Read Online Doctor at Large by Richard Gordon - Free Book Online

kip.’
    ‘Very wise of you, my dear. Early to bed and early to rise is a perfectly sound motto physiologically.’
    ‘Good night one and all,’ she said cheerfully, gathering her knitting. ‘Sleep tight, Dr Gordon.’
    As soon as she had left the room Dr Hockett turned the fire out.
    ‘Sweltering in here, Doctor, isn’t it? Now that my wife has retired we can have a talk on professional matters. I don’t like to discuss such things in front of her. First of all, your duties. You will see the National Health patients twice a day at the surgery in Football Ground Road, and take all the night calls. I see the rest and the private patients, such as they are, in my consulting-room here. I don’t go out at night.’ He gave me another look under his eyebrows. ‘I don’t like leaving Jasmine alone. She is still very young.’
    ‘Quite understandable.’
    There was a pause.
    ‘A very attractive woman, Jasmine,’ he added.
    ‘Most attractive, sir,’ I agreed politely. As he continued to stare at me in silence, I shifted in my chair and added, ‘I mean, in a sort of utterly platonic way, and all that, you know.’
    After gazing at me for several more seconds he suddenly produced a key on a string from his waistcoat pocket. ‘This is the duplicate key of the drug cupboard in my surgery next door. There are only two keys in the house. Please see that the cupboard is always locked. I do not think it wise for Jasmine to have access to it.’ He handed me the key and went on, ‘Jasmine is in many ways somewhat childish. As we are to work closely together, Doctor, I think it best for me to confide in you now. It may come as a shock to you to hear that Jasmine was my daily maid before becoming my wife.’
    ‘No! Really?’
    ‘I had practised abroad for many years. Out East. I never married. Marriage somehow seemed always beyond my means. However, when I settled here – I nevertheless love Jasmine very deeply, Doctor,’ he continued, staring hard. ‘I would not like to see anyone harm a hair of her head.’
    ‘That’s the spirit,’ I said brightly. I was now feeling badly in need of a drink. ‘After all, you’re her husband and all that, aren’t you?’
    ‘Yes, Doctor,’ he murmured. ‘I am her husband.’
    He then rose, switched out the light, and suggested we went to bed.
     
    Breakfast the next morning was tea and porridge. Dr Hockett didn’t believe in overloading the gastric absorption so early in the day.
    The meal was begun in silence, because Hockett was attending to his morning mail. The general practitioner’s daily postbag is filled with advertisements from the pharmaceutical firms and boxes of free samples, which are passed by most of their recipients directly into the wastepaper basket. But Hockett carefully opened each one, smoothing the envelopes for future use and reading the shiny pages of advertisements from the coloured slogans at the top to the formulae in small type at the bottom.
    ‘Surely, sir, you don’t believe in all that rubbish?’ I asked. I felt I had been bullied long enough in the house, and I had slept sufficiently badly to have the courage of a bad temper. ‘At St Swithin’s we were taught to chuck advertisements away unopened.’
    ‘On the contrary, Doctor, I find I derive a great deal of medical information from them. One of the difficulties of a general practitioner is keeping up with the latest work. And all the medical journals are so infernally expensive.’
    ‘But look at the muck they send in free samples! No GP in his right mind would prescribe it. This, for instance–’ I picked up a large bottle of green liquid labelled DR FARRER’S FAMOUS FEMALE FERTILITY FOOD.
    ‘Careful, Doctor! Don’t drop it. As a matter of fact I keep all the samples. I have several hundred in the cupboard in my consulting-room. My private patients seem glad enough of them.’
    ‘You charge for them, I suppose, sir?’ I asked coldly.
    ‘Naturally,’ he replied without