their operating gowns, mainly worried about getting the next hernia done in time to have a decent lunch. My hero, one Clifford Standforth, FRCS , was a brilliant, upright, serious young surgeon, and somehow he didn’t seem the sort of chap who’d last half an hour at St Swithin’s without getting his leg pulled by everyone down to the first-year students.
After a few weeks, with foolscap on the floor as thick as the snow on a Christmas card, I found myself like any other hermit in pressing need of a decent meal and some conversation, and I invited myself round to Miles’ flat for dinner. I thought I could finally pass on Sir Lancelot’s remarks about slapping chaps on the back a bit more, but I found the fellow in an even deeper condition of acute melancholia.
‘What’s up now?’ I asked. ‘Sir Lancelot still creating about that car park?’
‘Barefoot,’ Miles replied.
‘Oh,’ I said.
‘He’s putting up for the job, too.’
‘Unfortunate,’ I agreed.
‘Everything’s against me,’ muttered Miles. ‘I thought the fellow had settled down for life as Reader in Surgery at West Riding.’
‘He’s your only serious rival, I suppose?’
‘As ever,’ agreed Miles bitterly. ‘You’ve never said a word, I suppose. Gaston? Not about the true story?’
I shook my head. ‘Not evens to Connie.’
‘Thank you, Gaston. I appreciate that deeply.’
I felt so unhappy for him I had to help myself to some of his whisky and soda. The Barefoot incident was the only shady part of old Miles’ rather sad salad days. Everyone at St Swithin’s thought it pretty mysterious at the time, the general rumour being that the poor chap had suffered a nervous breakdown following years of chronic overwork, which was highly gratifying to students like myself who believed in long periods of recuperation between exams.
It all happened just before Miles went up for his finals before either of us had yet run into Connie. Charlie Barefoot was a small, untidy pink chap who resembled a cherub in glasses, and the pair of them had met their first week in St Swithin’s, over that beastly dogfish.
‘I say, isn’t that Hume’s Treatise on Human Nature you have there?’ asked Miles, waiting for the class to start one morning.
Barefoot nodded. ‘I like to keep my mind occupied while I’m hanging about for anything – trains, haircuts, scholarship exams, and so on. But isn’t that Darwin’s Origin of Species ?’
Miles said it was. ‘I thought it a useful start to one’s medical education.’
‘But I’ve been waiting for months to discuss Darwin’s views on natural selection!’
‘And I’ve been waiting for months to discuss Hume’s views on subjective idealism!’
After that they were great pals.
Medical students in the first year have hardly shaken the schoolroom chalk from their shoulders, but they soon learn to crowd the rear benches of the lecture-room so that unobtrusive exits might be made should the subject start to pall. Miles and Barefoot were always left with the front row to themselves, where they answered all the questions, took notes by the armful, and generally gave the impression intellectually of a pair of young Mozarts. At the end of the first year Miles won the Dean’s Prize in Biology, with Charlie Barefoot proxime accessit .
That got rid of the dogfish, by promotion from the medical kindergarden to the anatomy rooms. They shared the same leg.
‘Miles, I’ve got some capital news,’ Barefoot announced, as my cousin arrived one morning. ‘There’s a vacancy in my digs. Tony Benskin doesn’t want to stay any longer. I don’t know why, but he got quite shirty the other day, just because I wanted to discuss the popliteal fossa over breakfast. If you were thinking of making a change–’
‘I’ll give my landlady notice tonight,’ Miles replied at once. ‘My lodgings are really very difficult for studying in the evenings. Quite apart from the noise of Paddington Station, there are
After a few weeks, with foolscap on the floor as thick as the snow on a Christmas card, I found myself like any other hermit in pressing need of a decent meal and some conversation, and I invited myself round to Miles’ flat for dinner. I thought I could finally pass on Sir Lancelot’s remarks about slapping chaps on the back a bit more, but I found the fellow in an even deeper condition of acute melancholia.
‘What’s up now?’ I asked. ‘Sir Lancelot still creating about that car park?’
‘Barefoot,’ Miles replied.
‘Oh,’ I said.
‘He’s putting up for the job, too.’
‘Unfortunate,’ I agreed.
‘Everything’s against me,’ muttered Miles. ‘I thought the fellow had settled down for life as Reader in Surgery at West Riding.’
‘He’s your only serious rival, I suppose?’
‘As ever,’ agreed Miles bitterly. ‘You’ve never said a word, I suppose. Gaston? Not about the true story?’
I shook my head. ‘Not evens to Connie.’
‘Thank you, Gaston. I appreciate that deeply.’
I felt so unhappy for him I had to help myself to some of his whisky and soda. The Barefoot incident was the only shady part of old Miles’ rather sad salad days. Everyone at St Swithin’s thought it pretty mysterious at the time, the general rumour being that the poor chap had suffered a nervous breakdown following years of chronic overwork, which was highly gratifying to students like myself who believed in long periods of recuperation between exams.
It all happened just before Miles went up for his finals before either of us had yet run into Connie. Charlie Barefoot was a small, untidy pink chap who resembled a cherub in glasses, and the pair of them had met their first week in St Swithin’s, over that beastly dogfish.
‘I say, isn’t that Hume’s Treatise on Human Nature you have there?’ asked Miles, waiting for the class to start one morning.
Barefoot nodded. ‘I like to keep my mind occupied while I’m hanging about for anything – trains, haircuts, scholarship exams, and so on. But isn’t that Darwin’s Origin of Species ?’
Miles said it was. ‘I thought it a useful start to one’s medical education.’
‘But I’ve been waiting for months to discuss Darwin’s views on natural selection!’
‘And I’ve been waiting for months to discuss Hume’s views on subjective idealism!’
After that they were great pals.
Medical students in the first year have hardly shaken the schoolroom chalk from their shoulders, but they soon learn to crowd the rear benches of the lecture-room so that unobtrusive exits might be made should the subject start to pall. Miles and Barefoot were always left with the front row to themselves, where they answered all the questions, took notes by the armful, and generally gave the impression intellectually of a pair of young Mozarts. At the end of the first year Miles won the Dean’s Prize in Biology, with Charlie Barefoot proxime accessit .
That got rid of the dogfish, by promotion from the medical kindergarden to the anatomy rooms. They shared the same leg.
‘Miles, I’ve got some capital news,’ Barefoot announced, as my cousin arrived one morning. ‘There’s a vacancy in my digs. Tony Benskin doesn’t want to stay any longer. I don’t know why, but he got quite shirty the other day, just because I wanted to discuss the popliteal fossa over breakfast. If you were thinking of making a change–’
‘I’ll give my landlady notice tonight,’ Miles replied at once. ‘My lodgings are really very difficult for studying in the evenings. Quite apart from the noise of Paddington Station, there are
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