The Summer of Sir Lancelot

by Gordon, Richard

  ‘Very well, I should think. Sister Virtue‘s already promoted her from the soiled linen to the washing-up.‘

  ‘She‘ll be a useful member of St Swithin‘s, mark my words, now she‘s got over her juvenile infatuations. I soon put a stop to that, by Harry!‘ He produced his pipe. ‘What was I saying?‘

  ‘About how you‘d retired,‘ supplied Simon patiently.

  ‘Exactly. I have really no right whatever to raise my voice in St Swithin‘s politics,‘ Sir Lancelot continued, leaning forward to knock the pipe out against his heel. ‘I have moreover not the slightest — Ahhhhhhhhh!‘

  ‘Are you all right?‘ cried Simon, leaping forward.

  ‘Lay me flat, boy, lay me flat‘. Damnation! Do you know less surgery than the trainer of Tottenham Hotspurs?‘

  Simon looked round wildly. ‘I - I don‘t seem to see anything flat.‘

  ‘What‘s wrong with the blasted floor? That‘s better,‘ conceded Sir Lancelot gruffly, as Simon dragged him to the hearthrug.

  ‘Don‘t you think I ought to have another look at this back?‘ asked Simon, sounding concerned.

  ‘I am quite able to treat my own complaints, thank you.‘

  ‘You know perfectly well what you taught us, Lancelot,‘ insisted Simon firmly, rolling the surgeon on to his face, ‘that doctors make rotten patients and vice versa. May I pull up your shirt?‘

  ‘You blasted well leave my underwear alone!‘

  ‘There doesn‘t seem anything wrong,‘ Simon confessed five minutes later, ignoring protests as calmly as a paediatrician.

  ‘Nothing wrong? Then why do you imagine I am getting these attacks of excruciating agony, blast you?‘ countered Sir Lancelot.

  ‘Perhaps you should have another X-ray?‘ Simon considered.

  ‘When I‘ve only just had one? You young profligates are all the same with the Government‘s money. No wonder I have to pay such ghastly taxes.‘

  ‘As a matter of fact, I think I should do a lumbar puncture,‘ Simon decided.

  ‘Not bloody likely! With a spinal needle you‘d leave my back looking like double top on a dart-board.‘

  ‘Then I can only suggest radiant heat and procaine.‘

  ‘Radiant heat? You might as well rub me with a live toad at the full moon.‘

  Simon bit his lip. ‘I do wish you didn‘t find it necessary always to be so rude, Lancelot. I am only doing my best.‘

  ‘Oh? So we‘ve become rather grand, have we?‘ snarled the surgeon from the hearthrug. ‘When you were one of my students, boy, you were glad enough I was merely rude, instead of reporting you to the Dean as lazy and incompetent.‘

  Simon went pink. ‘Perhaps you will allow me to point out that I am, in fact, no longer a student?‘

  ‘I sometimes find that difficult to believe.‘

  ‘Yes, Lancelot.‘ Simon nodded briskly. ‘It was always your greatest fault in the wards, missing the blatantly obvious.‘

  ‘Get out.‘

  ‘Is that the painful spot?‘ asked Simon, pressing.

  ‘Get out!‘ roared Sir Lancelot. ‘You incompetent swollen-headed little twit! Get out before I—‘

  He was alone on the hearthrug.

  It was twenty minutes before coherent thought could be restored. ‘Ungrateful young cad!‘ he muttered, easing himself up. He found with relief he could get to his feet. ‘Only a brief spasm, thank God,‘ he grunted, pulling himself by the marble mantelpiece. ‘I wonder what exactly it is?‘ he mused, eyeing himself in the mirror. ‘I wonder if I should really see a neurological specialist?‘ he added, tugging his beard. ‘Or some other specialist?‘ He thumped the marble. ‘By George! I‘ve got it! No ruddy specialist at all. What I need is the opinion of a down-to-earth straightforward family doctor. Mrs Chuffey! Mrs Chuffey!‘

  ‘Sir?‘

  ‘The telephone directory, if you please, A to D.‘

  ‘Certainly, sir.‘

  ‘And, Mrs Chuffey — bring me a bottle of Bollinger. A trifle early, but I am in need of both a sedative and an analgesic.‘

  11

  Sir Lancelot rang the bell.

  Nothing happened for several minutes, which were extremely uncomfortable because the rain was seeping down the neck of his overcoat.

  He rang the bell again, and stamping his feet on the mat turned to survey the suburb of Leafy Grove.

  This part of London — which is probably an earthly paradise for its inhabitants, from the way they fight to board the Southern Electric and return there each night — consists mainly of Anne Hathaway‘s cottages tor stockbrokers‘ clerks. At that hour of the morning these were usually kissing the wife, patting the dog, and battening on their bowlers, before leaving to broke stocks furiously in the City until it was time to pat the dog, kiss the wife, and unbatten again. But it was Sunday, when the glistening road was empty save for a milk float crawling up the wrong side, and the railway station, which other days made the Black Hole of Calcutta seem pretty roomy, was deserted except for a cat sniffing the misdirected fish.

  ‘Well, it certainly isn‘t Las Vegas,‘ grunted Sir Lancelot. ‘Is everybody dead in there?‘ he bawled, ringing the bell again and bashing the knocker for good measure.

  Something offensive caught his eye in the porch of the little detached stucco-fronted house.

  ‘A doctor should have a clean plate quite as much as a clean collar,‘ he declared, producing the yellow silk handkerchief and imparting lustre to the name ‘Clement E Dinwiddie, MB, BS.‘

  ‘I‘ve been beating on this blasted door since daybreak,‘ he continued, shouting through the letter box.

  A window flew open upstairs. ‘Just coming, just coming! Is Mrs Peckwater in labour?‘

  A few seconds later Dr Clement E Dinwiddie himself stood blinking in the doorway.

  ‘Good heavens, Sir Lancelot-‘ He scratched a head just off the pillow. ‘I didn‘t expect you so soon.‘

  ‘Good morning to you, Dinwiddie. I thought we might get the consultation over early, then I could drive straight home to Wales. I have my luggage in the car.‘

  He indicated the Rolls at the kerb. He had left the Harley Street house before seven, his brother-in-law having got up specially to escort him down the front steps with great solicitude.

  ‘I‘m afraid I was asleep,‘ apologized Clem, adjusting his big round glasses. ‘I was up most of the night with a haematemesis. I‘ll go and put some clothes on, sir.‘

  ‘I assure you that won‘t be necessary,‘ declared Sir Lancelot, removing his damp overcoat in the narrow hall. Though he had to admit Dr Dinwiddie — who as a student was never a flashy dresser, with holes in his socks and elbows and sometimes suspending his trousers with string — standing in moth-eaten dressing gown, odd pyjamas, and an old pair of plimsols, presented a rather unprofessional appearance.

  ‘Would you like a cup of tea, sir?‘ Clem invited. ‘I‘m afraid Mrs Bowler, who usually does for me, never turns up on a Sunday.‘

  ‘Thank you. Milk but no sugar.‘

  Sir Lancelot followed him into a kitchen which seemed to have been ransacked during the night by a gang of burglars-and famished ones, too, from the scraps of half-eaten food lying all over the place.

  ‘Sorry the place is a bit rough,‘ Clem apologized as an afterthought. ‘I was meaning to have the house done up, but I bought one of those new electrocardiographs instead.‘

  Sir Lancelot frowned. ‘But surely the National Health Service pays for your equipment?‘

  ‘No such luck!‘ Clem gave a dry laugh. ‘Though I gather some of my fellow GPs use the modest expense allowance for papering the parlour.‘

  Sir Lancelot stroked his beard. The haziness of consultants towards family doctoring matches that of generals towards bayonet-fighting.

  ‘Tell me,‘ he asked, as he sipped his tea, ‘what on earth induced you to plunge into general practice? You could have stepped straight from your finals into a research laboratory. Or you might have taken up surgery. You‘d have got your Fellowship blindfol
d and in handcuffs.‘

  ‘It was you, sir,‘ replied Clem, shifting a microscope and the remains of some egg and chips.

  ‘It was I?‘

  Clem nodded. ‘Yes, you were always telling us how your lather was a GP up North, and the family doctor was the backbone of the profession. The front-line troops in the battle for survival — you remember, sir? I was most impressed.‘

  Sir Lancelot shifted on the kitchen chair.

  ‘And that last lecture you gave, sir, on the importance of the tamily doctor. I still recall every word of it. I‘d only just qualified, and I decided there and then that becoming a family doctor would be my best contribution to suffering humanity. Unfortunately,‘ he added, tidying aw ay a skull and two empty tins of baked beans, ‘humanity now doesn‘t seem to be suffering half as much as I am.‘ He gave a brief sigh. ‘Shall we get on with the consultation, sir? Naturally, I‘m terrifically honoured that you asked me. The surgery‘s through here,‘ he indicated, leading the way to a damp and chilly apartment at the front.

  ‘You‘ve got some decent equipment here, Dinwiddie,‘ Sir Lancelot remarked approvingly.

  ‘Though it‘s a bit disorganized, I‘m afraid.‘ Clem straightened the greyish cover of the examination couch and tipped a half-eaten tomato sandwich into the dirty-dressing bin. ‘I expect I‘ll get straight one day, when I‘ve a moment.‘

  ‘You find the work hard?‘ Sir Lancelot demanded.

  ‘Some of the patients are rather exacting.‘ He broke into a wheezy cough. ‘And this devilish asthma plagues me every summer, which doesn‘t make the job any easier.‘

  ‘But why don‘t you take a summer holiday, man?‘

  Clem shrugged his shoulders. ‘Can‘t afford to pay a locum,‘ he wheezed.

  ‘Can‘t afford it?‘ Sir Lancelot frowned. ‘But surely, the National Health Service provides a holiday replacement free of charge? What? No?‘ Clem shook his head. ‘How utterly disgraceful! Why don‘t you write to The Times?‘

  ‘It‘s my own fault, I suppose.‘ The young doctor leant dejectedly against the examination couch. ‘I seem to he in debt, rather. I‘ve absolutely no idea how to cope with cash. It was only the other week I found the bank sometimes sends those statement things in black ink as well.‘

  ‘Then get a wife,‘ suggested Sir Lancelot heartily. ‘She‘d feed you and tidy up the place and keep the accounts. Any young woman would break a leg to marry a doctor. In fact, some of them do,‘ he added reflectively.

  Clem burst into another bout of coughing. Eyeing the poor fellow sharply as he leant on the couch, Sir Lancelot was shocked with the suspicion he was indulging in a quick blub as well.

  ‘But I‘ve got a wife,‘ Clem managed to explain at last. ‘At least, I ought to have. Her name‘s Iris Micklejohn. She‘s a New Zealander who works in the local day nursery. We — we were going to get married tomorrow.‘

  ‘What, she‘s jilted you?‘ Sir Lancelot‘s eyebrows shot up. ‘Come, come, my dear fellow, cheer up! There‘re plenty more fish in the — ‘

  ‘No, we love each other,‘ Clem corrected him. ‘I had a pal fixed up to do my locum on the cheap — Henry Hopworth, you remember him from St Swithin‘s? — but it fell through, so we‘ve had to put off the wedding till the autumn. Locums are pretty impossible to find this time of the year, anyway,‘ he added philosophically, brushing some cake-crumbs off the instrument trolley. ‘We can easily wait, with Iris‘ people being in Auckland, because we are keeping things pretty secret, and — ‘

  ‘Have you a licence?‘ demanded Sir Lancelot.

  ‘I‘m afraid I never have time to watch television — ‘

  ‘A marriage licence, you idiot. You have? Good.‘ He rose. ‘I am sure that a week‘s honeymoon would do you the world of good. I have a plan,‘ he smiled, ‘but before I discuss it, take off that filthy pyjama coat. I think it high time someone took a look at your chest.‘

  Even for doctors Sunday is — more or less — a day of rest, and Monday was never a popular morning in Leafy Grove for visiting the surgery. With the washing, the weekend mess, the kids to send clean to school, the shopping, and the cold joint to mince for shepherd‘s pie, if you wanted to sit down and enjoy your elevenses you couldn‘t indulge in medical consultations as well.

  But Mrs Perrins called regularly on Dr Dinwiddie at eight-thirty every Monday — except, of course, when she was on holiday or ill. It was part of her weekly routine and without it she felt as upset as missing her favourite television programme.

  ‘Good morning, Mrs Bowler, here we are again,‘ she announced cheerfully on the doormat. ‘Thank heavens that nasty rain‘s stopped. I‘ve brought Gregory.‘ She pushed a small adenoidal boy through the door. ‘I think he‘s a hospital case,‘ she whispered darkly, with satisfaction. Alter all, having your child in hospital created a bit of a stir among the neighbours, and vaguely raised your status in the road.

  Mrs Perrins settled heavily in her usual chair in the empty waiting-room, while Gregory sat idly kicking the paintwork from the fireplace. She always came early to avoid the rush - you never knew what you might pick up from all those awful people who kept patronizing doctors‘ surgeries. She would, as she often explained over a teacup, have visited Dr Dinwiddie as a private patient, because she didn‘t agree with this National Health Service, which made everyone lazy and caused all those strikes, but you had to pay your taxes so you might as well use it, mightn‘t you, my dear?

  She looked up sharply from her shredded magazine. Such an experienced patient sensed something amiss. Mrs Bowler, a thin woman in a flowered apron, had an unusually feverish air as she dropped cigarette ash on the haircord carpet and flicked her duster over The World‘s Greatest Paintings — presented free by some drug firm anxious to enlarge public appreciation of the arts, in what strikes me as rather uphill conditions.

  ‘Something the matter?‘ demanded Mrs Perrins, watching the housekeeper nervously light one Player‘s Weight from another.

  ‘Matter? Don‘t make me laugh!‘ She grimly polished the Mona Lisa. ‘It‘s a madhouse, that‘s what it is.‘

  ‘Not poor Dr Dinwiddie?‘ gasped Mrs Perrins. ‘He always did look the nervous type.‘

  ‘He‘s gorn.‘

  ‘Gorn?‘

  Mrs Bowler nodded, turning to the Lady at the Virginals. ‘Rushed out at seven this morning, fair jet propelled.‘

  ‘You don‘t mean he‘s in trouble, Mrs Bowler?‘

  ‘Nothing but trouble, if you ask me.‘

  Mrs Perrins pursed her lips. To the public there is only one sort of trouble that doctors get into. She rapidly ran through her mind all female acquaintances who were fellow-patients.

  ‘He‘s gone and got a locum in,‘ continued the housekeeper, starting on The Night Watch. ‘A Dr Spratt.‘

  ‘Really?‘ Mrs Perrins sat up. ‘What‘s he like?‘

  Mrs Bowler picked up the Bridge at Arles. ‘He wanted kidneys for breakfast,‘ she explained.

  ‘I mean, is he an old doctor?‘ asked Mrs Perrins. ‘Or is he an — er, young one? Gregory, stop that kicking this instant! You‘ll hurt your shoes. He‘s English, I hope,‘ she added nervously.

  ‘He‘s old and fat with a dirty great beard,‘ replied Mrs Bowler, pocketing her duster as the door-bell rang.

  Sir Lancelot was just coming downstairs, rubbing his hands. He was in an excellent mood, despite cornflakes for breakfast. ‘This should be a proper holiday for me,‘ he assured himself. ‘If I had my time over again, by George! I‘d be a GP like a shot. That‘s where the real medicine is. Mrs Bowler, send the first patient into the surgery, if you please,‘ he added to his handmaiden.

  His back that morning was splendid.

  ‘You‘re Mrs Perrins?‘ Sir Lancelot greeted his first caller jovially, picking up a record card and pushing a pair of Dr Dinwiddie‘s socks from the consulting desk. ‘And this charming lad is yours? What‘s your name, my little man? Gregory? Right, sit down there, Gregory, and keep quiet. Now, madam,‘ he continued expansiv
ely as she eased herself into the patients‘ chair, ‘what‘s the trouble?‘

  Mrs Perrins didn‘t like the look of the fat old man in the tweed suit. She wondered where Dr Dinwiddie had dug him up. But as an old customer of the firm, she‘d stand no nonsense from anyone fresh across the counter. Opening her handbag, she produced a sheet of writing paper.

  ‘First of all there‘s my list,‘ she began firmly.

  Sir Lancelot frowned. ‘You mean you are walking down on one side?‘

  ‘I want some cotton wool, of course, bottle of aspirin, cream for my poor hands, tinted lip salve, blackcurrant throat pastilles — Gregory so loves sucking them - liquid paraffin, surgical spirit, bottle ot sparkling glucose drink, that surgical detergent, and my usual mixture.‘

  Sir Lancelot frowned harder. ‘I don‘t think I quite follow you.‘

  ‘I want a prescription for them, of course,‘ she explained to the new man. ‘And can I get a hot-water bottle on the Health as well?‘

  Sir Lancelot rose. ‘I fear you have been misdirected. I noticed the cash chemist‘s on the far side of the railway station. Good morning. Mrs Bowler! The next case.‘

  ‘But I always have these!‘ exclaimed Mrs Perrins in surprise. ‘I‘m entitled to them. I‘ve stuck on my stamps, the same as everyone else.‘

  ‘I fear you are confusing the Ministry of Health with the King Korn Company.‘

  She bit her lip. ‘Anyway, there‘s my chest,‘ she retreated. It wasn‘t her idea of a consultation to leave empty-handed.

  ‘Very well,‘ Sir Lancelot agreed. ‘Remove your garments and I shall examine you.‘

  ‘Examine me!‘ This was too much. ‘But I don‘t want my chest examined. I was examined thoroughly the winter before last. I only want some more medicine.‘

  ‘Either I examine your chest or you take it to another doctor. Mrs Bowler!‘

  ‘Yers?‘

  ‘Kindly step in while I examine a female patient.‘

  ‘I‘ve got my dusting to think of.‘

  ‘And I‘ve got my reputation to think of. Gregory, you will kindly shut your eyes and face the wall.‘

  ‘Now perhaps I can have my bottle of medicine,‘ Mrs Perrins asked grimly, doing up the last buttons of her blouse afterwards.