The Quack

THE QUACK

 

Quentin Vermilion LeStrange, revolutionary doctor and healer was in town, so said all the billboards!

 The man who was freeing the science of medicine from the superstition of the Victorian Era through scientific and other revolutionary techniques. 

 Doctor LeStrange. The name alone conjured up an image of unorthodoxy, even more so his appearance.  Long hair combed back, moustache, full tuxedo with red cape, carrying a walking cane, but his most striking feature were those cold, piercing eyes.  He just seemed to look right through you, deep into your soul.  

 His voice deep and very refined, he trilled his rrr’s in a manner which instantly held your attention.  

His arrival caused a sensation, a sell-out crowd at the biggest venue in town, the Orpheus theatre.  

The little town of Hickney had not seen anything like this since the PT Barnum Circus came to town in 1923, five years ago!

On the night his appearance on stage was awaited with tangible expectation, the audience gave him a standing ovation before he even uttered a word.  His new revolutionary method of treating sicknesses had seemingly brought great success with many diseases, even some of the nasty social ills.  A glass chamber on stage where an audience member would sit, a small electric current would pass through their body, reinvigorating them and instantly kick-starting the self-healing process.  So said Doctor LeStrange anyway.

His glamorous female assistant also added some spice to the evening, Minnie Moucha, a Mexican dancer, cured of deafness in one ear by the doctor’s treatment.  So said the poster outside. 

The first patient of the night was Womba, the village idiot, a well known face in the neighbourhood.  A poor half-crazed, overweight simpleton whose main method of communication was speaking gobbledygook, rolling his eyes or making obscene gestures. The daftie rubbed his hands gleefully as he came up on stage, an expression of infantile delight on his face, he frolicked about like a giant, capering loon, revelling in the attention of the audience. 

The crowd showed it’s approval as Womba sat in the glass chamber and the doctor turned the lever, starting the electric current.  The daftie’s eyes flickered as electricity surged through him, the crowd watched with bated breath. If Womba had had any hair it would have stood on end at this point.  When the poor fool stepped out of the chamber he did seem to be less of himself and more human.  It seemed as if he understood and tried to respond to Doctor LeStrange’s questions.   

The crowd lapped it up.  The LeStrange chamber was not an instant miracle cure, but the next best thing to one.  And during the interval Womba could purchase some of the Doc’s healing elixir, one month’s beer money for a tiny bottle of this riveting stuff was a clear bargain. This elixir would surely put him well on the road to normality. 

Next on stage a child with a metal brace on their leg, recuperating from TB of the bone.  After a minute in the Doctor’s chamber it seemed that the child was rejuvenated enough for the brace to come off. The audience went into rapturous applause at the sight of this medical miracle, seemingly impossible through conventional medicine.

Doctor LeStrange was on top form! Suffused with the approval of the audience he waved his hand in a regal manner, now pointing to his bottles of healing elixir, he advertised them enthusiastically.  Doctor LeStrange was a natural salesman and indeed could sell ice-cubes to Eskimos in the dead of winter.  A healing tonic would be no challenge to a man of his ability. 

But suddenly his demeanour changed.  A face in the audience that he recognised, a few seconds of searching in the deepest recesses of the mind brought recollection of past acquaintance, a past the good doctor perhaps wished to forget.

Bad luck came in twos.  A heckler in the front row suddenly started up, an older roughly spoken man with white hair.

‘HEY STRANGE, WHAT’S IN IT?’  the heckler bawled up! 

LeStrange composed himself, his colour and poise returned and he managed a spirited retort.  ‘My elixir is a compendium of wonder working herbs and medicines known to the ancient mages and sages of China and Persia!’

The heckler continued his chant ‘WHAT’S REALLY IN IT? I HEAR IT STINKS WORSE THAN THE BILGES!’

Now the mysterious guest spoke up too. ‘Are you not Quentin Crisp, former Chef at the Grand Hotel in Eastborne, wanted for trying to burn the hotel down in a fit of rage?’.  LeStrange now remembered this person, that detective who never gave up. 

LeStrange thought it would be an excellent time to go to interval.  The curtain came down and LeStrange mopped his sweating brow with a handkerchief.  Minnie Moucha knew there had been trouble, LeStrange told her to pack up, they would scarper during the intermission, being on a night train to London before the audience knew they were gone!  They would leave the electric chamber, taking only that which they could carry, it was all pure quackery anyway.  An electric shock had little healing value for complex illnesses, even LeStrange knew this, but the psycho-somatic value of the experience, the applause of the audience gave the illusion of healing, at least until LeStrange was safe in the next town.

Scurrying out of the stage door LeStrange and Minnie were confronted by the unsettling figure of Womba the capering loon.  He had loved being the centre of attention and was dancing about, greeting the doctor with meaningless gibberish.

LeStrange tried to get rid of the fat fool, knowing that the loon's gibberings could draw the attention of the townspeople to this moonlight flit.  Minnie dropped a few coins on the ground, as the loon peered at them in delight then stooped to pick them up LeStrange and Minnie made for the railway station.

They reached the station just in time to catch the London express, they sat laughing as the train pulled out of the station, the smoke from the engine obscuring the sign that said ‘HICKNEY’. They had a carriage to themselves, apart from the person in the corner reading The Times. The newspaper hid his face, but he seemed innocuous enough. 

 LeStrange rubbed his hands together, tonight’s takings in guineas and shillings was a pretty penny indeed!  

Suddenly the newspaper reader in the corner coughed loudly, putting the newspaper down. It was the detective!

The quack was caught!