The Doctor’s Dilemma

epub:type="z3998:persona">Schutzmacher Oh, in my case the secret was simple enough, though I suppose I should have got into trouble if it had attracted any notice. And I’m afraid you’ll think it rather infra dig. Ridgeon Oh, I have an open mind. What was the secret? Schutzmacher Well, the secret was just two words. Ridgeon Not Consultation Free, was it? Schutzmacher Shocked. No, no. Really! Ridgeon Apologetic. Of course not. I was only joking. Schutzmacher My two words were simply Cure Guaranteed. Ridgeon Admiring. Cure Guaranteed! Schutzmacher Guaranteed. After all, that’s what everybody wants from a doctor, isn’t it? Ridgeon My dear loony, it was an inspiration. Was it on the brass plate? Schutzmacher There was no brass plate. It was a shop window: red, you know, with black lettering. Doctor Leo Schutzmacher, L.R.C.P.M.R.C.S. Advice and medicine sixpence. Cure Guaranteed. Ridgeon And the guarantee proved sound nine times out of ten, eh? Schutzmacher Rather hurt at so moderate an estimate. Oh, much oftener than that. You see, most people get well all right if they are careful and you give them a little sensible advice. And the medicine really did them good. Parrish’s Chemical Food: phosphates, you know. One tablespoonful to a twelve-ounce bottle of water: nothing better, no matter what the case is. Ridgeon Redpenny: make a note of Parrish’s Chemical Food. Schutzmacher I take it myself, you know, when I feel run down. Goodbye. You don’t mind my calling, do you? Just to congratulate you. Ridgeon Delighted, my dear Loony. Come to lunch on Saturday next week. Bring your motor and take me down to Hertford. Schutzmacher I will. We shall be delighted. Thank you. Goodbye. He goes out with Ridgeon, who returns immediately. Redpenny Old Paddy Cullen was here before you were up, to be the first to congratulate you. Ridgeon Indeed. Who taught you to speak of Sir Patrick Cullen as old Paddy Cullen, you young ruffian? Redpenny You never call him anything else. Ridgeon Not now that I am Sir Colenso. Next thing, you fellows will be calling me old Colly Ridgeon. Redpenny We do, at St. Anne’s. Ridgeon Yach! That’s what makes the medical student the most disgusting figure in modern civilization. No veneration, no manners⁠—no⁠— Emmy At the door, announcing. Sir Patrick Cullen. She retires. Sir Patrick Cullen is more than twenty years older than Ridgeon, not yet quite at the end of his tether, but near it and resigned to it. His name, his plain, downright, sometimes rather arid common sense, his large build and stature, the absence of those odd moments of ceremonial servility by which an old English doctor sometimes shows you what the status of the profession was in England in his youth, and an occasional turn of speech, are Irish; but he has lived all his life in England and is thoroughly acclimatized. His manner to Ridgeon, whom he likes, is whimsical and fatherly: to others he is a little gruff and uninviting, apt to substitute more or less expressive grunts for articulate speech, and generally indisposed, at his age, to make much social effort. He shakes Ridgeon’s hand and beams at him cordially and jocularly. Sir Patrick Well, young chap. Is your hat too small for you, eh? Ridgeon Much too small. I owe it all to you. Sir Patrick Blarney, my boy. Thank you all the same. He sits in one of the armchairs near the fireplace. Ridgeon sits on the couch. I’ve come to talk to you a bit. To Redpenny. Young man: get out. Redpenny Certainly, Sir Patrick He collects his papers and makes for the door. Sir Patrick Thank you. That’s a good lad. Redpenny vanishes. They all put up with me, these young chaps, because I’m an old man, a real old man, not like you. You’re only beginning to give yourself the airs of age. Did you ever see a boy cultivating a moustache? Well, a middle-aged doctor cultivating a grey head is much the same sort of spectacle. Ridgeon Good Lord! yes: I suppose so. And I thought that the days of my vanity were past. Tell me: at what age does a man leave off being a fool? Sir Patrick Remember the Frenchman who asked his grandmother at what age we get free from the temptations of love. The old woman said she didn’t know. Ridgeon laughs. Well, I make you the same answer. But the world’s growing very interesting to me now, Colly. Ridgeon You keep up your interest in science, do you? Sir Patrick Lord! yes. Modern science is a wonderful thing. Look at your great discovery! Look at all the great discoveries! Where are they leading to? Why, right back to my poor dear old father’s ideas and discoveries. He’s been dead now over forty years. Oh, it’s very interesting. Ridgeon Well, there’s nothing like progress, is there? Sir Patrick Don’t misunderstand me, my boy. I’m not belittling your discovery. Most discoveries are made regularly every fifteen years; and it’s fully a hundred and fifty since yours was made last. That’s something to be proud of. But your discovery’s not new. It’s only inoculation. My father practised inoculation until it was made criminal in eighteen-forty. That broke the poor old man’s heart, Colly: he died of it. And now it turns out that my father was right after all. You’ve brought us back to inoculation. Ridgeon I know nothing about smallpox. My line is tuberculosis and typhoid and plague. But of course the principle of all vaccines is the same. Sir Patrick Tuberculosis? M‑m‑m‑m! You’ve found out how to cure consumption, eh? Ridgeon I believe so. Sir Patrick Ah yes. It’s very interesting. What is it the old cardinal says in Browning’s play? “I have known four and twenty leaders of revolt.” Well, I’ve known over thirty men that found out how to cure consumption. Why do people go on dying of it, Colly? Devilment, I suppose. There was my father’s old friend George Boddington of Sutton Coldfield. He discovered the open-air cure in eighteen-forty. He was ruined and driven out of his practice