I was fascinated by the heady, chancy, expense-account career of young Dr Lonelyhearts, playing his hand of credit cards, flaunting his mastery of airline timetables, enjoying through the (equally tax-deductible) liberality of drug companies the life of itinerant extravagance once led by the sons of dukes dispatched upon the Grand Tour. The hotel ballroom was already full of middle-aged, dowdyish men and women chattering light-heartedly and drinking purposefully, the medical profession with its bleep switched off. I recognized lean, tall Sir Arbuthnot Beakspeare conversing with Sir Rollo Basingstoke, my contemporary at St Swithin’s, who disguised his shock at seeing me in such powerful professional company with the suavity befitting a Surgeon to the Queen. On a dais with lights and microphones, Dr Lonelyhearts talked forcefully to a scruffy, restless group, the press. Cheerful, elegant black gentlemen sat round a table with the pink Chancan flag, enjoying a windfall from the British taxpayer more lavish than bestowed by their Caribbean hurricanes.
What do You think about Doctor On The Ball (2012)?
