Friday 31 July 1964

Don't talk to young Elsie Luke (Natasha Pyne) about your wedding day being the happiest of your life.  Hers began when she eloped with a man her parents didn't approve of, and ended with an accident that paralysed her for life (the details of which were presumably revealed in a previous instalment).  And Louise Mahler is the bearer of even more bad news: her move to Stoke Mandeville hospital, where she'll be taught how to live with her disability, has been indefinitely postponed as they don't have room for her.  "What is it they say? Keep your packer up?" says Louise, funny foreigner that she is.  "Pecker!" exclaims Mrs Luke, possibly as a way of expressing her frustration.

There's an episode lost between this and the one previously featured at TV Minus 50, and as Giles Farmer seems happy that his father's improving it appears that he wasn't suffering from terminal cancer after all.  Les Large, hoping to take Giles' mind off his troubles, asks him to accompany him on a fortnight's holiday touring the south coast.  But Giles is hoping to do something with Louise (surely all the doctors can't go on holiday in the same two weeks?).

Interim registrar Rex Lane-Russell is still trying to worm his way into Nurse Michaela Davis's underclothes - she's managed to put him off once by sending another nurse, Jane Beattie (Anne Lloyd) on a date with him in her place, but he's still harrassing her.

However, he's also keeping his options open by continuing to romance Jane.

Les admires Rex's prowess with the ladies, but he's got his own hands full with a workman (Reg Whitehead) who crushed himself against a wall with a forklift truck, ending up with a fractured sternum.  Cameron Miller, playing factory GP Dr Withers, proves totally unable to remember his lines.

While all this is going on, Louise is enjoying a coffee with Rex, whose time at Oxbridge is coming to an end.  "I haven't achieved everything I'd have liked..." he says, giving her a meaning glance.  Cue the entrance of a somewhat glowering Giles.

When Les calls on his superior Leon Dorsey (David Garth, who'd essentially reprise his role in the 1970s EW10 rehash General Hospital), he's having a pre-lunch drink with fellow consultant Harold De la Roux (John Barron) - a lot of drinking goes on in this hospital.  De la Roux, much less subtly than he imagines, is trying to secure Dorsey's backing for his bid to become chairman of the medical committee.

While Dorsey rushes to the workman's aid, De la Roux, peeved at missing his lunch, has a root round Les and Giles' office, discovering some rather interesting reading material in the process...

Having agreed to go on a date with Rex, Michaela's a tad narked to learn that he's still carrying on with Jane.  Together they come up with a plan to get their own back.

Much to the amusement of little Dr Withers, Les manages to get a strangely obliging De la Roux to examine some of his patients for him (perhaps he's hoping to get a lend of that book).  Note the rather charming font that makes having an accident seem like a much more pleasant experience.

Meanwhile, a ward sister who glories in the name of Jessie MacNab (Dorothy Smith), is fuming after most of the others sister have disowned a letter she sent to Matron on all their behalf protesting the announced changes in the way of doing things.  It seems she and Sister Doughty now stand alone against the forces of modernisation.

And finally, Michaela's attempt to embarrass the departing Rex by bringing all the other nurses he's made passes at on their date doesn't go as well as she'd hoped - he reveals he's hoping he'll be able to stay on at the hospital permanently...

In the unlikely event that you're gagging to know what happens next I can't help you, I'm afraid - the next few weeks of episodes are all lost as well.