The Doctor’s Dilemma

a man knows best; and sometimes he knows worst. You’d much better cure them both. Ridgeon I can’t. I’m at my limit. I can squeeze in one more case, but not two. I must choose. Sir Patrick Well, you must choose as if she didn’t exist: that’s clear. Ridgeon Is that clear to you? Mind: it’s not clear to me. She troubles my judgment. Sir Patrick To me, it’s a plain choice between a man and a lot of pictures. Ridgeon It’s easier to replace a dead man than a good picture. Sir Patrick Colly: when you live in an age that runs to pictures and statues and plays and brass bands because its men and women are not good enough to comfort its poor aching soul, you should thank Providence that you belong to a profession which is a high and great profession because its business is to heal and mend men and women. Ridgeon In short, as a member of a high and great profession, I’m to kill my patient. Sir Patrick Don’t talk wicked nonsense. You can’t kill him. But you can leave him in other hands. Ridgeon In B.B.’s, for instance: eh? Looking at him significantly. Sir Patrick Demurely facing his look. Sir Ralph Bloomfield Bonington is a very eminent physician. Ridgeon He is. Sir Patrick I’m going for my hat. Ridgeon strikes the bell as Sir Patrick makes for the hotel. A waiter comes. Ridgeon To the waiter. My bill, please. Waiter Yes, sir. He goes for it.

Act III

In Dubedat’s studio. Viewed from the large window the outer door is in the wall on the left at the near end. The door leading to the inner rooms is in the opposite wall, at the far end. The facing wall has neither window nor door. The plaster on all the walls is uncovered and undecorated, except by scrawlings of charcoal sketches and memoranda. There is a studio throne (a chair on a dais) a little to the left, opposite the inner door, and an easel to the right, opposite the outer door, with a dilapidated chair at it. Near the easel and against the wall is a bare wooden table with bottles and jars of oil and medium, paint-smudged rags, tubes of color, brushes, charcoal, a small lay figure, a kettle and spirit-lamp, and other odds and ends. By the table is a sofa, littered with drawing blocks, sketchbooks, loose sheets of paper, newspapers, books, and more smudged rags. Next the outer door is an umbrella and hat stand, occupied partly by Louis’ hats and cloak and muffler, and partly by odds and ends of costumes. There is an old piano stool on the near side of this door. In the corner near the inner door is a little tea-table. A lay figure, in a cardinal’s robe and hat, with an hourglass in one hand and a scythe slung on its back, smiles with inane malice at Louis, who, in a milkman’s smock much smudged with colors, is painting a piece of brocade which he has draped about his wife. She is sitting on the throne, not interested in the painting, and appealing to him very anxiously about another matter.

Mrs. Dubedat	Promise.
Louis	Putting on a touch of paint with notable skill and care and answering quite perfunctorily. I promise, my darling.
Mrs. Dubedat	When you want money, you will always come to me.
Louis	But it’s so sordid, dearest. I hate money. I can’t keep always bothering you for money, money, money. That’s what drives me sometimes to ask other people, though I hate doing it.
Mrs. Dubedat	It is far better to ask me, dear. It gives people a wrong idea of you.
Louis	But I want to spare your little fortune, and raise money on my own work. Don’t be unhappy, love: I can easily earn enough to pay it all back. I shall have a one-man-show next season; and then there will be no more money troubles. Putting down his palette. There! I mustn’t do any more on that until it’s bone-dry; so you may come down.
Mrs. Dubedat	Throwing off the drapery as she steps down, and revealing a plain frock of tussore silk. But you have promised, remember, seriously and faithfully, never to borrow again until you have first asked me.
Louis	Seriously and faithfully. Embracing her. Ah, my love, how right you are! how much it means to me to have you by me to guard me against living too much in the skies. On my solemn oath, from this moment forth I will never borrow another penny.
Mrs. Dubedat	Delighted. Ah, that’s right. Does his wicked worrying wife torment him and drag him down from the clouds? She kisses him. And now, dear, won’t you finish those drawings for Maclean?
Louis	Oh, they don’t matter. I’ve got nearly all the money from him in advance.
Mrs. Dubedat	But, dearest, that is just the reason why you should finish them. He asked me the other day whether you really intended to finish them.
Louis	Confound his impudence! What the devil does he take me for? Now that just destroys all my interest in the beastly job. I’ve a good mind to throw up the commission, and pay him back his money.
Mrs. Dubedat	We can’t afford that, dear. You had better finish the drawings and have done with them. I think it is a mistake to accept money in advance.
Louis	But how are we to live?
Mrs. Dubedat	Well, Louis, it is getting hard enough as it is, now that they are all refusing to pay except on delivery.
Louis	Damn those fellows! they think of nothing and care for nothing but their wretched money.
Mrs. Dubedat	Still, if they pay us, they ought to have what they pay for.
Louis	Coaxing;. There now: that’s enough lecturing for today. I’ve promised to be good, haven’t I?
Mrs. Dudebat	Putting her arms round his neck. You know that I hate lecturing, and that I don’t for