The Doctors Dilemma | Page 8

how are we to-day? a little chilly? a little
stiff? but hale and still the cleverest of us all. [Sir Patrick grunts]. What!
Walpole! the absent-minded beggar: eh?
WALPOLE. What does that mean?

B. B. Have you forgotten the lovely opera singer I sent you to have that
growth taken off her vocal cords?
WALPOLE [springing to his feet] Great heavens, man, you dont mean
to say you sent her for a throat operation!
B. B. [archly] Aha! Ha ha! Aha! [trilling like a lark as he shakes his
finger at Walpole]. You removed her nuciform sac. Well, well! force of
habit! force of habit! Never mind, ne-e-e-ver mind. She got back her
voice after it, and thinks you the greatest surgeon alive; and so you are,
so you are, so you are.
WALPOLE [in a tragic whisper, intensely serious] Blood-poisoning. I
see. I see. [He sits down again].
SIR PATRICK. And how is a certain distinguished family getting on
under your care, Sir Ralph?
B. B. Our friend Ridgeon will be gratified to hear that I have tried his
opsonin treatment on little Prince Henry with complete success.
RIDGEON [startled and anxious] But how--
B. B. [continuing] I suspected typhoid: the head gardener's boy had it;
so I just called at St Anne's one day and got a tube of your very
excellent serum. You were out, unfortunately.
RIDGEON. I hope they explained to you carefully--
B. B. [waving away the absurd suggestion] Lord bless you, my dear
fellow, I didnt need any explanations. I'd left my wife in the carriage at
the door; and I'd no time to be taught my business by your young chaps.
I know all about it. Ive handled these anti- toxins ever since they first
came out.
RIDGEDN. But theyre not anti-toxins; and theyre dangerous unless
you use them at the right time.
B. B. Of course they are. Everything is dangerous unless you take it at
the right time. An apple at breakfast does you good: an apple at
bedtime upsets you for a week. There are only two rules for anti-toxins.
First, dont be afraid of them: second, inject them a quarter of an hour
before meals, three times a day.
RIDGEON [appalled] Great heavens, B. B., no, no, no.
B. B. [sweeping on irresistibly] Yes, yes, yes, Colly. The proof of the
pudding is in the eating, you know. It was an immense success. It acted
like magic on the little prince. Up went his temperature; off to bed I
packed him; and in a week he was all right again, and absolutely

immune from typhoid for the rest of his life. The family were very nice
about it: their gratitude was quite touching; but I said they owed it all to
you, Ridgeon; and I am glad to think that your knighthood is the result.
RIDGEON. I am deeply obliged to you. [Overcome, he sits down on
the chair near the couch].
B. B. Not at all, not at all. Your own merit. Come! come! come! dont
give way.
RIDGEON. It's nothing. I was a little giddy just now. Overwork, I
suppose.
WALPOLE. Blood-poisoning.
B. B. Overwork! Theres no such thing. I do the work of ten men. Am I
giddy? No. NO. If youre not well, you have a disease. It may be a slight
one; but it's a disease. And what is a disease? The lodgment in the
system of a pathogenic germ, and the multiplication of that germ. What
is the remedy? A very simple one. Find the germ and kill it.
SIR PATRICK. Suppose theres no germ?
B. B. Impossible, Sir Patrick: there must be a germ: else how could the
patient be ill?
SIR PATRICK. Can you shew me the germ of overwork?
B. B. No; but why? Why? Because, my dear Sir Patrick, though the
germ is there, it's invisible. Nature has given it no danger signal for us.
These germs--these bacilli--are translucent bodies, like glass, like water.
To make them visible you must stain them. Well, my dear Paddy, do
what you will, some of them wont stain. They wont take cochineal:
they wont take methylene blue; they wont take gentian violet: they
wont take any coloring matter. Consequently, though we know, as
scientific men, that they exist, we cannot see them. But can you
disprove their existence? Can you conceive the disease existing without
them? Can you, for instance, shew me a case of diphtheria without the
bacillus?
SIR PATRICK. No; but I'll shew you the same bacillus, without the
disease, in your own throat.
B. B. No, not the same, Sir Patrick. It is an entirely different bacillus;
only the two are, unfortunately, so exactly alike that you cannot see the
difference. You must understand, my dear Sir Patrick, that every one