A Case of Suspicion by Ed Wallace

A Case of Suspicion by Ed Wallace 1 He threw back the covers and sat up on his bed, his feet feeling along the cold floor for his house slippers, the telephone ringing insistently a little distance away. He turned on the light and picked up the phone. “This is Dr. Benson,” he said. 5 The November wind was bringing sounds of winter as it blew around the little white house. The doctor got into his clothes, went to the table, and stared a moment at his watch, his spirit complaining at the job ahead of him. 2 a.m. His mind complained at the hour and at why people in such remote, rural parts of the 10 country chose such improper times to be born. He picked up his two satchels: the short pill bag, as the people of the town knew it, and the long obstetrical case – the baby bag, they called it. He debated whether to bring his cigarettes. He knew he should stop, knew he was setting a bad example for people – a doctor smoking! Imagine! But old habits die hard. He put the pack in his pocket. The cold wind felt like a surgeon’s knife at his face as he opened the door and ran, 15 bending low, around the driveway to the garage. His car started with difficulty, coughed a half-dozen times as he drove down the driveway, but then began to run more smoothly as he turned down Grass Street and onto the deserted highway. Mrs. Ott Sorley, whom Dr. Benson was on his way to visit, already had almost a dozen 20 children, but it seemed to the doctor that never once had she had a baby in good weather, nor in daylight. And while Dr. Benson was a country doctor, he was still a young man and couldn’t find the pleasure that his father, “the old Doc Benson”, had found in seeing Ott, the father, always two or three babies behind in the payment of his baby bills.