He found himself glad that the hour of Abbott’s visit had arrived, for once he knew what it was all about—if indeed Abbott really wanted him—he could quit his worrying and get down to business. The worry and the wonderment, he knew, had interfered with business—like that matter of Ted Brown’s symptoms that had shouted diabetes but had turned out finally not to be diabetes. That had been damned embarrassing, even though Ted, an old and valued friend, had been nice about it. Nice, perhaps, because he was so relieved he was not diabetic.
That was the trouble, he told himself, sitting behind his desk and listening with only half an ear to Abby’s departing chatter: all his patients were old and valued friends. He could no longer be objective; he bled for all of them. They came in, sick to death, and looked at him with trusting eyes because they knew in their secret hearts that good old Doc could help them. And when he couldn’t help them, when there was no one on God’s green earth who could help them, they died, forgiving him with the trust still in their eyes. That was the hell of family practice, that was the torture of being a country doctor in a little town—holding the trust of people who had no reason to trust you.
“I’ll be coming in again,” Abby said. “I been coming here for years and you always help me. I tell all my friends that I am lucky in my doctor.”
“That’s kind of you to say.”
If they were all like Abby, it wouldn’t be so bad. For with her, there was nothing wrong at all. She was a tough old woman who would outlive them all. The only thing wrong with her was a tendency to secrete an enormous amount of ear wax which required occasional irrigation. But the evident fact of sound, good health did not in the least deter the imaginary ills which brought her regularly to the office.
Rising to open the door for her, Benton wondered what she got from her regular visits, and thought he knew: fuel for conversation with her friends at the bridge table or with her neighbors across the backyard fence.
“Now you take care of yourself,” he told her, putting into his voice a medical concern for which there was no need.
“I always do,” she chirped in her bird-like old woman’s voice. “If there’s anything wrong, I’ll come straight to you.”
“Doctor,” said Nurse Amy, hastening to guide Abby out, “Mr. Abbott has been waiting for you.”
“Please send him in,” said Benton.
Abbott was younger than Benton had expected him to be and not half as handsome. He was, in fact, a rather ugly-looking man—which explained, Benton thought, why the dust jackets of his books had not flaunted his photograph.
“I’ve looked forward to meeting you,” Benton said, “and I don’t mind telling you I’ve done some wondering at what brought you here. Surely there are other men.”
“Very few,” said Abbott, “like Dr. Arthur Benton. Surely you are aware that you are one of a dying breed. Not many medical men today are willing to devote their lives to a small community such as this.”
“I’ve not regretted it,” Benton replied. “The folks are good to me.”
He waved Abbott to a chair and pulled another for himself from against the wall, not going back behind his desk.
“When I phoned you,” Abbott said, “I couldn’t very well explain. This is something that calls for face-to-face talk. Over the phone what I have to say would have made no sense at all. And I’m anxious that you understand what I am getting at because I’ll be seeking your cooperation.”
“Certainly. If I can help, I will.”
“I came here for several reasons,” Abbott explained. “You’re in family practice and must work with a broad spectrum of the population. You must deal with a variety of illnesses and disabilities, unlike the specialist, who sees only certain cases and usually only those patients who can afford his fees. One other matter—at one time you were in epidemiology. And then there is a matter of geography, as well.”
Benton smiled. “You have done a good workup on me. For several years, early on, I was an epidemiologist with the National Health people. But I came to realize the field was all too theoretical for me. I wanted to work with individuals.”
“You came to the right place to do it,” said Abbott.
“What’s this business about geography?” Benton asked. “What’s geography got to do with it?”
“I’m trying to track down an epidemic,” Abbott said. “There may be a lot of factors involved.”
“You can’t be serious. There’s no epidemic here or anywhere else I know of. Not even in India or the underdeveloped countries. Hunger, of course, but …”
“I’m fresh from months of burrowing through statistics,” said Abbott, “and I can assure you there is an epidemic. A hidden epidemic. You’ve seen it yourself. I am sure you have. But it’s been coming on so gradually and so undramatically that it has made no impression on you. A lot of little things that slipped by unnoticed. More people gaining weight—in some cases, very rapidly. That, by the way, may explain some of the faddish diets that are popping up. Wide variance in blood sugar levels—”
“Wait a minute,” said Benton. “I had a patient just last week, and would have sworn he had diabetes.”
Abbott nodded. “That’s part of what I’m talking about. If you go back in your records, you’ll probably find similar instances, perhaps not so dramatic as to suggest diabetes. But you’ll find minor symptoms. I can tell you what else you’ll find: More people feeling groggy, irritable, looking bleary-eyed. An increase in obesity. A lot of complaints about sore and aching muscles. People not feeling well—nothing specifically wrong with them, nothing you can put your finger on, but just not feeling well. A lot of people with no pep, a general tiredness, a loss of interest. Fifty years ago, you would have been prescribing tonic or sulfur and molasses to clear up the blood—thinning out the blood, I believe, was how they put it.”
“Well, I don’t know … the symptoms somehow sound familiar. But an epidemic?”
“If you’d seen the statistics I have seen,” Abbott said, “you’d agree it’s an epidemic. It’s happening all over the country, perhaps all over the world.”
“Okay, granting you are right—which I don’t—why did you come here? You said you wanted my cooperation. How could I possibly help?”
“By keeping your eyes open. By thinking about what I’ve just told you. You’re not the only one I’m seeing. I am talking to a number of other doctors, most of them in family practice. I will be asking them to do the same thing as I am asking you—observe, think about it, perhaps pick up a clue here and there.”
“But why us? There are specialists.”
“Look, Doctor,” said Abbott, “how many people go to a specialist because they’re feeling all beat out or have aching muscles or for most of the other things we have been talking about?”
“Not many, I would suppose.”
“That’s right. But they come running to good old Doc, bellyaching because they aren’t up to par, figuring he’ll pull a miracle out of his hat and fix them up.”
“How about the disease-prevention people in Atlanta?” Benton asked.
“That’s where I got some of my statistics,” Abbott told him. “Some of the people there agree with me that there may be an epidemic, although I don’t think any of them take it too seriously. Most of them think I’m trying to cook up another sensational book. Not that any of my books were sensational, but there are some doctors who think they are. The trouble with Atlanta is that they deal solely with data. What this job takes is field work. I need people like you, aware of the situation, looking at their patients and asking themselves questions, trying to see patterns. Not spending a lot of time at it, of course, for none of you will have the time, but keeping the problem there in the back of the mind. What I should like some months from now, if you are willing, are your impressions. Maybe then, with some input from a number of family doctors who see a lot of people representing a broad socio-economic range, it will be possible to pull together some sort of general picture of what is happening.”