The Summer of Sir Lancelot

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