Doctor On The Boil Read Free Page A

wish I could offer you hospitality. Josephine and I would be absolutely delighted if you could stay with us. Absolutely delighted! But we’re quite full, right to the eaves. There’s not only Miss MacNish, but now we’ve an au pair girl from Sweden, and the only spare bedroom the two children use for studying.’
    Sir Lancelot grunted. ‘How are your kids, anyway?’
    The dean’s expression, so far in the conversation resembling a man in the dentist’s waiting for the drill to hit the nerve, relaxed into a proud smile. ‘Muriel won the gold medal in anatomy, and George has got through his second MB – admittedly after one or two tries he is never at his best in examinations, being a somewhat nervous lad. So both have started work in our wards.’
    The dean’s fingers, feeling idly in his pocket, discovered a ball of crumpled paper. Mystified, he drew it out and spread it across the blotter. He read the message, hastily screwed it up and pocketed it again. ‘To what must we be grateful for this – er, brief visit?’ he asked Sir Lancelot, who was staring at him with raised eyebrows.
    The surgeon helped himself to a pinch of snuff. ‘I am here for two reasons. Firstly, I have a cough.’
    ‘Oh? I’m sorry.’
    ‘It’s not frequent. Worse in the mornings. No haemoptysis, or anything sinister like that. It came on towards the end of my eastern tour. That’s what prevented me from seeing the Taj Mahal – it seemed best not to risk the expedition, and anyway you can always look at the place on picture-postcards. I don’t think I’ve anything serious. But of course, one must have any persistent cough investigated.’
    ‘Most certainly.’
    ‘So I’ve come to you. You’re a member of the physicians’ union. I’m a surgeon, and therefore know nothing whatever about the chest, except as a convenient shelf for your instruments while you’re operating.’
    ‘My dear Lancelot, of course I’ll do what I can.’ The dean was flooded with the sympathy of all medical men towards others undergoing the indignity of being ill themselves. ‘Come up to my ward after lunch. I’ll examine you and fix up X-rays and so forth, if necessary. There’s a side-room empty at the moment, getting ready for the class examinations on Monday week.’ He rubbed his hands. ‘I’m really going to stretch the little blighters this time. There’s been far too much slacking in the medical school lately, nothing but girls, poker, and electric guitars.’
    ‘That’s very good of you,’ said Sir Lancelot amicably. ‘My second reason is another complaint, one from which the whole world suffers. Boredom.’
    The dean gave a sigh, drumming his fingers lightly on the desk. ‘It is the blessing of our arduous profession, the unending flow of interesting work.’
    ‘Exactly,’ Sir Lancelot agreed firmly. ‘As you know, I retired prematurely. At the height of my powers. But I felt I’d done my bit for both humanity and the tax-collector. I wanted to enjoy my country house in Wales. Perhaps it was selfish of me.’
    ‘All of us here thought it an estimable idea,’ the dean assured him warmly.
    ‘Then of course my poor wife died. Now I’m lonely. One can fish only during the season. One cannot continually orbit the earth as a tourist. As an Englishman, I would not presume to interest myself in local politics, and anyway they are totally impossible to comprehend. I need an object in life.’
    The dean nodded. ‘They say philately can be most interesting. Or the collecting of butterflies and moths. Possibly bird-watching? Or pot-holing?’
    ‘My dear Dean.’ Sir Lancelot rose, with his hands behind his back, starting slowly to pace the room. ‘You are of course familiar with the charter of our distinguished hospital?’
    ‘Granted by Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the First,’ the dean recited fondly. ‘I have often studied the original parchment. Quite awesome how its terms still govern much of our life here.’
    ‘ Quite