The Doctor Becomes a Criminal (Paging Dr. Marvin, Pt 4)

(Part 1 is here.)

The Atlanta Constitution (Georgia)
19 July 1897, Page 5 [continued]

The Doctor Becomes a Criminal.
From Springfield, Dr. Marvin was lost to his friends for a long time.

In the trial of the case which has recalled the story, it is said Marvin was engaged to perform a criminal operation in a town in Nebraska. The operation resulted in death and Marvin and the betrayer of his victim were convicted and sent to the penitentiary. It is not known what became of his companion in crime, but it seems that Marvin was pardoned after one year by the governor of Nebraska.

The victim of the criminal knife is reputed to have been a belle of an important little commercial town of that state. She was very popular and at one time it is said she was engaged to have been married to a candidate to the gubernatorial chair, who was defeated by the same man who won the race and afterwards pardoned Marvin. This is not in the records of the interesting case, but has developed in the trial.

From the convict camp Marvin is said to have extended his western trip and to have crossed the mountains and visited the Pacific coast. He is charged with having been an enthusiastic and successful gambler of the slope, and no doubt will be remembered by many of his old associates in California.

Marvin Comes to Atlanta.
It was Dr. Marvin when he reached Atlanta. He advertised as a specialist and is said to have been announced through the press and in glaring posters as a successful and highly reputed practitioner. He was regarded here as a quack, and but little legitimate practice is said to have ever reached his office.

Marvin was a dashing gallant and he was a favorite with women who were easily impressed. He was a great ladies' man, and gradually he secured patients whom he persuaded he could cure.

Among those who called at his office was a Mrs. Pitts, a member of a wealthy Atlanta family, and a handsome brunette. Whether Marvin was possessed of medical learning or whether his treatment was bused [sic] upon scientific lines, it is not known, but he and Mrs. Pitts became greatly infatuated and the two eloped. Their departure from Atlanta was at night and was in haste.

Mrs. Pitts's husband followed in hot pursuit. At Memphis he located the guilty pair and as he went up the front steps of the hotel with his loaded shotgun his wife and Marvin are said to have retreated, fleeing from the hotel by the rear steps and in much haste and considerable dishabille. Here the trail was lost, and after searching through the west, Pitts returned heartbroken.

Years passed by. Pitts had given up the chase as hopeless, until he was informed one day that Marvin and his wife were in Florida. Pitts took his pistol and shotgun from the shelf, rubbed off the dust and started again on the warpath.

Through Florida he searched. In every town and village he looked for the objects of his search. One day he became very ill. He went to a hotel and went to bed, dying shortly after with fever, which he contracted from the climate. In the death of Pitts the last barrier was removed and Marvin is said to have married Mrs. Pitts and then came into the possession of her fortune, which he secured in fee simple upon her death...

And the finale, Wife No. 4 on the Scene and The Past Becomes Present.