Stories of Erskine Caldwell (31 page)

“I just had to come back this morning for another bottle,” Effie said, smiling up at Professor Eaton. “The one I took last night made me feel better than I have ever felt before in all my life. There’s not another medicine in the whole country like it, and I’ve tried them all, I reckon.”

“Pardon me, madam,” Professor Eaton said. “There are hundreds of preparations on the market today, but there is only one Indian Root Tonic. You will be doing me a great favor if you will hereafter refer to my aid-to-human-life by its true and trade-marked name. Indian Root Tonic is the name of the one and only cure for ailments of any nature. It is particularly good for the mature woman, madam.”

“You shouldn’t call me ‘madam,’ Professor Eaton,” Effie said, lowering her head. “I’m just a young and foolish girl, and I’m not married yet, either.”

Professor Eaton wiped the perspiration from his upper lip and looked down at Effie.

“How utterly stupid of me, my dear young lady,” he said. “Anyone can see by looking at your fresh young face that you are a mere girl. Indian Root Tonic is particularly good for the young maiden.”

Effie turned around to see if any of the Negroes were close enough to hear what Professor Eaton had said. She hoped that some of the women who lived on her street would walk past the corner in time to hear Professor Eaton talk like that about her.

“I never like to talk about myself, but don’t you think I am too young yet to get married, Professor Eaton?”

“My dear young lady,” he continued after having paused long enough to relight his dead cigar, “Indian Root Tonic is particularly good for the unmarried girl. It is the greatest discovery known to medical science since the beginning of mankind. I personally secured the formula for this marvelous medicine from an old Indian chief out in our great and glorious West, and I was compelled to promise him on my bended knee that I would devote the remainder of my life to traveling over this great nation of ours offering Indian Root Tonic to men and women like you who would be helpless invalids without it.”

He had to pause for a moment’s breath. It was then that he looked down over the folded top and for the first time looked at Effie face to face. The evening before in the glare of the gasoline torch, when the lot was crowded with people pushing and shoving to get to the medicine stand before the special introductory offer was withdrawn, he had not had time to look at everyone who came up to hand him a dollar for a bottle. But now when he looked down and saw Effie, he leaned forward to stare at her.

“Oh, Professor Eaton,” Effie said, “you are such a wonderful man! Just to think that you are doing such a great work in the world!”

Professor Eaton continued to stare at Effie. She was as good-looking as the next girl in town, not over thirty, and when she fixed herself up, as she had done for nearly two hours that morning before leaving home, she usually had all the drummers in town for the day staring at her and asking the storekeepers who she was.

After a while Professor Eaton climbed out of the back seat of his car and came around to the rear where she was. He relit his cold cigar, and inspected Effie more closely.

“You know, Professor Eaton, you shouldn’t talk like that to me,” she said, evading his eyes. “You really don’t know me well enough yet to call me ‘dear girl.’ This is the first time we have been alone together, and —”

“Why! I didn’t think that a beautiful young girl like you would seriously object to my honorable admiration,” he said, looking her up and down and screwing up his mouth when she plucked at her blouse. “It’s so seldom that I have the opportunity of seeing such a charming young girl that I must have lost momentarily all sense of discretion. But, now that we are fully acquainted with each other, I’m sure you won’t object to my devoted admiration. Will you?”

“Oh, Professor Eaton,” Effie said excitedly, “do you really and truly think I am beautiful? So many men have told me that before, I’m accustomed to hearing it frequently, but you are the first man to say it so thrillingly!”

She tried to step backward, but she was already standing against the rear of the car. Professor Eaton moved another step closer, and there was no way for her to turn. She would not have minded that if she had not been so anxious to have a moment to look down at her blouse. She knew there must be something wrong, surely something had slipped under the waist, because Professor Eaton had not raised his eyes from her bosom since he got out of the car and came down beside her. She wondered then if she should not have confined herself when she dressed that morning, putting on all the undergarments she wore to church on Sunday morning.

“My dear girl, there is not the slightest doubt in my mind concerning your beauty. In fact, I think you are the most charming young girl it has been my good fortune to encounter during my many travels over this great country of ours — from coast to coast, from the Lakes to the Gulf.”

“You make me feel so young and foolish, Professor Eaton!” Effie said, smoothing her shirtwaist over her bosom. “You make me feel like —”

Professor Eaton turned abruptly and reached into the back seat for a bottle of Indian Root Tonic. He closed his teeth over the cork stopper and popped it out, and, with no further loss of time, handed it to Effie.

“Have this one on me, my dear girl,” he said. “Just drink it down, and then see if it doesn’t make you feel even better still.”

Effie took the green-blown bottle, looking at the picture of the strong young man in wrestler’s trunks.

“I drank the whole bottle I bought last night,” she said. “I drank it just before going to bed, and it made me feel so good I just couldn’t lie still. I had to get up and sit on the back porch and sing awhile.”

“There was never a more beneficial —”

“What particular ailment is the medicine good for, Professor Eaton?”

“Indian Root Tonic is good for whatever ails you. In fact, merely as a general conditioner it is supreme in its field. And then on the other hand, there is no complaint known to medical science that it has yet failed to allevi — to help.”

Effie turned up the bottle and drank down the beady, licorice-tasting fluid, all eight ounces of it. The Negroes standing around the car looked on wistfully while the alcoholic fumes from the opened bottle drifted over the lot. Effie handed the empty bottle to Professor Eaton, after taking one last look at the picture on the label.

“Oh, Professor Eaton,” she said, coming closer, “it makes me feel better already. I feel just like I was going to rise off the ground and fly away somewhere.”

“Perhaps you would allow me —”

“To do what, Professor Eaton? What?”

He flicked the ashes from his cigar with the tip of his little finger.

“Perhaps you would allow me to escort you to your home,” he said. “Now, it’s almost dinnertime, and I was just getting ready to close up my stand until the afternoon, so if you will permit me, I’ll be very glad to drive you home in my automobile. Just tell me how to get there, and we’ll start right away.”

“You talk so romantic, Professor Eaton,” Effie said, touching his arm with her hand. “You make me feel just like a foolish young girl around you.”

“Then you will permit me to see you home?”

“Of course, I will.”

“Step this way, please,” he said, holding open the door and taking her arm firmly in his grasp.

After they had settled themselves in the front seat, Effie turned around and looked at Professor Eaton.

“I’ll bet you have had just lots and lots of love affairs with young girls like me all over the country.”

“On the contrary,” he said, starting the motor, “this is the first time I have ever given my serious consideration to one of your sex. You see, I apply myself faithfully to the promotion, distribution, and sale of Indian Root Tonic. But this occasion, of course, draws me willingly from the cares of business. In fact, I consider your presence in my car a great honor. I have often wished that I might —”

“And am I the first young girl — the first woman you ever courted?”

“Absolutely,” he said. “Absolutely.”

Professor Eaton drove out of the vacant weed-grown lot and turned the car up the street toward Effie’s house. She lived only two blocks away, and during the time it took them to drive that distance neither of them spoke. Effie was busy looking out to see if people were watching her ride with Professor Eaton in his automobile, and he was busily engaged in steering through the deep white sand in the street. When they got there, Effie told him to park the machine in front of the gate where they could step out and walk directly into the house.

They got out and Effie led the way through the front door and into the parlor. She raised one of the shades a few inches and dusted off the sofa.

Professor Eaton stood near the middle of the room, looking uneasily through the small opening under the shade, and listening intently for sounds elsewhere in the house.

“Just sit down here on the sofa beside me,” Effie said. “I know I am perfectly safe alone with you, Professor Eaton.”

Effie closed her eyes and allowed herself the pleasure of feeling scared to death of Professor Eaton. It was an even nicer feeling than the one she had had the night before when she drank the first bottle of Indian Root Tonic and got into bed.

“And this is the ancestral home?” he asked.

“Don’t let’s talk about anything but you — and me,” Effie said. “Wouldn’t you just like to talk about us?”

Professor Eaton began to feel more at ease, now that it was evident that they were alone in the house.

“Perhaps,” Professor Eaton said, sitting closer to Effie and looking down once more at her blouse, “perhaps you will permit me to diagnose your complaint. You see, I am well versed in the medical science, and I can tell you how many bottles of Indian Root Tonic you should use in your particular case. Naturally, some people require a greater number of bottles than others do.”

Effie glanced out the window for a second, and then she turned to Professor Eaton.

“I won’t have to —”

“Oh, no,” he said, “that won’t be at all necessary, though you may do as you like about it. I can just —”

“Are you sure it’s perfectly all right, Professor Eaton?”

“Absolutely,” he said. “Absolutely.”

Effie smoothed her shirtwaist with her hands and pushed her shoulders forward. Professor Eaton bent towards her, reaching for her hand.

He held her hand for a few seconds, feeling her pulse, and then dropped it to press his ear against her bosom to listen to her heartbeat. While he listened, Effie tucked up a few loose strands of hair that had fallen over her temples.

“Perhaps,” he said, raising his head momentarily, “perhaps if you will merely —”

“Of course, Professor Eaton,” Effie said excitedly.

He bent closer after she had fumbled nervously with the blouse and pressed his head against her breasts. Her heartbeat jarred his eardrum.

After a while Professor Eaton sat up and loosened the knot in his necktie and wiped the perspiration from his upper lip with the back of his hand. It was warm in the room, and there was no ventilation with the door closed.

“Perhaps I have already told you —”

“Oh, no! You haven’t told me!” she said eagerly, holding her hands tightly clasped and looking down at herself with bated breath. “Please go ahead and tell me, Professor Eaton!”

“Perhaps,” he said, fingering the open needlework in her blouse, “perhaps you would like to know that Indian Root Tonic is the only complete aid for general health on the market today. And in addition to its general curative properties, Indian Root Tonic possesses the virtues most women find themselves in need of during the middle and later stages of life. In other words, it imparts a vital force to the glands that are in most need of new vitality. I am sure that once you discover for yourself the marvelous power of rejuvenation that Indian Root Tonic possesses, you will never again be alone in the house without it. In fact, I can say without fear of successful contradiction that—”

Effie laid her blouse aside.

“Do you want me to take —”

“Oh, yes; by all means,” he replied hastily. “Now, as I was saying —”

“And this, too, Professor Eaton? This, too?”

Professor Eaton reached over and pinched her lightly. Effie giggled and passed her hands over her bosom as though she were smoothing her shirtwaist.

“I don’t suppose you happen to have another bottle of that tonic in your pocket, do you, Professor Eaton?”

“I’m afraid I haven’t,” he said, “but just outside in my car there are several cases full. If you’ll let me, I’ll step out and —”

“Oh, no!” Effie cried, clutching at his arms and pulling him back beside her. “Oh, Professor Eaton, don’t leave me now!”

“Very well,” he said, sitting down beside her once more. “And now as I was saying, Indian Root Tonic’s supernatural powers of re —”

“Professor Eaton, do you want me to take off all of this — like this?”

“Absolutely,” he said. “And Indian Root Tonic has never been known to fail, whereas in so many —”

“You don’t want me to leave anything —”

“Of course not. Being a doctor of the medical science, in addition to my many other activities, I need absolute freedom. Now, if you feel that you cannot place yourself entirely in my hands, perhaps it would be better if I —”

“Oh, please don’t go!” Effie cried, pulling him back to the sofa beside her. “You know I have complete confidence in your abilities, Professor Eaton. I know you wouldn’t —”

“Wouldn’t do what?” he asked, looking down at her again.

“Oh, Professor Eaton! I’m just a young girl!”

“Well,” he said, “if you are ready to place yourself entirely in my hands, I can proceed with my diagnosis. Otherwise —”

“I was only teasing you, Professor Eaton!” Effie said, squeezing his hand. “Of course I trust you. You are such a strong man, and I know you wouldn’t take advantage of a weak young girl like me. If you didn’t take care of me, I’d more than likely run away with myself.”

“Absolutely,” he said. “Now, if you will continue removing the —”

“There is only this left, Professor Eaton,” Effie said. “Are you sure it will be all right?”