People Will Talk Page #10

I am by nature

a man who interrupts.

- However, I shall try.

- Thank you.

Dr. Praetorius,

may I suggest to begin with...

in order to avoid both the embarrassment

and time involved in examination...

that you give of your own accord...

a pertinent account of your life

and professional activities...

prior to your arrival in this city

and this university.

I prefer to be questioned.

- Why?

- Because I do not intend

to tell things about myself...

of my own accord which are

nobody's business but my own.

- They are the concern of

the entire medical profession.

- Uh-uh-uh.

- Be recognized.

- You too, Professor Barker.

Your objection is understandable,

Dr. Praetorius.

Professor Elwell,

you may begin your questioning.

My colleagues have appointed me

to speak in their name.

I hope I may prove worthy of what is

not only an honor but a grave responsibility.

Dr. Praetorius, will you stipulate and agree

to abide by the verdict of this committee?

- I will do nothing of the kind.

- Why not?

Because I don't know

what the verdict will be.

The verdict will affect you seriously

whether you agree to abide by it or not.

Then why ask idiotic questions

to which you already know the answers?

One horse on you, Elwell.

Will you admit that in 1936...

you were a highly successful

quack and miracle healer...

in a remote little village

in the southern part of this state?

I will admit nothing

of the kind.

- Where did you live in 1936?

- In Goose Creek.

Would you describe Goose Creek

as a thriving metropolis?

It is a remote little village

in the southern part of this state.

Exactly. And, uh, what was your source

of income in Goose Creek in 1936?

- My practice.

- You practiced openly?

I was available to anyone

at any time.

I mean to say, did you set up practice

as a doctor of medicine?

When I came to Goose Creek,

I had my degree as a doctor of medicine.

I did not, however, display

my M.D. Upon my door.

Upon your shop door.

I beg your pardon,

his shop door?

Isn't it true, Dr. Praetorius,

that in that remote little village...

called Goose Creek

you opened a butcher shop?

An honorable trade,

if ever there was one.

In itself, unimpeachable.

But what did you sell in your butcher shop?

Meat, at cost.

At cost? Without profit?

Then how did you make your living?

I made sick people well.

Aha.

Mm-hmm. Why should that

startle you? I still do.

Do you deny that at that time

your patients were under the

impression you were a butcher...

and not a doctor?

Do you prefer the impression given

to their patients by so many of our colleagues...

that they are doctors

and not butchers?

Bravo! Bravo!

Dr. Praetorius, won't you admit

that your practice flourished in Goose Creek...

because you took advantage of the ignorance

of its backward inhabitants...

of the pathetic willingness

of those poor people to rely upon a belief...

in miraculous cure rather

than scientific knowledge...

and because of the readiness

with which so many people will prefer...

the glamourous quack

to the licensed practitioner?

Despite your definition of a quack

as someone who does not practice medicine...

according to your rules,

Professor Elwell...

the fact remains that a quack is an unqualified

person who pretends to be a doctor.

I was a licensed practitioner,

and therefore, not a quack.

And as to the willingness of those

so-called ignorant and backward people...

to rely upon the curative powers of faith

and possibly miracles too...

I consider faith, properly

injected into a patient...

as effective in maintaining life

as adrenaline.

And a belief in miracles has been

the difference between living and dying...

as often as

any surgeon's scalpel.

- That is not the issue under discussion.

- It is precisely the issue!

Whether the practice of medicine

should become more intimately involved...

with the human beings

it treats...

or whether it's to go on

in this present way of becoming...

more and more a thing of pills,

serums and knives...

until eventually we shall

undoubtedly evolve an electronic doctor.

The issue at hand is simply that you amassed

a fortune by treating sick people...

who believed that you were

a miracle-working butcher.

I could not have amassed

that fortune...

unless I had made an enormous

number of sick people well!

All this folderol, as I see it...

has got nothing to do with

the ethics and honor of our profession.

It has everything to do with envy

of one man's genius for healing the sick...

ofhis use of remedies you can't prescribe,

buy in bottles or apply with a knife.

Call Praetorius a psychiatrist, high priest...

voodoo, medicine man,

witch doctor, anything you like...

but don't investigate him,

gentlemen, learn from him.

Professor Barker, it was understood

you would not interrupt.

I'm sorry.

You can strike my remarks

from the record.

I'm sure you all agree with me anyway,

so why don't we call this silly thing off...

and start the concert.

It would interest me,

Dr. Praetorius...

to know why you ever left

this lucrative practice in Goose Creek...

and under what circumstances.

I'd always intended to leave when I'd acquired

enough money to start a clinic of my own.

As it turned out,

I left a little sooner than I'd planned.

I fired my housekeeper.

She was falsifying my grocery bills...

and splitting the money

with the grocer.

Unfortunately, she had

previously discovered...

my medical diploma

in a bottom drawer of my desk.

In revenge for being fired,

she let it be known around Goose Creek...

that I was not a butcher at all,

but a licensed M.D.

I was confronted by a crowd of angry

townspeople and forced to admit the truth.

I narrowly escaped being

run out of town on a rail.

Any more questions,

Professor Elwell?

A great many more.

Thank you.

Shh.! Shh.!

- Professor Barker.

- May I point out that these monkeyshines...

are seriously delaying

the concert of our student orchestra?

Our concern here is

the future good and welfare of our students...

as doctors of medicine,

not as troubadours.

- Were you recognized?

- We're all concerned about

the delay of the concert.

The fact that this hearing conflicts with it

is a most unfortunate coincidence.

You don't believe that

any more than I do.

Continue, Professor Elwell.

- Dr. Praetorius.

- I thought you'd forgotten me.

Who is Shunderson?

I take it you mean Mr. Shunderson.

Mr. Shunderson is my friend.

Is he associated

with you professionally?

Not as a professional.

He helps at whatever he can.

He is also employed in your home

as a manservant or a butler, is he not?

I do not employ him at all.

He works at whatever he pleases...

where he pleases and when.

He is never very far from

your side or for long it seems.

- Really?

- Dr. Praetorius...

what was Mr. Shunderson

before you knew him?

I refuse to answer that question.

What were the circumstances

under which you made his acquaintance?

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