Our house was directly across the street from the clinic entrance of John Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore．We lived downstairs and rented the upstairs rooms to out-patients at the clinic．
One summer evening as I was fixing supper, there was a knock at the door．I opened it to see a truly awful looking man—no taller than my eight-year-old son—I thought as I stared at the shriveled （皱缩的）body．But the shocking thing was his face—twisted from swelling．
