San Antonio Adult Entertainment: An O. Henry Story Loaded With Morphine
October 14, 2009At the time of his residence, San Antonio, with its warm (some me, for instance would say unbearably hot), dry, and sunny climate and clean air, was a destination for tuberculosis sufferers. Within the story we are informed that San Antonio had 3,000 “tubercules” living within the city limits. Many were in the final stages of the disease and liberally dosed themselves with whiskey and/or morphine, at the time freely available over-the-counter without prescription, as palliative or final exit strategy.
Readers of O. Henry will be further stunned to learn that in this story a prostitute plays a major role. She, in fact, is the plot twist providing the ironic surprise ending. This is a very morbid story and O. Henry is having a lot of fun telling it in stereoscopic vision with one eye on the melancholy, the other one on the jolly with a wink and raised eyebrow.