Dear Dr Martle,
Thank you for your communication. If only NHS admin could do a bit of 'joined-up patient-centred' care as they keep telling everyone else to do, we might not have these problems! Your ophthalmology case rang bells with the ocular chappies here too. It seems that this Mr Gloucester has been wandering round the country visiting various NHS outpatient departments and moaning about treatment being a postcode lottery. He did say something about a Dr Foster at Gloucester who unfortunately fell into a puddle right up to his middle and hasn't been taking his clinic since.
The following may or may not be any help with your diagnosis of the bearded gentleman you refer to but, after Mr Gloucester and his companion left, we found this letter (copy enclosed) in the waiting room with lots of angry words scribbled in the margin. I hope this is of some help in assessing his case. It's possible there are family-related issues.
Yours etc
Dr Gusset
Mental Health Unit
"You don't have to be mad to work here, but it helps!"
West of England
17 December
Well, Christmas again, and what a year it’s been! Quite honestly Cornwall and I are looking forward to a bit of peace and quiet this year and are having difficulty hiding our relief that it’s Goneril’s turn to have Daddy over Christmas. Phew! I expect you heard that he was going through one of his ‘difficult’ patches when he stayed with us last year. Goneril and I sometimes wonder whether he does it deliberately. The first thing he did was to announce that he was going to stay for a hundred nights. Can you believe it?! That would have taken us well into April! We finally managed to beat him down to just the four but only after a great deal of fuss and sarcastic muttering.
Cordelia, of course, escapes all this on the grounds that she hasn’t got anywhere to put him up. Yeeees (in my sceptical Lord Hutton voice). As you know, when Daddy decided to hand over the properties to Goneril and me (something to do with inheritance tax; I never really understood it), Cordelia chose to take the shares option instead. At the time we all thought she was being a complete airhead but it turns out that, while the properties proved to be little more than a black hole for repair bills, crafty little Cordy’s shares went right through the roof. She made an absolute mint and now lords it over both of us. Honestly, if the devious little minx wasn’t my sister I would cheerfully throttle her. (Only kidding, Officer!) These days she’s always gadding to and fro across the channel with her ‘partner’, the King of France. Goodness only knows what she sees in him, or why she preferred him to Burgundy. “Rich, fruity and full bodied, with an elegant aftertaste,” it said on the label, (and I have some reason to believe it, if you get my drift). Well I wouldn’t have kicked him out of bed for eating biscuits, but that’s little sisters for you!!
I have warned Goneril she really must keep a close eye on Daddy. Last year he managed to lock himself out one night and got soaked to the skin wandering around the blasted heath for hours. Everyone else was to blame but him, of course! We never heard the end of it. This year she is going to tie the latch-key round his neck and insist that he only goes out if his ‘carer’ is with him. We never did discover his name by the way. Daddy always just calls him ‘that fool’. (Just entre nous, they actually seem as barmy as each other sometimes. Goodness only knows where Social Services find them!)
Do you remember Edmund by the way? He has been an absolute rock this year; someone you can really trust. I must admit I had always thought of him as a bit of a bastard before but he has made himself absolutely indispensable one way and another. He was wonderfully helpful in hushing up that unfortunate business last Christmas when the game of Blind Man’s Buff got a bit out of hand. (Whoops!!) Cornwall, bless him, isn’t too wild about him becoming my Personal Trainer (aren’t men ridiculous!) but he is a wonderful source of gossip. He has opened my eyes to all sorts of things going on at court. He tells me, for example, that his brother Edgar’s sudden decision to ‘downsize’ and try a new lifestyle wasn’t at all what it appeared to be. Its funny isn’t it, how you think you know someone…..
Well that is enough from me. I’m really hoping Daddy will mellow a bit this year and stop being such a mystery to everyone. We are due another invasion from across the channel in the New Year when Cordy and ‘France’ threaten to visit. Ah well, I’m sure we’ll all survive it somehow!
Happy Christmas
Regan
