RIDGEON [looking after him] Poor chap! [Turning to SIR PATRICK] So thats why they made me a knight! And thats the medical profession!
SIR PATRICK And a very good profession, too, my lad. When you know as much as I know of the ignorance and superstition of the patients, youll wonder that we’re half as good as we are.
RIDGEON We’re not a profession: we’re a conspiracy.
SIR PATRICK All professions are conspiracies against the laity. And we cant all be geniuses like you. Every fool can get ill; but every fool cant be a good doctor: there are not enough good ones to go round. And for all you know, Bloomfield Bonington kills less people than you do.
RIDGEON Oh, very likely. But he really ought to know the difference between a vaccine and an anti-toxin. Stimulate the phagocytes! The vaccine doesnt affect the phagocytes at all. He’s all wrong: hopelessly, dangerously wrong. To put a tube of serum into his hands is murder: simple murder.
EMMY [returnins] Now, Sir Patrick. How long more are you going to keep them horses standing in the draught?
SIR PATRICK Whats that to you, you old catamaran?
EMMY Come, come, now! none of your temper to me. And it’s time for Colly to get to his work.
RIDGEON Behave yourself, Emmy. Get out.
EMMY Oh, I learnt how to behave myself before I learnt you to do it. I know what doctors are: sitting talking together about themselves when they ought to be with their poor patients. And I know what horses are, Sir Patrick. I was brought up in the country. Now be good; and come along.
SIR PATRICK [rising] Very well, very well, very well . Good bye, Colly. [He pats RIDGEON on the shoulder and goes out, turning for a moment at the door to look meditatively at EMMY and say, with grave conviction] You are an ugly old devil, and no mistake.
EMMY [highty indignant, calling after him] Youre no beauty yourself. [To RIDGEON, much flustered] Theyve no manners: they think they can say what they like to me; and you set them on, you do. I’ll teach them their places. Here now: are you going to see that poor thing or are you not?
RIDGEON I tell you for the fiftieth time I wont see anybody. Send her away.
EMMY Oh, I’m tired of being told to send her away. What good will that do her?
RIDGEON Must I get angry with you, Emmy?
EMMY [coaxing] Come now: just see her for a minute to please me: theres a good boy. She’s given me half-a-crown. She thinks it’s life and death to her husband for her to see you.
RIDGEON Values her husband’s life at half-a-crown!
EMMY Well, it’s all she can afford, poor lamb. Them others think nothing of half-a-sovereign just to talk about themselves to you, the sluts! Besides, she’ll put you in a good temper for the day, because it’s a good deed to see her; and she’s the sort that gets round you.
RIDGEON Well, she hasnt done so badly. For half-a-crown she’s had a consultation with Sir Ralph Bloomfield Bonington and Cutler Walpole. Thats six guineas’ worth to start with. I dare say she’s consulted Blenkinsop too: thats another eighteenpence.
EMMY Then youll see her for me, wont you?
RIDGEON Oh, send her up and be hanged. [EMMY trots out, satisfied. RIDGEON calls] Redpenny!
REDPENNY [appearing at the door] What is it?
RIDGEON Theres a patient coming up. If she hasnt gone in five minutes, come in with an urgent call from the hospital for me. You understand: she’s to have a strong hint to go.
REDPENNY Right O! [He vanishes].
RIDGEON goes to the glass, and arranges his tie a little.
EMMY (announcing) Mrs Doobidad [RIDGEON leaves the glass and goes to the writing-table].
The lady comes in. EMMY goes out and shuts the door. RIDGEON, who has put on an impenetrable and rather distant professional manner, turns to the lady, and invites her, by a gesture, to sit down on the couch.
MRS DUBEDAT is beyond all demur an arrestingly good-looking young woman. She has something of the grace and romance of a wild creature, with a good deal of the elegance and dignity of a fine lady. RIDGEON, who is extremely susceptible to the beauty of women, instinctively assumes the defensive at once, and hardens his manner still more. He has an impression that she is very well dressed; but she has a figure on which any dress would look well, and carries herself with the unaffected distinction of a woman who has never in her life suffered from those doubts and fears as to her social position which spoil the manners of most middling people. She is tall, slender, and strong; has dark hair, dressed so as to look like hair and not like a bird’s nest or a pantaloon’s wig (fashion wavering just then between these two models); has unexpectedly narrow, subtle, dark-fringed eyes that alter her expression disturbingly when she is excited and, flashes them wide open; is softly impetuous in her speech and swift in her movements; and is just now in mortal anxiety. She carries a portfolio.
MRS DUBEDAT [in low urgent tones] Doctor—
RIDGEON [curtly] Wait. Before you begin, let me tell you at once that I can do nothing for you. My hands are full. I sent you that message by my old servant. You would not take that answer.
MRS DUBEDAT How could I?
RIDGEON You bribed her.
MRS DUBEDAT I—
RIDGEON That doesnt matter. She coaxed me to see you. Well, you must take it from me now that with all the good will in the world, I cannot undertake another case.
MRS DUBEDAT Doctor: you must save my husband. You must. When I explain to you, you will see that you must. It is not an ordinary case, not like any other case. He is not like anybody else in the world: oh, believe me, he is not. I can prove it to you: [fingering her portfolio] I have brought some things to shew you. And you can save him: the papers say you can.
RIDGEON Whats the matter? Tuberculosis?
MRS DUBEDAT Yes. His left lung—
RIDGEON Yes: you neednt tell me about that.
MRS DUBEDAT You can cure him, if only you will. It is true that you can, isnt it? [In great distress] Oh, tell me, please.
RIDGEON [worningly] You are going to be quiet and self-possessed, arnt you?
MRS DUBEDAT Yes. I beg your pardon. I know I shouldnt—[Giving way again] Oh, please, say that you c a n; and then I shall be all right.
RIDGEON [huffily] I am not a curemonger: if you want cures, you must go to the people who sell them. [Recovering himself, ashamed of the tone of his own voice] But I have at the hospital ten tuberculous patients whose lives I believe I can save.
MRS DUBEDAT Thank God!
RIDGEON Wait a moment. Try to think of those ten patients as ten shipwrecked men on a raft—a raft that is barely large enough to save them—that will not support one more. Another head bobs up through the waves at the side. Another man begs to be taken aboard. He implores the captain of the raft to save him. But the captain can only do that by pushing one of his ten off the raft and drowning him to make room for the new comer. That is what you are asking me to do.
MRS DUBEDAT But how can that be? I dont understand. Surely—
RIDGEON You must take my word for it that it is so. My laboratory, my staff, and myself are working at full pressure. We are doing our utmost. The treatment is a new one. It takes time, means, and skill; and there is not enough for another case. Our ten cases are already chosen cases. Do you understand what I mean by chosen?
MRS DUBEDAT Chosen. No: I cant understand.
RIDGEON (sternly] You m u s t understand. Youve got to understand and to face it. In every single one of those ten cases I have had to consider, not only whether the man could be saved, but whether he was worth saving. There were fifty cases to choose from; and forty had to be condemned to death. Some of the forty had young wives and helpless children. If the hardness of their cases could have saved them they would have been saved ten times over. Ive no doubt your case is a hard one: I can see the tears in your eyes [she hastily wipes her eyes]: I know that you have a torrent of entreaties ready for me the moment I stop speaking; but it’s no use.You must go to another doctor.
MRS DUBEDAT But can you give me the n
ame of another doctor who understands your secret?
RIDGEON I have no secret: I am not a quack.
MRS DUBEDAT I beg your pardon: I didnt mean to say anything wrong. I dont understand how to speak to you. Oh, pray dont be offended.
RIDGEON [again a little ashamed] There! there! never mind. [He relaxes and sits down]. After all, I’m talking nonsense: I daresay I am a quack, a quack with a qualification. But my discovery is not patented.
MRS DUBEDAT Then can any doctor cure my husband? Oh, why dont they do it? I have tried so many: I have spent so much. If only you would give me the name of another doctor.
RIDGEON Every man in this street is a doctor. But outside myself and the handful of men I am training at St Anne‘s, there is nobody as yet who has mastered the opsonin treatment. And we are full up? I’m sorry; but that is all I can say. [Rising] Good morning.
MRS DUBEDAT (suddenly and desperately taking some drawings from her portfolio] Doctor: look at these. You understand drawings : you have good ones in your waiting-room. Look at them. They are his work.
RIDGEON It’s no use my looking. [He looks, all the same]. Hallo! [He takes one to the window and studies it]. Yes: this is the real thing. Yes, yes. [He looks at another and returns to her]. These are very clever. Theyre unfinished, arnt they?
MRS DUBEDAT He gets tired so soon. But you see, dont you, what a genius he is? You see that he is worth saving. Oh, doctor, I married him just to help him to begin: I had money enough to tide him over the hard years at the beginning—to enable him to follow his inspiration until his genius was recognized. And I was useful to him as a model: his drawings of me sold quite quickly.
RIDGEON Have you got one?
MRS DUBEDAT [producing another] Only this one. It was the first.
RIDGEON [devouring it with his eyes] Thats a wonderful drawing. Why is it called Jennifer?
MRS DUBEDAT My name is Jennifer.
RIDGEON A strange name.
MRS DUBEDAT Not in Cornwall. I am Cornish. It’s only what you call Guinevere.
RIDGEON [repeating the names with a certain pleasure in them] Guinevere. Jennifer. [Looking again at the drawing] Yes: it’s really a wonderful drawing. Excuse me; but may I ask is it for sale? I’ll buy it.
MRS DUBEDAT Oh, take it. It’s my own: he gave it to me. Take it. Take them all. Take everything; ask anything; but save him. You can: you will: you must.
REDPENNY [entering with every sign of alarm] Theyve just telephoned from the hospital that youre to come instantly—a patient on the point of death. The carriage is waiting.
RIDGEON [intolerantly] Oh, nonsense: get out. [Greatly annoyed] What do you mean by interrupting me like this?
REDPENNY But—
RIDGEON Chut! cant you see I’m engaged? Be off.
REDPENNY, bewildered, vanishes.
MRS DUBEDAT [rising] Doctor: one instant only before you go—
RIDGEON Sit down. It’s nothing.
MRS DUBEDAT But the patient. He said he was dying.
RIDGEON Oh, he’s dead by this time. Never mind. Sit down.
MRS DUBEDAT [sitting down and breaking down] Oh, you none of you care. You see people die every day.
RIDGEON [petting her] Nonsense! it’s nothing: I told him to come in and say that. I thought I should want to get rid of you.
MRS DUBEDAT [shocked at the falsehoodJ Oh!
RIDGEON [continuing] Dont look so bewildered: theres nobody dying.
MRS DUBEDAT My husband is.
RIDGEON [pulling himself together) Ah, yes: I had forgotten your husband. Mrs Dubedat: you are asking me to do a very serious thing?
MRS DUBEDAT I am asking you to save the life of a great man.
RIDGEON You are asking me to kill another man for his sake; for as surely as I undertake another case, I shall have to hand back one of the old ones to the ordinary treatment. Well, I dont shrink from that. I have had to do it before; and I will do it again if you can convince me that his life is more important than the worst life I am now saving. But you must convince me first.
MRS DUBEDAT He made those drawings; and they are not the best—nothing like the best; only I did not bring the really best: so few people like them. He is twenty-three: his whole life is before him. Wont you let me bring him to you? wont you speak to him? wont you see for yourself?
RIDGEON Is he well enough to come to a dinner at the Star and Garter at Richmond?
MRS DUBEDAT Oh yes. Why?
RIDGEON I’ll tell you. I am inviting all my old friends to a dinner to celebrate my knighthood—youve seen about it in the papers, havnt you?
MRS DUBEDAT Yes, oh yes. That was how I found out about you.
RIDGEON It will be a doctors’ dinner; and it was to have been a bachelors’ dinner. I’m a bachelor. Now if you will entertain for me, and bring your husband, he will meet me; and he will meet some of the most eminent men in my profession: Sir Patrick Cullen, Sir Ralph Bloomfield Bonington, Cutler Walpole, and others. I can put the case to them; and your husband will have to stand or fall by what we think of him. Will you come?
MRS DUBEDAT Yes, of course I will come. Oh, thank you, thank you. And may I bring some of his drawings—the really good ones?
RIDGEON Yes. I will let you know the date in the course of to-morrow. Leave me your address.
MRS DUBEDAT Thank you again and again. You have made me so happy: I know you will admire him and like him. This is my address. [She gives him her card].
RIDGEON Thank you. [He rings].
MRS DUBEDAT [embarrassed] May I—is there—should I—I mean—[she blushes and stops in confusion].
RIDGEON Whats the matter?
MRS DUBEDAT Your fee for this consultation?
RIDGEON Oh, I forgot that. Shall we say a beautiful drawing of his favorite model for the whole treatment, including the cure?
MRS DUBEDAT You are very generous. Thank you. I know you will cure him. Good-bye.
RIDGEON I will. Good-bye. [They shake hands]. By the way, you know, dont you, that tuberculosis is catching. You take every precaution, I hope.
MRS DUBEDAT I am not likely to forget it. They treat us like lepers at the hotels.
EMMY [at the door] Well, deary: have you got round him?
RIDGEON Yes. Attend to the door and hold your tongue.
EMMY Thats a good boy. [She goes out with MRS. DUBEDAT].
RIDGEON [alone] Consultation free. Cure guaranteed. [He heaves a great sigh].
ACT II
After dinner on the terrace at the Star and Garter, Richmond. Cloudless summer night; nothing disturbs the stillness except from time to time the long trajectory of a distant train and the measured clucking of oars coming up from the Thames in the valley below. The dinner is over; and three of the eight chairs are empty. Sir Patrick, with his back to the view, is at the head of the square table with Ridgeon. The two chairs opposite them are empty. On their right come,first, a vacant chair, and then one very fully occupied by B. B., who basks blissfully in the moonbeams. On their left, Schutzmacher and Walpole. The entrance to the hotel is on their right, behind B. B.. The five men are silently enjoying their coffee and cigarets, full of food, and not altogether void of wine.
Mrs Dubedat, wrapped up for departure, comes in. They rise, except Sir Patrick; but she takes one of the vacant places at the foot of the table, next B. B.; and they sit down again.
MRS DUBEDAT [as she enters] Louis will be here presently. He is shewing Dr Blenkinsop how to work the telephone. [She sits]. Oh, I am so sorry we have to go. It seems such a shame, this beautiful night. And we have enjoyed ourselves so much.
RIDGEON I dont believe another half-hour would do Mr Dubedat a bit of harm.
SIR PATRICK Come now, Colly, come! come! none of that. You take your man home, Mrs Dubedat; and get him to bed before eleven.
B. B. Yes, yes. Bed before eleven. Quite right, quite right. Sorry to lose you, my dear lady; but Sir Patrick’s orders are the laws of—er—of Tyre and Sidon.ey
WALPOLE Let me take you
home in my motor.
SIR PATRICK No. You ought to be ashamed of yourself, Walpole. Your motor will take Mr and Mrs Dubedat to the station, and quite far enough too for an open carriage at night.
MRS DUBEDAT Oh, I am sure the train is best.
RIDGEON Well, Mrs Dubedat, we have had a most enjoyable evening.
MRS DUBEDAT [with a touch of shy anxiety] What did you think of Louis? Or am I wrong to ask?
RIDGEON Wrong! Why, we are all charmed with him.
WALPOLE Delighted.
B. B. Most happy to have met him. A privilege, a real privilege.
SIR PATRICK [grunts]!
MRS DUBEDAT [quickly] Sir Patrick: are y o u uneasy about him?
SIR PATRICK [discreetly] I admire his drawings greatly, maam.
MRS DUBEDAT Yes; but I meant—
RIDGEON You shall go away quite happy. He’s worth saving. He must and shall be saved.
MRS DUBEDAT rises and gasps with delight, relief, and gratitude. They all rise except SIR PATRICK and SCHUTZMACHER, and come reassuringly to her.
B. B. Certainly, c e r-tainly.
WALPOLE Theres no real difficulty, if only you know what to do.
MRS DUBEDAT Oh, how can I ever thank you! From this night I can begin to be happy at last. You dont know what I feel.
She sits down in tears. They crowd about her to console her.
B. B. My dear lady: come come! come come! [very persuasively] c o m e come!
WALPOLE Dont mind us. Have a good cry.
RIDGEON No: dont cry. Your husband had better not know that weve been talking about him.
MRS DUBEDAT [quickly pulling herself together] No, of course not. Please dont mind me. What a glorious thing it must be to be a doctor! [They laugh]. Dont laugh. You dont know what youve done for me. I never knew until now how deadly afraid I was—how I had come to dread the worst. I never dared let myself know. But now the relief has come: now I know.
LOUIS DUBEDAT comes from the hotel, in his overcoat, his throat wrapped in a shawl. He is a slim young man of 23, physically still a stripling, and pretty, though not effeminate. He has turquoise blue eyes, and a trick of looking you straight in the face with them, which, combined with a frank smile, is very engaging. Although he is all nerves, and very observant and quick of apprehension, he is not in the least shy. He is younger than JENNIFER; but he patronizes her as a matter of course. The doctors do not put him out in the least: neither SIR PATRICK’s years nor BLOOMFIELD BONINGTON’s majesty have the smallest apparent effect on him : he is as natural as a cat: he moves among men as most men move among things, though he is intentionally making himself agreeable to them on this occasion. Like all people who can be depended on to take care of themselves, he is welcome company; and his artist’s power of appealing to the imagination gains him credit for all sorts of qualities and powers, whether he possesses them or not.
Pygmalion and Three Other Plays (Barnes & Noble Classics Series) Page 30