Hunting for Hippocrates. Warren J. Stucki
urinating. Not only was it hard to start and the stream was only a dribble, but he had to go all the time, just small amounts. He had the feeling he never really got his bladder empty.
In his seventieth year Walter began having pain. At first just his hips, then the long bones of the arms and legs and finally his ribs. Eventually, the pain became so severe that Walter almost never left his bed. The spare tire around his abdomen began to disappear, but unfortunately his muscle mass began to melt away also. With cascading folds of loose skin draped over his increasingly prominent, painful bones, Walter began to look quite cachectic. Food just did not taste good. Eventually Walter noticed that he had quit making urine altogether, which was a blessing, as he no longer had to lie in a puddle of urine or try to struggle up to the bathroom. His mind became foggy at times and he started carrying on long conversations with Kate and his deceased parents. Finally, he slipped into a coma. Walter really never knew when he died, nor did anyone else.
It was almost a week before anyone found him. And that was only because the paper boy noticed an awful stench emanating from the house when he went to collect the monthly bill. The door was locked and no one answered his knock, but he reported the odor to his mother, who called the police.
Walter’s death was unattended, witnessed by no one, and the cause of death, at first glance, was obscure. In the great state of Utah, this set of circumstances fulfilled the criteria for a mandatory autopsy. Thus, Walter Maughn became a ward of the court and was sent to Dixie Pioneer Hospital. His body was placed on a metal stretcher, then slid into the refrigerator of the morgue, awaiting autopsy.
ONE
The first message hinted of concern, the second, a definite chord of panic. Moe punched the rewind button of the telephone answering machine. “Dr. Mathis—uh—I mean Moe, this is Tommie Rheinhart, you know from next door.” Tommie sounded flustered and he paused. “Anyway, your colt looks mighty sick. I called the number you left, but they said you’d already gone. When you get home, check on the colt.”
Next there was a message from the E.R. “Dr. Mathis, we have a Mr. Harry Baranski here. You did a TURP on him three weeks ago and now he’s blocked off with clots. Give us a call.”
Another message form the E.R. “Dr. Mathis, we are still trying to arrange a disposition for Mr. Baranski. Who is on call for urology? We’ve tried both you and Dr. Wright and can’t find anybody. We’ll try Dr. Rasmussen.”
Those messages made Moe flinch. He hoped Mr. Baranski was okay. They must have eventually found Dr. Ramussen, since they didn’t call back. Even though he was not part of the group, Moe liked Ed Rasmussen. He was a conscientious physician and a nice guy. In a way, Moe would have preferred Ed as a partner instead of Rusty. Anyway, like it or not, Rusty would be back from his medical convention tomorrow night.
It was the final message from Tommie that made him shiver. “Moe, the colt looks much worse.” Tommie’s voice sounded shrill as he measured his words. “It’s shi—it’s droppings are black and real runny. If you’re not home in the morning, I’m having my dad call the vet.”
Not waiting to hear the rest of his messages, Moe bolted for the closet, rummaging frantically for a flashlight. He should’ve come directly home after the funeral, but he hadn’t. He had needed some time to clear his head, try to find some perspective and arrive at some sort of closure. Try to make some sense of the culmination of a life. Someone he was supposed to be close to, but wasn’t.
From Salt Lake, he’d driven to Wendover where he’d spent the night. The endless stream of scotch-on-the rocks had helped, but the gambling, the whirring of the slot machines, the constant background noise spiced with raucous laughter, had not. The next morning, taking his headache with him, he had left Wendover and headed on home. It was close to midnight when he had arrived back at the ranch.
With a sense of urgency, he chucked winter coats, sleeping bags, tents and other camping gear from the closet. Where was that damn flashlight? His mind raced back to the horse as he searched. That colt, with his long gangly legs and trusting dark eyes, was the only thing Moe was looking forward to as he drove home from the funeral. If not for the horse, it would have been just fine to just keep on driving—driving right on past his medical practice in St. George, past the twenty-acre ranch in Diamond Valley to God only knew where. Wherever SR 18 would take him.
Goddamn it! No flashlight stored with the camping gear. He always left a flashlight there. But that little horse! That was the light, the only beacon of his life. He’d been there at 1:45 in the morning when he was born. Through the night, he’d continuously checked on the mother, Dorey. She was a full month over due and Moe had been worried. He’d called the vet twice, who had checked her and reported everything was fine, sometimes they just go over. Then finally Dorey went into labor about 6 p.m. and at 1:45 he was there to help her get rid of the vernix caseosa. After Dorey licked most of it with her tongue, Moe rubbed the rest off it off with a towel. At that moment, he christened the colt Casey. He watched him take his first faltering steps, then rubbed him again, this time without the towel. He’d read somewhere about human imprinting for colts—why not? It couldn’t hurt.
Maybe the flashlight was in the junk drawer in the kitchen. As he ran to the kitchen, his mind raced along. The funeral had been depressing. What did he expect? Not just because his father had died. They hadn’t been that close anyway. But death, particularly of the second parent, always seemed to compel one to take inventory of his own life. After all this meant, in the great cycle of human biology, that he would be next.
The results of that inventory had depressed him. What did he have to show for his forty-one years of life? On the credit side of the ledger, he was a successful physician with a booming urological practice. He was financially solvent. In fact, the ranch, house, and medical office building were all mortgage-free. His only major monthly payment was alimony. But that should really go in the debit column of his life, along with his divorce. Also, add to this column the minor fact that he was basically alone in the world. No children. Not even a girlfriend unless you counted Judy. He was not sure he could count on Judy for anything, even for the up coming vacation they’d planned together.
He’d been gone a week. First, there was the brain stem stroke, which should have killed his father immediately, but it didn’t. Then a week later, the funeral. When he had received the news, he had dropped everything. Moe had Sally cancel all his clinic appointments, giving each patient the choice of seeing Rusty or waiting for him to return. Not surprising, few had wanted to see Rusty. Then, of course, the whole week’s surgery schedule had to be cleared and rescheduled.
The flashlight was not in the junk drawer. When did he use it last? Probably when he rotated the irrigation sprinklers last week in the east pasture. More than likely, he’d set it down in the garage.
In his haste to leave town, to get to his father’s bedside before he died and maybe achieve some kind of closure to their stormy relationship, he’d almost forgotten about the horses. On his way out of Diamond Valley, he stopped at his nearest neighbor, Mel Rheinhart, and asked his son Tommie to look after the horses. Hurriedly he gave instructions: two scoop-shovels of hay cubes morning and night, one quarter of a coffee can of grain per horse per day, keep the water trough full. Then he gave Tommie the phone number for the motel where he would be staying. His sister, whom his father had been living with, had invited him to stay with her, but she would have her hands full with other out-of-town relatives and she still had five kids of her own at home. He would stay in a motel. It was not as if he couldn’t afford it.
Probably, he should have shared the five-hour ride to Salt Lake City with his older brother, Abraham. That was a laugh! Though Abe also lived in St. George, they had not spoken in years, ever since his mother’s death. Moe had never been to Abe’s new home in the posh Stone Cliff section of St. George and Abe had never set foot on the ranch. Also, Moe did not approve of Abe’s vocation: a lawyer who made a handsome living harassing and suing other hardworking people, often doctors. On the other hand, Abe did not condone Moe’s lifestyle of a Jack-Mormon, the divorce, his drinking and inactivity in the church. They had not said two words to each other at mother’s