DOCTOR. At first perhaps you will; but when they find they’ve both fared alike, they’ll each feel secretly flattered by the inattention you show to the other. Go to your work.
JOSEPH. Yes, sir.
[Exit at C.
DOCTOR. Well, friend Jeremiah!
MAJOR. Well, friend Vicessimus!
DOCTOR. I seem to have dropped in at rather an unlucky moment; but frankly, if I were to wait till your domestic barometer pointed to “calm and settled” weather, I’m afraid my visits wouldn’t be very frequent.
MAJOR. True, my dear doctor.
DOCTOR. I don’t know how you manage it, but you generally contrive to have a thunder-storm, more or less violent, rumbling over this house of yours.
MAJOR. True again, and I’ll tell you why. Because this “house of mine,” as you call it, is constantly exposed to two discordant elements from opposite directions, but invariably coming into contact and exploding here!
DOCTOR. I don’t exactly understand.