Doctor in Clover

20

It had been raining heavily all day. It had been raining heavily all the day before. In fact it had been raining heavily as long as I could remember, and I was beginning to get the feeling of living under water.

I looked through the window of the clinic, which was constructed largely of old petrol tins. There was the River Amazon, very muddy and full of crocodiles. Beyond were some trees. Behind were some trees, and all round were more trees. It struck me what a damn silly song it was they used to sing about the beastly things.

I wondered whenever I'd see London again. I'd had a pretty miserable week while Miles fixed me up with the oil company, mooching round saying good-bye to things I'd hardly thought twice about before, such as Nelson's Column and the swans on the Serpentine. I'd already forgotten how long I'd been in Brazil, the only newspapers coming with the weekly launch, but I supposed it was only a couple of months. That meant another four years or so before I would ever again taste a mouthful of good old London fog. I wondered if Miles had got his job. I wondered if Sir Lancelot had got his cash, I wondered who had won the November Handicap. I wondered if I were going steadily potty, and would see my old chums again only between a couple of those chaps in neat blue suits you sometimes saw lurking round St Swithin's.

My reflections were interrupted by a cry behind me of, 'Hello, Grimalkin, old thing!

How'd you like another little game of rummy?'

I turned to face Dr Janet Pebbley, my professional colleague.

'I suppose so. There doesn't seem anything else much to do for the next five years.'

'Gosh, you're funny! But I always say, there's nothing like a game of cards for passing the time. When my friend Hilda and I were doing our midder at the Femina, I always said to her, "Hilda," I said, "let's have another little game of rummy, and I bet they'll be popping like corks again all over the place before we've even had time to notice it."'

Janet Pebbley and I had arrived together to share the job of looking after the locals' bad feet and yellow fever inoculations, and she was the only Englishwoman I had to talk to. In fact, she was the only person in the whole of Brazil I had to talk to except myself, and I'd tried that a few times already. Personally, I'm generally in favour of female doctors, who these days all wear nice hair-dos and nice nylons, but Janet was one of the standard type whose psychological development became arrested somewhere about the hockey stage. She was a tall, pink-faced girl, qualified a few years before from the London Femina, who looked as if she could rearrange Stonehenge single-handed.

The trouble was, I was falling in love with her.

I suppose that psychiatrist in Wimpole Street would have explained it as a conflict between my id and my super-ego, but as far as I was concerned I knew it was a damn silly thing to do. But seeing Janet every day, I somehow had no alternative. It's like when they stick a pair of rats in a cage in the physiology laboratory. When she emerged from her tiny bungalow for breakfast every morning with a hearty cry of, 'Hello, there, Grimalkin! How's the old liver today?' I knew perfectly well I should lock myself in and tell her to call me in five years' time. But I didn't. I sat at the table, eyeing her like a hungry cat in a cheesemonger's.

'What are you going to do, Grimalkin?' she asked, when we'd finished our meal of pork and beans that evening. 'When your contract's up and you go home, I mean.'

I looked past the oil-lamp through the clinic window, where insects nobody had ever heard of before were jostling in the darkness. It was still raining, of course.

'I don't think I can see quite as far ahead as that.'

'I can. This five years will pass in a flash. An absolute flash. As I said to my friend Hilda the very day we were starting together at the Femina, time always does flash by if you will it to. You know what I'm going to do?'

'No?'

'I'll have a bit of money saved up then.

We'll both have, won't we? Nothing to spend it on here except fags. First I'm going to have a jolly good tramp all over Scotland.

Then I'm going to settle down in practice somewhere in the Midlands. My friend Hilda's up there, and strictly between _entre nous_ she could fix an opening.' She made a little squiggle with her finger on the tablecloth. 'Two openings, if she wanted to.'

I realized I'd taken her other hand.

Janet-'

'Yes?'

'You're jolly nice, you know.'

'Go on with you, Grimalkin.'

'But you are. Honestly. The nicest girl I can remember. Janet, I-'

But luckily the old super-ego fell like a trip-hammer.

'Yes, Grimalkin?'

'Nothing,' I said.

'You're not looking very bright tonight.'

'The heat, you know. The rain. Bit worked up.'

'How'd you like a nice game of rummy? It will help you to unwind.'

'I suppose so,' I said, though I felt the spring had bust long ago.

The next night I kissed her.

'Grimalkin!' she shrieked. 'You shouldn't!'

'But Janet, I-I love you.'

There was silence, except for the rain on the roof.

'I do. Really and truly. Cross my heart, you're the only girl in my life.'

'Oh, Grimalkin! I knew it. As soon as I set eyes on you at London Airport, I could tell you'd taken to me. I don't know what it was. Perhaps it was the sad sort of look you had. I knew you'd want someone like me to cheer you up.'

Being cheered up by Janet Pebbley was like having your back scratched with a horse-rake, and perhaps the memory of it brought down the super-ego again.

'Haven't you anything else to say?' she asked.

But I shook my head, and we had another game of rummy.

The next day she left in the launch for a week at the company's headquarters in Manaus. As I'd read all the books and damp had got into the gramophone and you can't play rummy by yourself, I spent the evenings contemplating life somewhere like Porterhampton with Janet. There would be her friend Hilda, of course. And that tramp round Scotland. But I was so ruddy lonely looking at the rain, I started counting the days till she'd come back as carefully as the months till we'd both be released. After all, she wasn't a bad sort of girl. A bit jolly at breakfast, admittedly, but I could get used to that. Her friend Hilda might be quite witty and delightful. Come to think of it, I'd always wanted to have a good look at Scotland. The British Consul in Manaus could marry us, and that would leave a whole bungalow free for playing rummy in.

I started to prepare little speeches, and wonder if it would possibly be a fine day for the wedding.

Janet came back to the camp with more pork and beans and a couple of new packs of playing cards. I waited until we finished our evening meal, and when the Brazilian cook chap had cleared away the dishes said:

'Janet-'

'Yes, Grimalkin.'

'I have something I want to ask you.'

'Really, Grimalkin?'

The super-ego quivered on its bearings. The mechanism had rusted like everything else in the ruddy climate.

'Janet, we've got on pretty well these last few weeks or months or whatever they've been, haven't we?'

'Like houses on fire, Grimalkin.'

'I mean, we've managed to hit it off pretty well together.'

'You've certainly kept me entertained with all your jokes. Especially that one about the bishop and the-'

'What I mean is, I thought, in the light of experience and under the circumstances, that is, you wouldn't mind if I asked you-'

'Go on, Grimalkin.'

There was a shocking crash, indicating somebody knocking on the corrugated iron door.

'Just one moment.'

I unlatched the door. Outside was Mr Carboy, in a Homburg and holding an umbrella.

'At last!' he cried. 'I am in the presence of the master. Allow me to shake you by the hand.'

He did, scattering drops of water all over the place.

'But-but what on earth are you doing in Brazil?' I stared at him. 'I thought you were busy correcting proofs in Bloomsbury.'

'My dear fellow! Luckily I was half-way here on holiday in Nassau when the news came.'

'News? What news?'

'But haven't you heard? About your book, of course. Tremendous success, my dear chap! We've reprinted it six times already and burnt out two rotary machines. Magnificent notices-look, I've got some of them here. Union Jack have been cabling me every day for the film rights. I might tell you that Melody Madder herself is absolutely desperate for the part of the girl. Why, you've got the whole country laughing its head off with your portrait of that pompous and pig-headed little surgeon.'

This was all very confusing.

'But-but-dash it! When you gave me that contract thing to sign in London, you said the book trade was in such a state nobody read any new novels any more.'

'Ah, well, you're a doctor. You know it's sometimes better to say the patient's going to die and collect the credit, eh? Ha ha! Talking of contracts, a fellow from Potter and Webley hasn't been prowling round, has he? Nasty little man with a moustache and a dirty brief-case. Good! Well, perhaps you'd like to sign this here and now for your next six books. Substantially increased royalties, of course. How d'you do, madam.' He noticed Janet. 'So sorry to disturb your evening. But we won't be long, as we can't keep the launch waiting.'

'Launch waiting?' I felt a touch of the vertigo. 'We," did you say? But I've got a job here. For the next five years, at any rate.'

'My dear fellow, I soon fixed that with the oil people. Your replacement's arriving tomorrow. Why, you've got receptions, television, personal appearances, and no end of work to face. Better hurry up, the plane leaves at midnight. Another few hours and you'll be facing the photographers in London.'

I wondered whether this was all hallucinations, due to the collapse of my psychological mechanisms.

'Well,' I said, 'I suppose I'd better pack.'

'Grimalkin-'

'Ah, yes?' I'd forgotten Janet.

'What was it you…you were going to ask me?'

'I was just going to ask if you'd care for another game of rummy,' I said.

Ten minutes later I was in the launch. I noticed that the rain had stopped.