another one was rubbing his feet with oils smelling strongly of clove and cardamom.

In one motion, the doctor made a full stride around the room and ushered everyone out as to leave him alone with the captain.

The door was quietly closed and locked.

“This.. this malady, has gotten a hold on me so profoundly..” The captain raised a fist so frailly that the doctor placed his hand gingerly on it to guide it back beneath the covers.

“You can, I know you can cure me..”, the captain continued, “I know you are a, compassionate man.” His eyes began to roll into his head as he suffered another spasm of pain.

“Yes, of course, rest assured” The doctor pulled the blanket over the captain’s chest.

“I only ask one thing from you, my captain” Dr.P leaned close to the captain’s ear and despite them being alone in the room, spoke in hushed tones. “I only ask that you give yourself, your sickened state up to me. Unconditionally. That as long as you are under my care you surrender yourself. Is that clear?”

The captain said nothing, he only grasped the doctor’s hand as feebly as he could and nodded his head spitting out “..Yes…yes, I do. Yes, its all..”

He did not speak again after that, but slipped into an exhausted hibernation lulled no doubt by the assurance that his life was in competent hands.

Working swiftly the doctor had at the ready the tools he needed. “What I require today is very simple, you need only lay very still while I draw up a phial of blood.”

He was unsure if the captain even heard his request.

After withdrawing the needle, the doctor quickly retreated back to his quarters.

After being scrutinized under proper medical equipment,

The sample of blood and tissue from the captain was placed upon a special mirror and put upon the doctor’s motorized wheel.

The fragile apparatus also equipped with various mirrors, was placed gently upon the spinning wheel, over the dish of the captain’s granted samples.

The doctor activated his machine again, and he stood against the wall, naked.

What happened next was no surprise, the invading organisms that were present in the captain’s blood were plentiful and they had the upper hand. We never expected him to have a chance, after all, the doctor reflected.

In the dark the contents of the petri dish was projected over the doctor’s body via the light and mirrors in the spinning contraption. The germs writhed and undulated across the walls, as if sensing danger, panicked. All over the small cabin cavorting organisms played and spun, and fucked themselves and split in two, they ate one another. In time the doctor could feel it, the taste of devouring your brother cell, yourself, the feeling of being split right down the middle and becoming two. As I swim among them, as the water around the ship can not be discerned from the water inside my body and brain and looking out, the boat is still and the sea is moving beneath us, so is the disease still and the ship moving around it.

The doctor in his state as disease digested this vision and split it in twine, and again, spreading it to be absorbed. He knew diseases well; he knew their motives, their tactics.

He knew what has never been taught, what cannot be conveyed in textbooks. He knew this disease’s granddaddy and probably introduced it to its grandma.

And he knew the one thing that this or any disease had never known; FEAR.

No single disease has the capacity of being afraid, the doctor sought to change that. Not to make it afraid of its host, that would inevitably eradicate the disease all together, but to give it that which would make it a real formidable enemy once and for all.

The doctor let the disease spin through the night.

In the morning, having drawn the sample back into a hypodermic needle, returned to the Captain’s quarters.

Again he ushered the servants out, Dr.P reassured Captain Prescott; “I think your suffering will, take a turn. Very soon.”

The sample, once reintroduced into the captain went to work very quickly. The doctor sat in a chair opposite the bed and watched the process. As the captain began to convulse, Dr.P was mixing a drink from the liquor cart, pouring in the remains of a paregoric elixir into his brandy. He took out a handkerchief and listlessly wiped a few drops of blood that had landed on his cheek. The doctor put another bottle of paregoric into his pocket and left. Not yet inside his own cabin, the urgent footsteps of a dozen deck hands quick to answer the captain’s cries of pain. But they hadn’t a chance. The captain was wrapped in his bed sheet and already out the window. He who could barely lift up his head today was climbing the mainsail with the strength of a rutted baboon.

The very moment he reached the top, he went down, as if wanting to climb higher and simply ran out of pole.

And what of the doctor? He commandeered himself the choicest of lifeboats, loaded with baggage, mostly his own. He rowed silently, puffing away at the captain’s best tobacco. The saint Agnes grew smaller before him. He was no fool; he was not about to be left to explain an empty, unmanned vessel pulling into harbor.