Seeing Things at Night

DR. CONY – Dreams, eh? Very significant, sometimes, but we'll get to them later.

COTTONTAIL – But I'm afraid it wasn't a dream.

DOCTOR – What wasn't a dream?

COTTONTAIL – Last Tuesday evening I was sitting in this room, quietly reading The Evening Post, when suddenly something tore the ceiling away, and down from above there came ten horrible pink tentacles and seized me in an iron grasp. Then something stabbed me with some sharp instrument. I was too frightened to move for several minutes, but when I looked up the ceiling was back in place as if nothing had touched it. I felt around for the wound, but the only thing I could find, was a tiny scratch that seemed so small I might have had it some time without noticing it. I couldn't be sure it was a wound. In fact, I tried to make myself believe that the whole thing was all a dream, until I was taken sick to-night. Now I'm afraid that the sword, or whatever it was that stabbed me, must have been poisoned.

DR. CONY (sharply) – Let me look at your tongue. (Cottontail complies.) Seems all right. Hold out your hands. Spread your fingers. (He studies the patient for a moment.) Nothing much the matter there. (Producing pen and paper.) If it was only March now I'd know what to say. Let's see what we can find out about hereditary influence. Father and mother living?

COTTONTAIL – I had no father or mother. I came out of a trick hat in a vaudeville act.

DR. CONY – That makes it a little more difficult, doesn't it? Do you happen to remember what sort of a hat?

COTTONTAIL (a little proudly) – It was quite a high hat.

DR. CONY – Yes, it would be. What color?

COTTONTAIL – Black and shiny.

DR. CONY – That seems normal enough. I'm afraid there's nothing significant there. (Anxiously.) No fixed delusions? You don't think you're Napoleon or the White Rabbit or anything like that, do you? Do you feel like growling or biting anybody?

COTTONTAIL – Of course not. There's nothing the matter with my brain.

DR. CONY – Perhaps you went to sleep and dreamed it all.

COTTONTAIL – No, I distinctly saw the ceiling open and I felt the stab very sharply. I couldn't possibly have been asleep. I was reading a most interesting dramatic review in The Evening Post.

DR. CONY – But you weren't stabbed in the big toe, now, were you?

COTTONTAIL – Well, no.

DR. CONY – And you will admit that the ceiling's just the same as it ever was?

COTTONTAIL – It looks the same from here. I haven't called any workmen in yet to examine it.

DR. CONY – Take my advice and don't. Just let's keep the matter between ourselves and forget it. I'm afraid you've been working too hard. Drop your business. Do a little light reading, and after a bit maybe I'd like to have you go to a show. Something with songs and bunny-hugging and jokes and chorus girls. None of this birth control stuff. I don't see how any self-respecting rabbit could go to a play like the one I saw last night. (He goes to his instrument case and produces a stethoscope.)

DR. CONY – Have you had your heart examined lately?

COTTONTAIL (visibly nervous) – No.

DR. CONY – Any shortness of breath or palpitation?

COTTONTAIL – I don't think so.

DR. CONY – If that's a vest you have on, take it off. There, now. (He stands in front of Cottontail with his stethoscope poised in the air. Cottontail is trembling. Dr. Cony allows the hand holding the stethoscope to drop to his side and remarks provocatively), I'll bet you Maranville doesn't hit .250 this season.

COTTONTAIL (amazed) – Really, sir, I never bet. No, never. I don't know what you are talking about, anyway.

DR. CONY – That's all right, that's all right. Don't agitate yourself. Just a little professional trick. I wanted to calm you down. Now (he makes a hurried examination), Mr. Cottontail, I don't want you to run. I don't want you to climb stairs. Avoid excitement and don't butter your parsnips. Fine words are just as good, no matter what anybody may tell you, and they don't create fatty tissue. Of course, you've got to have some exercise. You might play a little golf. Say, about three holes a day.

COTTONTAIL (sadly) – Three holes?

DR. CONY – Yes, that will be enough.

COTTONTAIL (musing) – It's a little tough, doctor. I can still remember the day I won my "H" at dear old Hassenpfeffer in the 'cross-country run. I had the lungs and the legs then. Even now I can feel the wind on my face as I came across the meadow and up that last, long hill. They were cheering for me to come on. I can tell you I just leaped along. It was nothing at all for me. If I'd sprinted just a bit sooner I could have been first in a hop. Anyhow, I was second. There was nobody ahead of me but the Tortoise. (Cheerlessly) Three holes of golf a day!

DR. CONY – Come, come, sir, be a rabbit. There's no cheating nature, you know. You had your fun, and now you must pay.

COTTONTAIL – What's the matter with me?

DR. CONY – Plain, old-fashioned gout.

COTTONTAIL – What does that come from?

DR. CONY (with evident relish) – From too much ale or porter or claret or burgundy or champagne or sherry or Rhine Wine or Clover Clubs or Piper Heidsieck or brandy or Bronxes or absinthe or stingers, but the worst of all and the best of all is port wine.

COTTONTAIL (horrified) – You mean it comes from drinking?

Dr. Cony – In all my twenty-five years of professional practice I have never known a case of gout without antecedent alcoholism.

COTTONTAIL (much relieved) – Well, then, it can't be gout. I've never taken a drink in my life.

Dr. Cony – In all my twenty-five years of professional experience I've never made an incorrect diagnosis. It is gout.

COTTONTAIL – But I'm president of the Bone Dry Prohibition Union.

Dr. Cony – The more shame to you, sir.

COTTONTAIL – What shall I do?

DR. CONY – Obey my instructions implicitly. A good many doctors will tell you that they can't cure gout. Undoubtedly they are right. They can't. But I can. Only you simply must stop drinking. Cutting down and tapering off to ten or twelve drinks a day won't do. You must stop absolutely. No liquor at all. Do you understand? Not a drop, sir.

COTTONTAIL (his nose violently palpitating with emotion) – I never took a drink in my life. I'm president of the Bone Dry Prohibition Union. I was just sitting quietly reading The Evening Post—

DR. CONY – Save that story for your bone-dry friends. I have nothing to do with your past life. I'm not judging you. It's nature that says the alcoholic must pay and pay and pay. I'm only concerned now with the present and the future, and the present is that you're suffering from alcoholism manifested in gout, and the future is that you'll die if you don't stop drinking.

COTTONTAIL – I tell you I promised my Sunday school teacher when I was a boy that I would always be a Little Light Bearer, and that I would never take a drink if I lived to be a hundred.

DR. CONY – Don't worry, you won't live that long, and don't take on so. You're not the first one that's had his fun and then been dragged up by the heels for it. Cheer up. Remember the good times that are gone. Life can't be all carrots, you know.

COTTONTAIL – But I never had any good times.

DR. CONY – Oh, yes, you did, I'll warrant you. There must have been many merry nights as the bottle passed around the table. (With evident gusto) Maybe there was a rousing song – "When Leeks Are Young in Springtime" – or something like that, and I wouldn't be surprised if now and again there was some fluffy little miss to sing soprano to your bass. Youth! Youth! To be young, a rabbit and stewed. (Quoting reminiscently) "A leaf of lettuce underneath the bough." After all, salad days are the best days. I never meet an old rabbit with gout but I take off my hat and say, "Sir, you have lived."

COTTONTAIL (wildly) – It's not true. I never lived like that. I never took a drink in my life. You can ask anybody. Nobody ever saw me take a drink.

DR. CONY – That's bad. You solitary drunkards are always the hardest to handle. But you've simply got to stop. You must quit drinking or die, that's all there is to it.