Chocolate Fever Read online

  Mrs. Kimmelfarber didn’t move. She just stood there with her mouth open, staring at Henry.

  “You scoot now,” insisted Nurse Farthing in a stern tone. “Shoosh . . . off with you!

  “And you, Henry Green,” she said as Mrs. Kimmelfarber left the room, “are coming with me. Let us go. Quietly. Calmly.”

  She took his hand, and once again, Henry noticed that it felt good and somehow made him feel better. He kept holding her cool hand as they left the school. All the way to the hospital, as the taxi sped along, Henry held fast to the calm steady hand of Nurse Molly Farthing. In fact, it wasn’t until he had been checked by two different doctors and was waiting to be examined by the hospital’s chief of children’s medicine, Dr. Fargo, that he dared to let go.

  “What—what? What—what?” said Dr. Fargo as he came bounding into the examining room. He was a small, round man with a bushy white mustache and a confused look on his face. “What have we here, eh?” he asked. “Boy looks like he fell in a mud puddle.”

  He leaned down so close to Henry’s nose that Henry could smell his puffy breath. It smelled like peppermints. “Didn’t fall in a mud puddle, did you, lad?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Didn’t think so,” said Dr. Fargo. “Too bad, would have explained what those big brown spots are all over you.”

  “Well, then,” he said, turning to Nurse Molly Farthing, “tell me things.”

  “You’re not going to believe this, Doctor,” Nurse Farthing began, as she told Dr. Fargo about the events of the morning.

  “I am not going to believe this,” Dr. Fargo repeated when she had finished. “It’s impossible. No rash in the whole history of rashes ever appeared so fast. Or grew so big. Or popped out with a noise you could hear. Impossible!”

  “It happened,” said Nurse Farthing.

  “So I see. Well, we’ll soon get to the bottom of this or my name’s not . . . er. What is my name, by the way?”

  “Dr. Fargo, I believe,” said Henry.

  “Pleased to meet you, son,” said Dr. Fargo, and he shook Henry’s hand. “Ought to do something about those big brown spots, though.”

  “Yes, sir,” said Henry, who was beginning to feel confused himself.

  Dr. Fargo took Henry to the examining table and switched on the big lamp. For a full five minutes he said nothing but “hmmmm” and “hah” as he poked and prodded Henry. He looked at every big brown spot and at all the bare spots in between the brown spots. He looked with a magnifying glass and without a magnifying glass. In Henry’s eyes and ears and nose and even under his tongue. Finally he said, “I don’t know any more than when I started. They look just like your typical big brown spots . . . except, of course, in the whole history of the civilized world there has never been a case of big brown spots before.”

  “I’m frightened,” said Henry.

  “I’m Dr. Fargo,” said the doctor, “that much I know. Now what I’d like to do is get to know more about those brown spots of yours.” He wet the tip of a cotton swab and brushed it gently against one of the big brown spots on Henry’s right arm.

  “Ouch,” said Henry.

  “Did that hurt?”

  “ No.”

  “Then why did you say ‘ouch’?”

  “Because,” said Henry, “I thought it was going to hurt.”

  “I see,” said Dr. Fargo. Shaking his head, he put the cotton swab into a glass jar. “Take this to the laboratory at once,” he said to one of his assistants, and the man rushed out of the room.

  “In a few minutes we’ll know more about those big brown spots of yours,” the doctor said. Hands behind his back, he began to pace the room. Suddenly he stopped, his nose in the air. “Who has been eating a candy bar in my office?” he demanded.

  No one answered.

  Dr. Fargo’s nose twitched from side to side as he sniffed the air. “I smell candy,” he said. “Someone’s been eating a candy bar.”

  Just then the telephone rang, and Dr. Fargo bounded across the room to answer it. “What—what?” he said into the phone. “Are you sure?” His white mustache bounced up and down as Dr. Fargo sank slowly into a chair. He put the telephone down, a look of amazement on his face. “Chocolate,” he said. “Those big brown spots . . . are pure chocolate. . . .”

  “Chocolate?” gasped Nurse Farthing.

  “Chocolate?” exclaimed Henry Green.

  “Chocolate?” echoed Dr. Fargo’s two assistants.

  “Exactly,” said Dr. Fargo. “The boy, it seems, is nothing more than a walking candy bar!”

  Chapter 6

  Catch That Boy!

  THERE WAS MORE EXCITEMENT than Henry had ever seen. All kinds of doctors were examining him now, poking and prodding as if he were not a boy, but a pincushion. And Dr. Fargo was bounding about the room, talking about “Chocolate Fever” . . . “a new disease” . . . “making medical history” . . . and things like that.

  Henry was tired. And afraid.

  He wanted to be left alone. He wanted all the doctors to go away. He wanted to be home. He wanted, in fact, to be just about any place in the world except this hospital.

  So he did something very simple. Something his heart told him he had to do to survive.

  He jumped off the examining table and began to run.

  In a flash he had bolted through the doorway and was running down the long corridor. Behind him he heard shouts of “Stop!” and “Catch that boy!”

  Two nurses at the end of the corridor tried to catch him, but Henry was simply too quick. He dodged past them and darted down the stairway. Down, down, down he went, down three whole flights of stairs and out into the main lobby of the hospital. Ahead of him a guard at the door held out an arm. Running as hard as he could, Henry crashed through his grasp and into the street.

  Without pausing to think where he was headed, Henry ran. As he was about to turn the corner, he looked back. There was a whole army of people pursuing him. Doctors in white coats, nurses, guards blowing whistles, policemen waving their arms. And behind them he could see Dr. Fargo.

  Henry didn’t wait to see any more. “Legs,” he said, “don’t fail me now.” And with that he turned the corner and took off down the street.

  He ran and ran until he had no breath left. And then he ran some more.

  His legs flashing in the afternoon sun, Henry darted down one street and up another. He had no idea of where he was. He had no idea of where he was going. But still he kept running.

  People stared at him as he whizzed by. A few even raised their hands, as if to stop him or say something, but Henry kept right on running.

  After a long while he couldn’t see or hear any of the people running after him. I must be far ahead of them by now, Henry thought. But suddenly, up ahead at the corner, a police car flashed by with its siren screaming. They must be after me, he thought with alarm. I’m a wanted man!

  Sick at heart, Henry pushed himself to run faster. His head hurt. His side hurt. His legs hurt. But he kept running.

  His lungs hurt. His eyes hurt. Even his hair began to hurt. But Henry kept running.

  At last he could run no more. He was finished. Done. He had to rest, and to rest he had to hide. Without thinking about it, Henry ran down a large grassy alley that lay between two white houses. At the end of the alley was a large garage with one door partly open. Henry sneaked in and looked around. There was an automobile parked inside, but not a person in sight. With his last bit of strength he flopped down on the floor beside the automobile.

  A fine mess you’re in now, he thought. You’ve run away from a hospital, the police are after you, your mother must be scared to death with worry, and you have a disease no one has ever heard of before.

  The more he thought about his predicament, the sadder Henry became. A lump rose in his throat. A tear ran down his cheek. A sob escaped from his lips. And he was crying, sobbing out loud, really crying.

  He cried for a few moments because he was so sad. He cried some more because he
was lost. And then he cried for a long, long time because everything had become so hopeless.

  At last, when he could cry no more, Henry dried his eyes and tried to think out his situation. He would not go back to Dr. Fargo and the hospital, of that he was certain. Nothing on earth, or any other planet, could make him do that.

  But what if he went home? What would his mother and father do?

  They would take him back to Dr. Fargo and the hospital. They would have to.

  “Never,” Henry said aloud, “never, never, never!”

  In the dim light of the garage, Henry looked at the big brown spots on his arm and began to hate them. Stupid spots, he thought, why did you have to happen to me? Feeling angry, he stood up and began to pace the half-empty garage.

  I can’t go home, he thought, and I won’t go back to the hospital. All right then, I’m on my own. Somewhere there must be a place for me. A place to go until these stupid big brown spots disappear. A place far away, where no one has ever heard of me or the hospital or Dr. Fargo or my parents.

  Feeling much braver now, with things somehow settled in his mind, Henry lay down to rest for a while before setting off on his journey.

  Chapter 7

  In the Schoolyard

  IT WAS ALMOST TWO HOURS later now, and the sun was somewhat lower in the sky. Henry looked cautiously out of the garage, saw no one, and started on his way.

  He walked for a long time, trying to stay on side streets and being careful to avoid attention. It was not easy. People kept staring at him. Henry ignored them and kept on walking.

  In the middle of the street down which he was walking stood a school. Henry could see lots of boys playing in the schoolyard. He decided to walk through the yard to get to the next street. As he started through, all the boys stopped playing basketball and pitching-in and roller-skate hockey to look at him. It was as if all the noise and action had become frozen, like a movie or a TV show that stops suddenly.

  Henry kept going. As he was about halfway through, just about in the middle of the yard, the kids seemed to come to life again. In less time than it takes to tell about it, he was surrounded.

  Henry looked around him. All the boys stared back. They had formed a tight circle around him. Henry didn’t like it.

  One of the tallest boys, who looked a good deal older than Henry, spoke up. “Boy, are you ugly!” he said.

  “Yeah,” said another boy in the crowd, “really ugly.”

  “Ugg-ly!” echoed another boy.

  I’d better be polite, Henry thought. “Excuse me,” he said in a quiet voice, “could I get through, please?”

  The boys didn’t move.

  The big boy, who seemed to be a leader, spoke again. “I’ve seen pimples before, but those are ridiculous.”

  “They’re not pimples,” another boy said, “they’re warts.”

  “Yeah, warts,” said another, “they gotta be warts.”

  Now all the boys were speaking up.

  “Ugliest warts in the whole world.”

  “In the world? Man, they are the ugliest warts in the universe!”

  “I thought I seen ugly kids before, but this one is out of sight!”

  “Horrible!”

  “Disgusting!”

  “Revolting!”

  “And he smells, too,” a fat boy with glasses said. “Yuch! Like a stupid candy factory.”

  “Nauseating!”

  The more the boys called him names, the worse Henry felt. He opened his mouth to say something, but nothing came out.

  The big boy in the crowd held up his hands to silence the others. “Quiet down, you guys,” he said. “I want to talk to Mr. Ugly here.”

  In a few moments the crowd was silent.

  “Now then,” the big one said, “you—Mr. Ugly —what’s your name, kid?”

  Before Henry answered, he thought carefully. He was ashamed of himself and the way he looked. But he was even more ashamed of the gang around him. How dare they act so mean? He hadn’t harmed them. And now, when he could certainly use a friend, they had clearly marked him as an enemy.

  Henry got angry, but he kept his anger firmly under control.

  “My name is my own business,” he said. “It’s no concern of yours.”

  The gang hooted and shouted at Henry’s reply. A few even whistled.

  “Don’t be fresh, kid,” the big boy said. “We don’t like fresh kids here.”

  A few of the larger boys edged closer to Henry, closing the ring around him tighter.

  “Let me hit him, Frankie,” a voice said.

  “Let me get him,” another boy said.

  Henry thought quickly. “Touch me and you die,” he said. “I have a rare and mysterious disease. Whoever touches me will catch it and die a horrible death!”

  The gang stopped closing in on Henry.

  “Oh, yeah?” said the big boy. “You expect us to believe that?”

  “I don’t care whether you believe it or not,” Henry said.

  “You’re bluffing.”

  “Bluffing?” Henry said, “touch me and you’ll find out if I’m bluffing. I have Chocolate Fever, one of the most horrible and catching diseases in the world.”

  “Chocolate Fever?” echoed the big boy. “You’re making it up.”

  Henry could see that he had the crowd on the run. “Chocolate Fever is the worst disease ever discovered on earth,” he said. “You know what happens if you get Chocolate Fever? Your whole head swells up. Your mouth gets dry. You break out in big chocolate spots—like me. You begin to look . . . ugly. And then the really bad stuff begins.”

  The boys were listening closely now. And the circle around him was beginning to widen as the gang started to back away.

  “He’s making it up, fellas,” Big Boy said. “Don’t listen to him.” But the boys were listening all right and believing every word. Henry began to walk toward the boys. As he did, they made way for him. Slowly, a path opened, giving him room to get by.

  “I don’t want you to die,” Henry said as he passed through the ring of boys, “so you’d just better let me be on my way.”

  None of the boys tried to stop him. Even Big Boy, as Henry passed close by, made no move to touch him.

  Just as Henry neared the outer ring of boys, he heard one of them exclaim: “Hey! I know who he is. I heard it on the radio when I came home from school. There’s a kid who ran away from a hospital this morning . . . and the police are looking for him. His name is Henry Green.”

  Big Boy called out as Henry kept walking, “Is that you, kid? Are you Henry Green?”

  “Henry Green?” Henry called back over his shoulder. “Never heard of him.”

  Just the same, as soon as he was clear of the schoolyard, Henry broke into a run and didn’t stop until he had left the gang far, far behind him.

  Chapter 8

  Mac

  THE TRUCK THUMPED AND RUMBLED along the superhighway, its powerful headlights cutting a yellow slice through the blackness. “Are you all right up there, kid?” the driver called.

  From the sleeping bunk set up high in the cab of the big diesel Henry answered, “Right, Mac, I’m okay.”

  Okay, Henry thought bitterly, sure I’m okay. I don’t have a friend in the world, I look like some sort of side-show freak, the police and doctors and my folks and heaven knows who else is after me, and I don’t know where I’m going. If that’s being okay, then I’m okay.

  He had stood out on the highway for a long time and watched the day turn into dark. Hundreds of cars and trucks had swept by without stopping. But Mac had stopped and offered him a lift. That was hours ago, and they had come a long way. Henry didn’t know how many miles they had traveled or where they were heading, and what’s more he didn’t care.

  He was sure that Mac had not seen his spots. It had probably been too dark to notice them. No one in his right mind would have anything to do with me, Henry thought. Not once they got a look at these stupid big brown spots. Even Mac, nice as he seemed, wou
ldn’t have taken a chance if he had seen me clearly.

  “Hop in,” Mac had said, “the weather’s fine,” a big grin crossing his friendly face. He was a huge black man dressed in dirty coveralls. His truck was clean and warm, and Henry didn’t hesitate. After sitting alongside Mac for an hour or so in the front seat, Henry had climbed up to the bunk and fallen quickly asleep. He didn’t know how long he had slept, but he felt rested now.

  Mac turned the big truck off the highway and onto a service road. Slowly, he shifted down through the gears and, braking gently, brought the huge trailer to a stop.

  “Hey, kid,” he called. “Come on down here.”

  Henry climbed down to sit beside Mac.

  “Suppertime,” Mac said. “Now just as soon as I get the lights on—”

  “I like the dark,” Henry said quickly.

  “You what?”

  “I like the dark,” Henry said as the lights came on. Henry blinked at the sudden brightness. He’s seen me now, he thought.

  Mac reached down below his seat and brought up a big picnic basket. He placed it between them on the seat.

  “Now let’s just see what that woman gave us for supper,” he said.

  “It’s all right,” Henry said. “I’ll get off here.”

  “Huh?”

  “I won’t make any fuss,” Henry said. “I’ll just go quietly.”

  “You are a strange one, kid,” Mac said. “Now what are you talking about?”

  “Well, you must see these big brown spots all over me by now . . .”

  Mac nodded. “Yeah, -I see them.” He began looking through the picnic basket. “You like ham and cheese?”

  “I’m willing to go,” Henry began.

  “Maybe chicken spread? We got chicken spread, too. And I do believe . . . yes, by heavens, tuna fish.”

  “I mean,” Henry began again, “if you don’t want to have anything to do with me, I’ll understand. I really will.”

  “What’ll it be?” Mac asked. “Tuna, chicken spread, or ham and cheese?” He was looking squarely into Henry’s face, smiling ever so slightly.