There once was a great physician who specialized in treating one specific and very deadly disease. Leaving the big city behind, the good doctor and her entourage headed for the rural coast, where many people were in need of her special skills.

As they traveled through the region, her party repeatedly encountered a local man who, very persistently, kept asking for the doctor to come look at his son. The boy was apparently suffering from an illness that was not related to the doctor’s specialty.

Being very busy, she paid him no mind. Her assistants, though, had lost patience and asked that she at least talk to the man. Perhaps the doctor could convince him to leave them alone. She agreed to meet with him.

“Look”, she said, ” I am a specialist. I’ve come to take care of those people who need me. My work is very important. I can’t just help anybody who is sick.”

The local man dropped to his knees, “Please, doctor. Please help me. Your skills are well known. My son may die without you.”

“Surely,” said the great physician, “there are local doctors who can help you. It would be unwise for me to be distracted by the common ailments of ordinary people. My training has been exclusively devoted to the curing of a very specific malady and I have been expressly sent to save just those people.“

“But” said the man, “weren’t you first trained to help ordinary people, before you learned to specialize in great diseases? Don’t all diseases, including the lowly ones, hurt innocents just as well as the great ones?”

They were both silent for a long moment, the doctor intensely studying the man’s upturned face.

“Dammit, man!” she finally exclaimed. “By God, if you aren’t right. Now where’s that child of yours?”