The Young Physician

by Francis Brett Young

Maskew was a more typical product of the Midlands. His home, and all his upbringing, had lain in one of the great black towns that cluster, like swollen knots, upon the North Bromwich system of railways. He had never lived in the country; he did not even know what country was, and his distinctive if provincial urbanity showed itself in a hundred ways—in his dress, that was a little too smart, in his speech, that was not quite smart enough, in a certain lack of fresh air in his mental atmosphere. His people were wealthy, and his tastes, without emulating the style of Harrop, were expensive. He was handsome, and if his hair had been shorter and not so mathematically correct he would have been handsomer. Still, he was intensely interested in women, and a great retailer of Rabelaisian stories. He wore buttoned boots and was very nearly a first-class billiard player.

A more unusual combination than his partnership with the abrupt and unsubtle Brown it would have been difficult to imagine; but even in his undoubted cleverness, his nature was complimentary, and Edwin found himself happy in the society of both. In their company he became a habitué of the Dousita Café; a subterranean privacy in which excellent coffee was served in the most comfortable surroundings by young ladies whose charms had already made something of a sensation in that decorous city. Maskew, naturally, knew them all by their Christian names, and treated them with a familiar badinage that impressed Edwin, mildly ambitious but quite incapable of imitation, by the ease with which it was performed. The cushioned seats and the mild stimulus of the coffee and cigarettes would even rouse the massive Brown to a ponderous levity by which the lady of their choice, a certain Miss Wheeler, whose uncle, Maskew seriously confided to Edwin, was a bishop, was obviously flattered. Edwin could understand any woman being attracted by Brown, or rather, “W.G.” as the need of a distinction had by this time made his familiar name. It also pleased him to see the way in which W.G. went red in his bull neck on a certain occasion when Maskew had delicately overstepped the limits of good taste in his conversation with Miss Wheeler. But the niece of the bishop did not blush. . . .

In the intervals between lectures they would congregate in their gowns in a dismal chamber, at the very bottom of the cramped building that was called the Common Room, drinking tea and eating squashed-fly biscuits. This place was frequented not only by members of the Medical School but by students of other faculties whom Edwin regarded with some contempt. One afternoon on entering this room Edwin found W.G. holding forth with some indignation before a notice that had been pinned on the board asking for a list of freshmen who were anxious to play Rugby football during the present season. So far, only five or six names had appeared: W.G.’s, naturally enough, came first, for his prowess in the game was well known in the North Bromwich district.

“Isn’t it a damnable thing,” he said indignantly, “in a school of this size to see a measly list like that?”

“You can stick mine down,” said Edwin.

“Well . . . as a matter of form, my son . . . though I don’t see what good you’re likely to be to the club except to give it tone.”

“I play soccer,” said Maskew.

“You would,” said W.G. “Nice gentlemanly game.”

“Rugger isn’t all beef,” put in Edwin.

“No,” said W.G., “but the team wants weight. And this place is simply thick with great, hefty, science men and brewers who’ve never known the meaning of a healthy sweat in their lives. Upon my word, it sickens me. Look at that chap.”