Unhappy People

"You see, Doc?"

"No, I don't! Why do you feel so inadequate, Mark?"

PC Mark Mylow looked up sheepishly, his eyes wary in his freckled face under a shock of brown hair. "Well, you know, Doc." He was seated in front of my desk in surgery.

"No. I don't," I snapped. "You tell me. It's not the uh… private thing… is it? I'm certain that things… erh… the thing… is perfectly adequate…"

"No!" Mark Mylow, the constable of Portwenn, sighed. "Not that – thing. You know!"

"No, I don't Mark. So get on with it!"

He stared at the floor for quite a while. "It's Julie," he said sadly.

"Julie?"

"Yeah, Doc! Julie Mitchell, no I mean Emma Lewis! Or whatever she's calling herself this month."

"Your ex-fiancé?" I shook my head at the sad policeman. "Oh, come on, Mark! I can't believe that you're still taken by her?"

"Taken Doc? Yes, I've gone totally Bodmin I have! But am I mad, sad, or in love? God!"

"Well, yes… perhaps you can tell me."

He stood up, pulled the wrinkles from his police jumper and turned as if to go, but then glared at me. "If I knew that Doc, why would I be asking you?" He struck his forehead with his hand. "I can't stop thinking about her!"

"You'll just have to… forget about her. Put it behind you. She is incarcerated, after all."

"Yes, Doc! I know! And I put her there, in the clink! Along with her unborn baby!" he groaned.

"Technically you didn't actually arrest her, now did you?"

"I did send the report on, Doc!"

"And it's not your baby, either is it? The test… established that before…"

"Thanks a hell of a lot, Doc! You bring that up? Damn it, Doc!"

A fertility test had showed that Mark Mylow was sterile. And Julie, or whoever, was already pregnant when she came to Portwenn and started dating Mylow. "Mark, erh… sorry. I was only saying…!"

"You've said bloody enough for one day Doc!" He darted for the door.

I sat there with mouth gaping as he left the room and slammed the door behind him. The sound reverberated in the surgery then Pauline waltzed in wearing a clashing green skirt and orange top. Her red trainers made a special accent to her ensemble along with gaudy bracelets and a huge necklace.

"What's wrong with Mark?" she asked. "He seems really upset."

"Well… patient information. I can't discuss it."

Pauline nodded. "Yeah. I know. Secrets. Probably about Julie anyway. Should I send the next patient in? It's Mrs. Holcombe. Her elbow is acting up again."

Mrs. Holcombe was eighty-three years old, lived on a small holding near town, and still insisted on washing windows, hauling ladders, and doing every dog's body work about her place. I treated her last month for elbow inflammation. And she was back again. "Send her in."

"Mrs. Holcombe," I went on, "I've suggested that you rest this arm. Here you are once again with an injury that if you'd only rest the joint…"

"Doc Martin! Are you telling me that I should live in a house with dirty windows? My neighbors would be scandalized. Can't be done!" the little lady told me, her petite frame full of agitation. "I'll not do it."

"Yes." I knew she'd not follow orders but I tried anyway. "Well then, I suggest you use paracetomal several times a day, ice the joint – not too long at a time – and rest it as much as possible."

She stood up and glared at me. "That's what I did last month and it did no good!"

"Mrs. Holcombe! Those are my instructions and if you don't follow them… there is nothing else I can do. If you insist on scrubbing your house top to bottom at your age…"

She cut me off. "Some doctor you are!" she said, then whirled and stomped out. Another happy customer of the Portwenn GP.

Pauline swept into the vacuum. "That's it Doc. Nobody else on the schedule."

"Ah." I penned notes to the patient record and handed it to Pauline. "Well…"

"Can I go?"

"What if someone arrives in the next forty-five minutes and I require your services? Certainly there must be some filing you could do."

She sniffed and flounced out, muttering as she went, followed by drawer slamming and papers being flipped about. This went on for a time then Pauline came back. "Now I'm done."

"Records filed away and the schedule updated for tomorrow?"

"Yeah." Her eyes wandered about the room.

"Blood samples packed off?"

"Yeah," she sighed.

"Disgusted with me again?"

"Yeah. Oops, sorry, Doc." She followed this with a laugh.

I sneered. "Whatever. Go on! Out with you!"

"Thanks. Night Doc!" she breezed away and the front door closed and locked behind her.

At least someone was happy leaving my surgery.