A
disease to the Indians, Haze said, was like talking about a claim-jumper or a
burglar, some crook that had got, instead of into your house or property, into
your body. If you could see it, it would look like an actual person! No
intelligence to speak of. So the right kind of soft soaping—prettier’n a
speckled bird! beat the Dutch! ain’t you the finest!—compliments like that,
that the medicine man could reel off to perfection, and the sickness would
start to first peep out, and then—that would be the moment! Grab, pull,
yank—No, you don’t, you jobbing dealer! And Haze said he felt foolish to say
what he saw then, but he did see it! as plain as I see you, and it was a fight
between old Duck Legs and something that looked like a man but had no
substance, like a blue gauze of smoke. Powerful, though, it pounded, thumped and
shook the medicine man till he was bleary-eyed and blood run down his face. But
Duck Legs hung on and won. Then back into the forest he dragged whatever the
thing was and drowned it in the river. And the dying patient reared up, cured.
--From Variation West
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