Cards of Identity

by Nigel Dennis

  ‘The religious aspect is going to be a nuisance,’ said Mrs Mallet.

  ‘Not if you keep out of deep water, my dear. Don’t try to be profound about it; try and make it chime with Florrie, if you see what I mean. I shall supply the heavy Florence metaphysics. How interesting it was, by the way, to find the withered old habit still latent in her!’

  ‘It puts me on the rocks, rather,’ said Beaufort. ‘I shall find it hard to be both devout and sporting, reverent and naughty.’

  ‘Quite so: you are too young for Friar Tuck.’

  ‘And too good a figure, thank heaven!’ said Mrs Mallet.

  ‘I suggest a bolder course,’ said the captain. ‘You are the apple of her eye, are you not? She has mothered you ever since you were a baby. She knew my first wife and, at heart, I am sorry to say, still feels that my second marriage was a betrayal of that dear memory, of which you are the sole fruit. But who are you, a thoughtless boy, to be aware of the tragic loss you sustained in infancy? As far as you know, you are perfectly happy and are merely amused by her efforts to consider you an orphan. Her religious views strike you as somewhat comical – the comedy of those we love. Your attitude to her deepest feelings is one of sceptical, jesting irreverence. Laugh sardonically, though in a kindly way; enough to shock her into worrying about your wild character. She will give you a long, grave, muddled lecture on Christian principles, to which you will say something like: “You’re a good sort, Florrie, you really are,” and give her a hearty kiss. She will love you far more if she feels that it is her duty to reform you: that’s only human. I am sure you will do it very well: I don’t want you to become merely a man of action: I think of you, in full maturity, as comparable to one of our generals, earning his living by bloodshed but convinced that he is at heart a student of poetry.’

  ‘You don’t think Jellicoe will want to marry the widowed Mrs Paradise?’ asked Mrs Mallet.

  ‘I think there will be too many obstacles. There is the religious barrier, for one thing. He has not her faith. There is his past. He probably went through ceremonies of marriage with at least two women. He is certainly an absentee father.’

  ‘In brief, poor Mrs Paradise is too good for him,’ said Mrs Mallet.

  ‘And, I suspect, too fat. He is a neat man.’

  ‘She is to retain the name Paradise, is she?’ asked Beaufort.

  ‘I think so. The addition of “Mrs” is change enough. Jellicoe will assume the Christian name Henry, one which Mrs Paradise greatly esteems.’

  ‘What a lot of nostalgic memories she is going to have!’ said Beaufort. ‘Does she know how different they are from Jellicoe’s?’

  ‘He is too polite to speak openly about them. But she knows – or will know after we have dropped a few hints – that he was only just saved in time.’

  ‘You don’t think he should have a dead wife?’

  ‘No. Two living ones are quite enough. I don’t want him to feel like a murderer – which is what all widowers feel sure they are.’

  The captain got up, paced the floor, and looked at his watch. ‘Two in two days,’ he said; ‘that’s not bad. The President will be impressed. But we must work very hard if we are to have not only a staff but a steady, stable staff when the Session opens. What have you to report, Beaufort?’

  ‘Promising stuff. Last night I lay awake wondering where I could best find, collected together, the largest and most varied number of local people. What, I asked myself, is today the most popular social resort? I thought of the cinema; but it is too dark inside; I thought of the local auction, but it is too distracting. Suddenly, I saw it in a flash: the doctor’s morning “Surgery”.’

  ‘Bravo!’ cried the captain, gently clapping his hands.

  ‘I got down there sharp at opening-time this morning. To my delight I found that no less than four doctors, all in partnership, plus a nurse, cater for Hyde’s Mortimer and its environs. Their ages range roughly from twenty-five to seventy-five: all are in an unbecoming condition of intense hysteria. This condition is not shared by the patients, of whom, this morning, there were twelve men, fourteen women, and six children. Save for hacking coughs and muted whispers to the children, all sat in relaxed silence in an ante-room, on close-set chairs that followed the walls round in an eternal square with an occasional gap for a door. Old papers, which the children love to tear, stand on a central table; a large filing cabinet in a corner, with one drawer always dangling out, contains the visitors’ Health dossiers.

  ‘What impresses one about this “surgery” is that it seems perfectly to realize and to blend two old and popular dreams – the pub-keeper’s dream of a respectable clientele and the parson’s dream of a happy congregation. The ritual sense is over-poweringly strong, particularly as all visitors to “Surgery” keep their eyes closed, cast-down, or fixed in lively expectations on the narrow door that leads to those mysterious rooms where the hysterical gods are at work with swab and kidney basin.

  ‘After I had waited, soaking up the feel of it, for some fifteen minutes, the narrow door opened and the nurse put her head into the room. She cried winningly: “Mrs Chirk? Is Mrs Chirk here?” and then immediately withdrew her head again like one who knows that though this ritual call must be made, it can never be answered. Then, quite suddenly, the whole place came alive. The door flew open as if pushed by a whirlwind and the lunatic face of an arch-priest flashed on the scene. In a high, cracked voice, he screamed: “Who’s next? Who’s next for me?”

  ‘A thin, melancholy figure disengaged itself from the circle with a rustling of withdrawing woollens. He spoke no word, only tottered slowly to the open door, where the doctor, his face quivering, seized him by the shoulder, threw him down the passage, and ran after him like a greyhound. The rest of the “Surgery” were pleased by this and began a sort of expanding movement with their buttocks, so that within a few seconds it was impossible to detect the space vacated by the sacrifice. It would not surprise me to learn that when only one patient is left in “Surgery”, he, as a result of the tremendous initial compression and subsequent expanding exercises, is able easily to cover all the chairs.

  ‘But scarcely had the door closed when it flew open again and a second, different, medical form forced itself through in wild anxiety, its trembling fingers running through its hair like a grass-fire. “Any more for me?” he cried. “Next, next, for me, next, next, next, come along now, who’s next, next?” The sound of gnashing teeth followed his words, and he began passionately to bite his nails.

  ‘There was another tearing sound from a point in the circle and another overcoated figure propelled itself tramp-like over the linoleum. It waved a paper slip, on which the mad doctor bent a malignant eye.

  ‘“If you’d sign this, Dr Burke,” the patient muttered. “My cough was only good for last week.”

  ‘“No, no, not me!” screamed the doctor, shrinking back as from a leper or a whore. “Nurse will do it; get nurse, nurse…. Now, next for me; who’s next?”

  ‘The disappointed patient turned to resume his seat, only to find, of course, that nothing softer than a steel wedge could insert itself between his late companions. While he stood there, fretting, the nurse’s face, crying faintly “Mrs Chirk? Mrs Chirk?” appeared over the doctor’s trembling shoulder; and over her shoulder, in turn, loomed up the passionate face of yet another doctor, who shouted: “For me? For me? Next? Next?” And then, realizing that he was not visible to most of the patients, he lowered his voice to a distinctive boom, and shouted: “For Dr Towzer! Who’s for Towzer?”

  ‘“For Dr Burke – next, next!” screamed the doctor in front, nettled by his colleague’s use of an individual name.

  ‘“Mrs Chirk? Mrs Chirk?” trilled the nurse.’

  ‘Dear me, what bedlam!’ said the captain.

  ‘“Pardon me, Dr Burke,” murmured the nurse, manoeuvring one hand under his splayed arm and seeking to insert her fingers into the filing cabinet – only to find them closing on the slip of paper which the cough
ing patient had skilfully insinuated over the top of the cards. “If you’d just sign this, Miss …” he suggested.

  ‘“Towzer, Towzer!” bellowed the rearmost physician, flattening himself against the passage wall as Dr Burke began desperately to push one of the patients before him out of the room. “While you’re here, Dr Burke, you’d better take your coffee,” said the nurse lightly, studying the slip of paper but reaching backwards into a dark recess of the passage with her free hand and vaguely resting a steaming cup on the bent shoulder-blade of Dr Burke’s victim. “Mrs Chirk is not here?” she added, raising a pencil on a long string and signing the slip of paper.

  ‘As you see, the field was now left pretty clear for Dr Towzer, who advanced to the very centre of the doorway, brushing spots of Dr Burke’s coffee from his suit. The seated patients looked up at him in a friendly way, not resenting his tense and curious glare. The nurse came to his help by suddenly fixing a detective’s eye on a woman with two children and asking sharply: “Aren’t you for Dr Towzer?”

  ‘“Didn’t know it was my turn,” said the woman, rising and pressing her children forward.

  ‘All the patients were delighted by this plain, honest reply. But not Dr Towzer, who allowed a look of unbearable irritation to run down the dry furrows of his face. When the rattling and sniffling of his and his patients’ progress down the passage had ended at last in a loud crack – whether a slammed door or a snapped bone, I cannot say – the nurse, spotting a group of late-comers hobbling up the surgery path, glanced at her watch and then crossed the room swiftly and pressed down the catch of the Yale lock. This sally was received with smug satisfaction of a most disgraceful kind by those who were safely inside: they reminded me of the favoured drunkards who are allowed to remain secretly on the premises when the landlord cries: “Time, gentlemen, please!”

  ‘“Now,” said the nurse, placing her hands firmly on her broad hips, “Is Mrs Chirk not here?”

  ‘All the patients stared shyly at the ceiling. They were trying to avoid the nurse’s accusing eye – for it was clear that even the men suspected that they might be Mrs Chirk. But they also hoped to avoid the appealing faces which the late-comers outside were now pressing, with mingled hope and hostility, against the window pane. After some moments of thus pressing, while feebly twisting the handle of the locked door and giving little knocks, the rejected ones staggered away, hobbling much more than they had before and allowing the gaunt necks of their empty medicine bottles to protrude indignantly from their pockets. As their steps died away, a tired but pleasant-looking woman got up and said: “My name’s Mrs Finch, Nurse.”’

  ‘Capital! Capital!’ cried the captain.

  ‘“Well!” exclaimed the nurse: “You are a nice one, aren’t you? Here I’ve been calling you all the morning! Come along now at once, and please don’t hold the whole queue up like that again.”

  ‘I am sure the other patients relished this conclusion to the treasure-hunt: they stared excitedly as the unveiled witch was passed on to the priests wearing an expression of ashamed perplexity. The nurse followed, closing the temple door behind her, and the ante-room became wonderfully peaceful again. In fact, one daring young man lit up a cigarette and said: “Well, they’re moving pretty fast this morning.”

  ‘What a silly thing to say when you are waiting for something! Everyone in the room, myself included, winced at the young man’s provocation of the fates. And sure enough, next moment a thundering noise sounded down the passage, the temple door flew open, and Drs Burke and Towzer, each gripping a black bag and struggling into an overcoat, stormed through the door like Furies and shot out into the street. An instant later we heard the roarings of their new and powerful cars, followed by the painful clashes of clutchs and gear-levers fallen into the hands of madmen. A long sigh passed round the room: only two doctors now remained to assuage whole centuries’ accumulation of medical neglect. Everyone relapsed into his other, older self; and even when Mrs Chirk, or Finch, passed through on her way home, she was ignored by her late fellows as a thing belonging to other days, a vision once captured but now escaped again. I felt so sad that I waited no longer, but passed out into the open world again like a visitor emerging from the tunnels of the Great Pyramid.’

  ‘Darling, you have done simply wonderfully!’ exclaimed Mrs Mallet. ‘I could eat you up!’

  ‘You most certainly deserve the lady’s appetite, Beaufort,’ agreed the captain. ‘A perfect presentation. I make bold to say that when you are old enough to try your hand on a case-history, not another member of the Club will hold a candle to you. But now, to business! What possibilities seemed best to you?’

  ‘Well, obviously the Chirk-Finch woman is ripe for re-identification. Naturally, I don’t know her history, but it is clear that she has not grasped herself for many years. It was my good luck to stumble on her just at a moment when, so to speak, the National Health Service was pointing an accusing finger at her suspended identity. There is no question, however, that her original name was Mrs Finch. According to the Electoral Register, which I went on to consult at the Post Office, there is no Mr or Miss Finch in the district, so we may assume she is a widow. She will not demand any great effort from us, poor thing: all she asks for herself is a fixed entity. In fact, the choice is open to us: we can strengthen her waning faith in herself as Finch, or we can follow National Health and recreate her as Chirk. This choice is fortunate for us since Mrs Jellicoe – I mean Miss Paradise – I mean – oh! dear I am confused myself.’

  ‘Gently, boy, gently!’ said the captain. ‘All is perfectly clear. You refer to our housekeeper, who is Mrs Henry Paradise to herself, Florence to me, and Florrie to your – ah! – stepmother.’

  ‘Exactly. Perhaps Mrs Paradise has known this woman under her obsolescent name of Finch. If so, we can get some idea of whether she is a good domestic. If Mrs Paradise says she is, we will drop the matter for a few days and then tell Mrs P. that Mrs Finch has been unable to come. We will then bring Mrs Finch to the house as another applicant, named Mrs Chirk.’

  ‘The other way round,’ said the captain. ‘We inform Mrs Paradise of an applicant named Chirk, who is new to these parts, and then we produce Mrs Finch, under the name of Chirk. Mrs P., who will have been feeling nervous at the thought of a strange domestic coming here, will be relieved to find that Mrs Chirk resembles closely a trustworthy female whose name she had forgotten but which she thinks was something like Finch. And yet, on the whole, I think there’s no doubt that the important thing is to establish Finch as Finch – to give her the feeling that no matter what National Health may think, she knows best who she is. If we confirm her as Finch, she will soon feel that this is the one place in the world where she has no reason to doubt her existence. In this respect, of course, she is quite the opposite of Mrs Paradise, who has needed to be totally re-identified in order to make the most of herself. … Well, what else have you brought from your fruitful “Surgery”?’

  ‘I think it clear that all three doctors have already lost almost all sense of personal distinctiveness. Dr Burke’s gestures and panting suggested a man bursting with emigration tendencies: only half his mind is chained to “Surgery”; the other half is already wearing pongee in Buenos Aires or helicoptering with a beard between Australian sheep-stations. I am not sure that we could allay this lust for a new beginning simply by bringing him here – unless, of course, we were able to convince him that he had spent his life in Australia and that this was the free, cultured world he had always dreamed of as the only way of realizing himself.’

  ‘Rule him out,’ said the captain. ‘Restless types are too full of grudges. What about Towzer?’

  ‘Most interesting. His is the insanity of the phlegmatic, Britain-can-take-it type. He has gone on taking it for so long that he no longer knows exactly what it is he is taking. With every pore wide open, he absorbs this unknown infliction, squeezing away his identity in order to give room to the stranger. By now, only his way of life remains true to his
departed self: he continues to utter sounds that he vaguely associates with his proper status and character. At heart, of course, he has not the slightest idea of what that character and status are; nor does he dare pause to ask, for fear of finding them changed out of recognition. Provided a room full of despondent people between eight and ten a.m. daily, he would settle down anywhere.’

  ‘We could introduce morning-prayers every day at eight-thirty,’ said Mrs Mallet.

  ‘An excellent idea,’ said the captain. ‘You will play the harmonium. Beaufort will always be late, and flushed, and, unseen by Mrs Finch, will wink at Florrie. Why, I am beginning to see a pattern already! Oh, joy, joy! But tell me, Beau, to what use shall we put Towzer? Something in the open-air, poor man, I presume?’

  ‘I thought something in the garden. A hideously neglected bed of roses grows outside his house: I am sure he loved them before his face became so corrugated. He needs a beard, of course.’

  ‘Very well. We’ll try Towzer, though I must say I am a little shy of tampering with country doctors. They are accustomed either to being extravagantly praised or savagely denounced. They lack the poise and laisser-aller of the Harley Street man: I mean, they are sensitive to people and circumstances, and they expect to fight against odds and suffer. Well, if he is not the father often, which he may well be, bring him along, my boy. And now, what about the nurse – that vague lady who so ruthlessly plays fast-and-loose with human names? Nurses are a very distinct type, in my experience; the present does not exist for them at all; though absolutely practical in their daily behaviour, their minds are entirely concentrated upon the future – that is to say, upon the day when they marry a doctor. This is why they become so terrifyingly real when, instead of becoming doctors’ wives, they become head-nurses: it is a frightful shock to the nervous system, com parable to a man setting out to walk to Cuba and after years of trudging finding himself in Siberia. Could this particular nurse not help Towzer in the garden? We could give her those old cord breeches of Jellicoe’s to wear and, if she’s a good girl, a small tractor. While Towzer chops and clips, she can spray and syringe: it will be just like hospital. And who knows – after rubbing shoulders with Towzer in the open air for a few months, she may cause his disbudded instinct to burst forth again? Yes, we must insist on Towzer’s beard. Though lecherous, nurses are a nesting type – true cuckoos, one might say, in every respect, including monotony.’