A Dutch Soul Saved

THE CRAZY DOCTOR (248 pp.]--Arle Van der Lugi--Random ($3).

When a priest and a sinner become fond of each other, an account of their genial tilting is apt to make a readable story. Such bestselling authors as Giovanni Gua reschi (The Little World, oj Don Camilla), Bruce Marshall (The World, the Flesh, and Father Smith), and A. J. Cronin (The Keys of the Kingdom) have made the most of it. Now enters Dutch Novelist Arie van der Lugt with The Crazy Doctor, to show that the everlasting contest goes on in Holland too. It is, after all, a universal story, its interest limited only by the writer's originality in fashioning sin and in keeping the priest's skill within the bounds of spiritual fair play.

Dr. Tom de Geus was a good doctor, but he also earned the reputation of being crazy. When he came bouncing onto the dike-enclosed farming island on a motorcycle, to replace the old doctor who had died, the poor peasants refused to take him seriously. Short, bald, muscular and hairy-chested, he looked like a good-natured, grinning ape. Unlike his dapper predecessor, he wore the wooden shoes and coarse clothing of his patients. He cursed, he got into fist fights, and he loved his gin. When he showed up to deliver a baby on his first case, he even had a little trouble being admitted to the house. How could this genial ruffian be so unprofessional and so skillful too?

Father Conings dropped in on Dr. de Geus to say, "Welcome to my parish." The answer: "I don't want to have anything to do with your dear Lord." But the priest liked the little ruffian,the only other educated man on the poverty-stricken island. It was hard not to like a man who not only treated the poor for nothing but gave them food, money and fuel as well. In Robin Hood fashion, De Geus clipped his few rich patients unmercifully, but no one could accuse him of greed. Before long he and the priest were pals, sat long over the wine after dinner, carried on endless conversations. The peasants were almost as shocked by their priest's choice of company as they were by the doctor's ungodly ways, but Father Conings knew his man. Even when the doctor went off to Rotterdam and came back with a fancy woman, he refused to give up.

In such a contest, the outcome is pretty well rigged. What weakens Author Van der Lugt's lively yarn is his unashamed sentimentality, his failure to make the doctor seem like a truly troubled man or even a convinced atheist. What is good about The Crazy Doctor is its author's earthy sense of humor, and the fresh background of Holland life and scenery that sometimes has the authenticity of a Rembrandt. Van der Lugt, a prolific writer still under 40 (more than 70 plays, six novels, many juveniles), writes like a man in a hurry. In his first U.S. bow, he very nearly throws away his characters and his story, but what is left is enough to keep the pages turning.

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