Richard Gordon: DOCTOR IN CLOVER

I crept inside the house, tapped softly at the bedroom door, and Petunia let me in.

'You look as if you've just come off Everest,' she said.

'I hope you passed a good night yourself,' I replied shortly.

'Absolutely adorable. I haven't been so warm for months.' She was already up and dressed, and seemed more amenable than the evening before.

'Poor Gaston! Are you sure you won't catch your death?'

'I wouldn't really care at the moment if I did.'

'I'm sorry-but it wasn't really my fault, was it? Perhaps you could have slept on the floor behind the wardrobe, or something.'

'I think it was a far, far better thing that I did.'

'You know, there really is something of the Sidney Carton about you, dear. No other man I know would have been half so noble.'

'Anyway, it's all over now. The fog's thinning rapidly, and as far as I remember there's a good train about five on Sunday afternoons. If you can stick it out till then.'

'I'm sure I can,' said Petunia. 'It's really awfully cosy here.'

'You do look pale this morning,' giggled Mrs Wattle when I appeared at breakfast. 'I hope you got plenty of sleep.'

The day passed without mishap. Petunia seemed quite to enjoy herself sitting about the house reading magazines, and in the afternoon I drove her to see the Town Hall, the waterworks, the bus depot, and the new abattoir.

'Quite a pretty little place after all,' she remarked, as I pulled up outside the municipal baths. 'It's a wonder I've never been here on tour.'

'Would you like to see the statue of the first Mayor?'

'Yes, please,' said Petunia.

After tea and Dundee cake I looked at my watch and announced to the Wattles, 'Perhaps my wife ought to be getting ready. We're due at the station in half an hour.'

'But isn't there a later train, darling?' asked Petunia. 'I could always catch that.'

'There's the eight forty-two,' I told her, looking surprised. 'And the ten six.'

'I'll take the ten six.'

'A far better idea,' agreed Ma Wattle. 'A few more hours together mean so much at your age, don't they?'

Shortly afterwards we were left alone. As a matter of fact, we were always being left alone, and Dr Wattle must have got awfully tired of sitting in his cold consulting-room.

'What's the idea, Petunia?' I demanded at once. 'I thought you couldn't get out of the place quick enough.'

She helped herself to a cigarette from the silver box.

'Gaston,' she said. 'I've been thinking.'

I flicked the Wattles' table lighter.

'Thinking what?'

'That this is the nicest part I've ever played.'

'You were a great success at it, thank you very much. And now for the final curtain.'

'But do you know why I was a success? I've just realized it myself. It was because I felt the part-here.'

She indicated her mid-sternal region.

'That's essential for all high-class acting, so they tell me.'

Petunia sat on the sofa.

'Do you remember, Gaston, what you told me in that night-club, the last time we were out together?'

Remembering what chaps tell them in night-clubs is another illustration of how women are congenitally defective in sportsmanship.

'That I was the dearest and sweetest girl you'd ever met, and how you wished you could live in my arms for ever?'

'Ah, yes.'

'Perhaps, Gaston, dear, you didn't think I took your remarks seriously?'

'Of course I did.'

As far as I remembered, she was hitting someone on the head with a balloon at the time.

It's terrible how I have to disguise my feelings, my sweet. We actresses must always put our career first. We can never enjoy the simple home life of other women. It's awfully tragic.'

I think you're perfectly right,' I told her briskly. 'Wonderful thing, devotion to one's vocation. You'll never regret it once you're a famous star with half London at your feet.'

I'd never be a famous star. Not someone like Monica Fairchild, with every manager in London fighting over her. It's no good fooling myself. I'd just continue with walking-on parts, and live with Mum year in and year out, except for a few weeks on tour in miserable theatrical boarding-houses.'

'Oh, come! You're just a bit depressive for the moment. I bet Sarah Bernhardt felt exactly the same dozens of times.'

'But seeing you here,' Petunia went on, flicking her ash over the bearskin rug, 'in your dear little home in this sweet little town, has opened my eyes. My racket isn't worth the candle. I want to settle down.'

'But this isn't my dear little home,' I argued. 'It's Dr Wattle's dear little home. As for the town, I came here intending to settle for life and now I wouldn't even touch it for bed and breakfast. It would send a girl like you crackers in less than-'

She got up and stood so near me I could see the arteries in her conjunctivae.

'This last twenty-four hours I've realized how wonderful it is being your wife-'

'But dash it! You're not my-'

'You're so sweet, so modest. So honourable, so upright. So tender, so considerate, Gaston, darling, I've decided to accept you. We can get married secretly in some registry office-'

'Sorry to disturb the nest of lovebirds,' Ma Wattle chuckled, entering at that moment, 'I just wondered if your wife would like some nice hot soup for supper, to brace her for her journey.'

'Mrs Wattle.' Petunia turned to face her. 'I'm not going. I must stay with my husband. I'll send a telegram to London and resign my job. My mother can send on my things tomorrow.'

'I'm absolutely delighted!' exclaimed the old dear, embracing us. 'As I always say, a woman's place is at her husband's side, come what may. Of course, my children, you may stay with us as long as you wish. I'll just put the kettle on for your hot-water bottles.

I expect after such excitements you'll both be wanting to go early to bed.'

If I wasn't keen on marrying Avril, I'd rather have swallowed the entire poisons cupboard before marrying Petunia. An agreeable companion for a gay night out, certainly. But you can't make a life partner of a woman who keeps trying to conduct the band with sticks of celery.

'You haven't eaten your nice soup, Gaston,' said Ma Wattle at supper.

'Not very hungry, I'm afraid.'

'What a wonderful thing love is!'

I was nearly sick over the sliced brawn.

I was edgy and jumpy the rest of the evening, which, of course, the idiotic Wattles put down to passion, or the expectation thereof. Worst of all, the mental trauma of the past two days seemed to have beaten my brain into paralysis. Nothing I could contrive by ten o'clock prevented Petunia and myself again being shown into my bedroom.

'Alone at last!' breathed Petunia.

'Yes, but only for a couple of shakes,' I told her smartly. 'As soon as the Wattles have bedded down, I'm going to skip it into the night again.'

'But Gaston! Surely you're not going to leave your wife?'

'Pet, you chump! You're not my wife-only on the programme. Let me make it perfectly clear I'm not going to stay with you up here.'

'How honourable you are!' she breathed. 'How fine! How different!'

The Grimsdykes, of course, have their honour. But I must admit I wouldn't have objected to the same arrangement if we'd been in a hotel at Brighton instead of the Wattles' spare bedroom. Under prevailing circumstances the only place for me was Clem's Caff.

'We'll be married tomorrow if you like,' she said, starting to unzip her dress. 'A girl friend of mine once got a special licence terribly easily.'

'Petunia! You don't understand-'

'I understand everything, darling. You're a wonderfully honest man, and I shall love you more and more as the years go by.'

About twenty minutes later I was sitting again over one of Clem's cups of tea. I woke at five-thirty the next morning, so ill from the effects of prolonged exposure that I would almost have married Petunia on the spot for a comfortable night's rest in my own bed. I got back to the house shivering and with a shocking headache, and found Dr Wattle in the hall.