When the discovery was announced, it was Dr. ChaunceyPatrick Coffin who announced it. He had, of course,arranged with uncanny skill to take most of the creditfor himself. If it turned out to be greater than he had hoped,so much the better. His presentation was scheduled for thelast night of the American College of Clinical Practitioners'annual meeting, and Coffin had fully intended it to be abombshell.
It was. Its explosion exceeded even Dr. Coffin's wilder expectations,which took quite a bit of doing. In the end he hadwaded through more newspaper reporters than medical doctorsas he left the hall that night. It was a heady evening for ChaunceyPatrick Coffin, M.D.
Certain others were not so delighted with Coffin's bombshell.
"It's idiocy!" young Dr. Phillip Dawson wailed in the laboratoryconference room the next morning. "Blind, screamingidiocy. You've gone out of your mind—that's all there is to it.Can't you see what you've done? Aside from selling yourcolleagues down the river, that is?" He clenched the reprintof Coffin's address in his hand and brandished it like a broadsword."'Report on a Vaccine for the Treatment and Cure ofthe Common Cold,' by C. P. Coffin, et al. That's what it says—etal. My idea in the first place. Jake and I both poundingour heads on the wall for eight solid months—and now yousneak it into publication a full year before we have any businesspublishing a word about it."
"Really, Phillip!" Dr. Chauncey Coffin ran a pudgy handthrough his snowy hair. "How ungrateful! I thought for sureyou'd be delighted. An excellent presentation, I must say—terse,succinct, unequivocal—" he raised his hand—"butgenerously unequivocal, you understand. You should haveheard the ovation—they nearly went wild! And the look onUnderwood's face! Worth waiting twenty years for."
"And the reporters," snapped Phillip. "Don't forget the reporters."He whirled on the small dark man sitting quietly inthe corner. "How about that, Jake? Did you see the morningpapers? This thief not only steals our work, he splashes it allover the countryside in red ink."
Dr. Jacob Miles coughed apologetically. "What Phillip isso stormed up about is the prematurity of it all," he said toCoffin. "After all, we've hardly had an acceptable period ofclinical trial."
"Nonsense," said Coffin, glaring at Phillip. "Underwood andhis men were ready to publish their discovery within anothersix weeks. Where would we be then? How much clinical testingdo you want? Phillip, you had the worst cold of your life whenyou took the vaccine. Have you had any since?"
"No, of course not," said Phillip peevishly.
"Jacob, how about you? Any sniffles?"
"Oh, no. No colds."
"Well, what about those six hundred students from theUniversity? Did I misread the reports on them?"
"No—98 per cent cured of active symptoms within twenty-fourhours. Not a single recurrence. The results were just shortof miraculous." Jake hesitated. "Of course, it's only been amonth...."
"Month, year, century! Look at them! Six hundred of theworld's most luxuriant colds, and now not even a sniffle." Thechubby doctor sank down behind the desk, his ruddy facebeaming. "Come, now, gentlemen, be reasonable. Think positively!There's work to be done, a great deal of work. They'llbe wanting me in Washington, I imagine. Press conference intwenty minutes. Drug houses to consult with. How dare westand in the path of Progress? We've won the greatest medicaltriumph of all times—the conquering of the Common Cold.We'll go down in history!"
And he was perfectly right on one point, at least.
They did go down in history.
The public r