EIGHT
I HARDLY NOTICED THE passage of the weeks as I rattled along the moorland roads on my daily rounds; but the district was beginning to take shape, the people to emerge as separate personalities. Most days I had a puncture. The tyres were through to the canvas on all wheels; it surprised me that they took me anywhere at all.
One of the few refinements on the car was a rusty “sunshine roof.” It grated dismally when I slid it back, but most of the time I kept it open and the windows too, and I drove in my shirt sleeves with the delicious air swirling about me. On wet days it didn’t help much to close the roof because the rain dripped through the joints and formed pools on my lap and the passenger seat.
I developed great skill in zig-zagging round puddles. To drive through was a mistake as the muddy water fountained up through the gaps in the floorboards.
But it was a fine summer and long days in the open gave me a tan which rivalled the farmers’. Even mending a puncture was no penance on the high, unfenced roads with the wheeling curlews for company and the wind bringing the scents of flowers and trees up from the valleys. And I could find other excuses to get out and sit on the crisp grass and look out over the airy roof of Yorkshire. It was like taking time out of life. Time to get things into perspective and assess my progress. Everything was so different that it confused me. This countryside after years of city streets, the sense of release from exams and study, the job with its daily challenge. And then there was my boss.
Siegfried Farnon charged round the practice with fierce energy from dawn till dark and I often wondered what drove him on. It wasn’t money because he treated it with scant respect. When the bills were paid, the cash went into the pint pot on the mantelpiece and he grabbed handfuls when he wanted it. I never saw him take out a wallet, but his pockets bulged with loose silver and balled-up notes. When he pulled out a thermometer they flew around him in a cloud.
After a week or two of headlong rush he would disappear; maybe for the evening, maybe overnight and often without saying where he was going. Mrs. Hall would serve a meal for two, but when she saw I was eating alone she would remove the food without comment.
He dashed off the list of calls each morning with such speed that I was quite often sent hurrying off to the wrong farm or to do the wrong thing. When I told him later of my embarrassment he would laugh heartily.
There was one time when he got involved himself. I had just taken a call from a Mr. Heaton of Bronsett about doing a P.M. on a dead sheep.
“I’d like you to come with me, James,” Siegfried said. “Things are quiet this morning and I believe they teach you blokes a pretty hot post-mortem procedure. I want to see you in action.”
We drove into the village of Bronsett and Siegfried swung the car left into a gated lane.
“Where are you going?” I said. “Heaton’s is at the other end of the village.”
“But you said Seaton’s.”
“No, I assure you …”
“Look, James, I was right by you when you were talking to the man. I distinctly heard you say the name.”
I opened my mouth to argue further but the car was hurtling down the lane and Siegfried’s jaw was jutting. I decided to let him find out for himself.
We arrived outside the farmhouse with a screaming of brakes. Siegfried had left his seat and was rummaging in the boot before the car had stopped shuddering. “Hell!” he shouted. “No post-mortem knife. Never mind, I’ll borrow something from the house.” He slammed down the lid and bustled over to the door.
The farmer’s wife answered and Siegfried beamed on her. “Good morning to you, Mrs. Seaton, have you a carving knife?”
The good lady raised her eyebrows. “What was that you said?”
“A carving knife, Mrs. Seaton, a carving knife, and a good sharp one, please.”
“You want a carving knife?”
“Yes, that’s right, a carving knife!” Siegfried cried, his scanty store of patience beginning to run out. “And I wonder if you’d mind hurrying. I haven’t much time.”
The bewildered woman withdrew to the kitchen and I could hear whispering and muttering. Children’s heads peeped out at intervals to get a quick look at Siegfried stamping irritably on the step. After some delay, one of the daughters advanced timidly, holding out a long, dangerous-looking knife.
Siegfried snatched it from her hand and ran his thumb up and down the edge. “This is no damn good!” he shouted in exasperation. “Don’t you understand I want something really sharp? Fetch me a steel.”
The girl fled back into the kitchen and there was a low rumble of voices. It was some minutes before another young girl was pushed round the door. She inched her way up to Siegfried, gave him the steel at arm’s length and dashed back to safety.
Siegfried prided himself on his skill at sharpening a knife. It was something he enjoyed doing. As he stropped the knife on the steel, he warmed to his work and finally burst into song. There was no sound from the kitchen, only the ring of steel on steel backed by the tuneless singing; there were silent intervals when he carefully tested the edge, then the noise would start again.
When he had completed the job to his satisfaction he peered inside the door. “Where is your husband?” he called.
There was no reply so he strode into the kitchen, waving the gleaming blade in front of him. I followed him and saw Mrs. Seaton and her daughters cowering in the far corner, staring at Siegfried with large, frightened eyes.
He made a sweeping gesture at them with the knife. “Well, come on, I can get started now!”
“Started what?” the mother whispered, holding her family close to her.
“I want to P.M. this sheep. You have a dead sheep, haven’t you?”
Explanations and apologies followed.
Later, Siegfried remonstrated gravely with me for sending him to the wrong farm.
“You’ll have to be a bit more careful in future, James,” he said seriously. “Creates a very bad impression, that sort of thing.”
Another thing about my new life which interested me was the regular traffic of women through Skeldale House. They were all upper class, mostly beautiful and they had one thing in common—eagerness. They came for drinks, for tea, to dinner, but the real reason was to gaze at Siegfried like parched travellers in the desert sighting an oasis.
I found it damaging to my own ego when their eyes passed over me without recognition or interest and fastened themselves hungrily on my colleague. I wasn’t envious, but I was puzzled. I used to study him furtively, trying to fathom the secret of his appeal. Looking at the worn jacket hanging from the thin shoulders, the frayed shirt collar and anonymous tie, I had to conclude that clothes had nothing to do with it.
There was something attractive in the long, bony face and humorous blue eyes, but a lot of the time he was so haggard and sunken-cheeked that I wondered if he was ill.
I often spotted Diana Brompton in the queue and at these times I had to fight down an impulse to dive under the sofa. She was difficult to recognise as the brassy beauty of that afternoon as she looked up meltingly at Siegfried, hanging on his words, giggling like a schoolgirl.
I used to grow cold at the thought that Siegfried might pick her out of the mob and marry her. It worried me a lot because I knew I would have to leave just when I was beginning to enjoy everything about Darrowby.
But Siegfried showed no sign of marrying any of them and the procession continued hopefully. I finally got used to it and stopped worrying.
I got used, too, to my employer’s violent changes of front. There was one morning when Siegfried came down to breakfast, rubbing a hand wearily over red-rimmed eyes.
“Out at 4 a.m.,” he groaned, buttering his toast listlessly. “And I don’t like to have to say this, James, but it’s all your fault.”
“My fault?” I said, startled.
“Yes, lad, your fault. This was a cow with a mild impaction of the rumen. The farmer had been mucking about with it himself for days; a pint of linseed oil one day, a bit of bicarb and ginger the next, and at four o’clock in the morning he decides it is time to call the vet. When I pointed out it could have waited a few hours more he said Mr. Herriot told him never to hesitate to ring—he’d come out any hour of the day or night.”
He tapped the top of his egg as though the effort was almost too much for him. “Well, it’s all very well being conscientious and all that, but if a thing has waited several days it can wait till morning. You’re spoiling these chaps, James, and I’m getting the backwash of it. I’m sick and tired of being dragged out of my bed for trifles.”
“I’m truly sorry, Siegfried. I honestly had no wish to do that to you. Maybe it’s just my inexperience. If I didn’t go out, I’d be worried the animal might die. If I left it till morning and it died, how would I feel?”
“That’s all right,” snapped Siegfried. “There’s nothing like a dead animal to bring them to their senses. They’ll call us out a bit earlier next time.”
I absorbed this bit of advice and tried to act on it. A week later, Siegfried said he wanted a word with me.
“James, I know you won’t mind my saying this, but old Sumner was complaining to me today. He says he rang you the other night and you refused to come out to his cow. He’s a good client, you know, and a very nice fellow, but he was quite shirty about it. We don’t want to lose a chap like that.”
“But it was just a chronic mastitis,” I said. “A bit of thickening in the milk, that’s all. He’d been dosing it himself for nearly a week with some quack remedy. The cow was eating all right, so I thought it would be quite safe to leave it till next day.”
Siegfried put a hand on my shoulder and an excessively patient look spread over his face. I steeled myself. I didn’t mind his impatience; I was used to it and could stand it. But the patience was hard to take.
“James,” he said in a gentle voice, “there is one fundamental rule in our job which transcends all others, and I’ll tell you what it is. YOU MUST ATTEND. That is it and it ought to be written on your soul in letters of fire.” He raised a portentous forefinger. “YOU MUST ATTEND. Always remember that, James; it is the basis of everything. No matter what the circumstances, whether it be wet or fine, night or day, if a client calls you out, you must go; and go cheerfully. You say this didn’t sound like an urgent case. Well, after all, you have only the owner’s description to guide you and he is not equipped with the knowledge to decide whether it is urgent or not. No, lad, you have to go. Even if they have been treating the animal themselves, it may have taken a turn for the worse. And don’t forget,” wagging the finger solemnly, “the animal may die.”
“But I thought you said there was nothing like a dead animal to bring them to their senses,” I said querulously.
“What’s that?” barked Siegfried, utterly astonished. “Never heard such rubbish. Let’s have no more of it. Just remember—YOU MUST ATTEND.”
Sometimes he would give me advice on how to live. As when he found me hunched over the phone which I had just crashed down; I was staring at the wall, swearing softly to myself.
Siegfried smiled whimsically. “Now what is it, James?”
“I’ve just had a torrid ten minutes with Rolston. You remember that outbreak of calf pneumonia? Well, I spent hours with those calves, poured expensive drugs into them. There wasn’t a single death. And now he’s complaining about his bill. Not a word of thanks. Hell, there’s no justice.”
Siegfried walked over and put his arm round my shoulders. He was wearing his patient look again. “My dear chap,” he cooed. “Just look at you. Red in the face, all tensed up. You mustn’t let yourself get upset like this; you must try to relax. Why do you think professional men are cracking up all over the country with coronaries and ulcers? Just because they allow themselves to get all steamed up over piffling little things like you are doing now. Yes, yes, I know these things are annoying, but you’ve got to take them in your stride. Keep calm, James, calm. It just isn’t worth it—I mean, it will all be the same in a hundred years.”
He delivered the sermon with a serene smile, patting my shoulder reassuringly like a psychiatrist soothing a violent patient.
I was writing a label on a jar of red blister a few days later when Siegfried catapulted into the room. He must have kicked the door open because it flew back viciously against the rubber stop and rebounded almost into his face. He rushed over to the desk where I was sitting and began to pound on it with the flat of his hand. His eyes glared wildly from a flushed face.
“I’ve just come from that bloody swine Holt!” he shouted.
“Ned Holt, you mean?”
“Yes, that’s who I mean, damn him!”
I was surprised. Mr. Holt was a little man who worked on the roads for the county council. He kept four cows as a sideline and had never been known to pay a veterinary bill; but he was a cheerful character and Siegfried had rendered his unpaid services over the years without objection.
“One of your favourites, isn’t he?” I said.
“Was, by God, was,” Siegfried snarled. “I’ve been treating Muriel for him. You know, the big red cow second from the far end of his byre. She’s had recurrent tympany—coming in from the field every night badly blown—and I’d tried about everything. Nothing did any good. Then it struck me that it might be actinobacillosis of the reticulum. I shot some sodium iodine into the vein and when I saw her today the difference was incredible—she was standing there, chewing her cud, right as rain. I was just patting myself on the back for a smart piece of diagnosis, and do you know what Holt said? He said he knew she’d be better today because last night he gave her half a pound of epsom salts in a bran mash. That was what had cured her.”
Siegfried took some empty cartons and bottles from his pockets and hurled them savagely into the wastepaper basket. He began to shout again.
“Do you know, for the past fortnight I’ve puzzled and worried and damn nearly dreamt about that cow. Now I’ve found the cause of the trouble, applied the most modern treatment and the animal has recovered. And what happens? Does the owner express his grateful thanks for my skill? Does he hell—the entire credit goes to the half point of epsom salts. What I did was a pure waste of time.”
He dealt the desk another sickening blow.
“But I frightened him, James,” he said, his eyes staring. “By God, I frightened him. When he made that crack about the salts, I yelled out ‘You bugger!’ and made a grab for him. I think I would have strangled him, but he shot into the house and stayed there. I didn’t see him again.”
Siegfried threw himself into a chair and began to churn his hair about. “Epsom salts!” he groaned. “Oh God, it makes you despair.”
I thought of telling him to relax and pointing out that it would all be the same in a hundred years, but my employer still had an empty serum bottle dangling from one hand. I discarded the idea.
Then there came the day when Siegfried decided to have my car rebored. It had been using a steady two pints of oil a day and he hadn’t thought this excessive, but when it got to half a gallon a day he felt something ought to be done. What probably decided him was a farmer on market day saying he always knew when the young vet was coming because he could see the cloud of blue smoke miles away.
When the tiny Austin came back from the garage, Siegfried fussed round it like an old hen. “Come over here, James,” he called. “I want to talk to you.”
I saw he was looking patient again and braced myself.
“James,” he said, pacing round the battered vehicle, whisking specks from the paintwork. “You see this car?”
I nodded.
“Well, it has been rebored, James, rebored at great expense, and that’s what I want to talk to you about. You now have in your possession what amounts to a new car.” With an effort he unfastened the catch and the bonnet creaked open in a shower of rust and dirt. He pointed down at the engine, black and oily, with unrelated pieces of flex and rubber tubing hanging around it like garlands. “You have a piece of fine mechanism here and I want you to treat it with respect. I’ve seen you belting along like a maniac and it won’t do. You’ve got to nurse this machine for the next two or three thousand miles; thirty miles an hour is quite fast enough. I think it’s a crime the way some people abuse a new engine—they should be locked up—so remember, lad, no flogging or I’ll be down on you.”
He closed the bonnet with care, gave the cracked windscreen a polish with the cuff of his coat and left.
These strong words made such an impression on me that I crawled round the visits all day almost at walking pace.
The same night, I was getting ready for bed when Siegfried came in. He had two farm lads with him and they both wore silly grins. A powerful smell of beer filled the room.
Siegfried spoke with dignity, slurring his words only slightly. “James, I met these gentlemen in the Black Bull this evening. We have had several excellent games of dominoes but unfortunately they have missed the last bus. Will you kindly bring the Austin round and I will run them home.”
I drove the car to the front of the house and the farm lads piled in, one in the front, the other in the back. I looked at Siegfried lowering himself unsteadily into the driving seat and decided to go along. I got into the back.
The two young men lived in a farm far up on the North Moors and, three miles out of the town, we left the main road and our headlights picked out a strip of track twisting along the dark hillside.
Siegfried was in a hurry. He kept his foot on the boards, the note of the engine rose to a tortured scream and the little car hurtled on into the blackness. Hanging on grimly, I leaned forward so that I could shout into my employer’s ear. “Remember this is the car which has just been rebored,” I bellowed above the din.
Siegfried looked round with an indulgent smile. “Yes, yes, I remember, James. What are you fussing about?” As he spoke, the car shot off the road and bounded over the grass at sixty miles an hour. We all bounced around like corks till he found his way back. Unperturbed, he carried on at the same speed. The silly grins had left the lads’ faces and they sat rigid in their seats. Nobody said anything.
The passengers were unloaded at a silent farmhouse and the return journey began. Since it was downhill all the way, Siegfried found he could go even faster. The car leaped and bumped over the uneven surface with its engine whining. We made several brief but tense visits to the surrounding moors, but we got home.
It was a month later that Siegfried had occasion to take his assistant to task once more. “James, my boy,” he said sorrowfully, “you are a grand chap, but by God, you’re hard on cars. Look at this Austin. Newly rebored a short time ago, in tip-top condition, and look at it now—drinking oil. I don’t know how you did it in the time. You’re a real terror.”