Every Living Thing

  “Well, that’s wonderful, Mr. Dowson. I’m so pleased to hear it.” I shook my head to dispel the mists of fantasy that had begun to billow around me. I am a run-of-the-mill veterinary surgeon, hard-working and conscientious, but that’s all, and it knocks me out of my stride to be hailed as a genius, but as always, listening to Mr. Dowson was like soothing oil being poured on my oft-bruised ego. I had to admit I enjoyed it, and I didn’t demur when he went on.

  “And while you’re ’ere, just have a look at this pig.” He took my arm and led me into an outbuilding. “There she is,” he said, leaning over a pen and pointing to a fine big sow stretched on the straw with a litter of piglets sucking busily at her teats. “That’s the one that had that nasty great swelling on her foot. Dead lame she was, and I was right worried about ’er. You gave her a jab and left me some salve to rub on the lump and next morning it was gone!”

  “You mean…it vanished overnight? All of it?”

  “Aye, that’s right, ah’m not jokin’ nor jestin’. It was gone!”

  “Well…that’s quite amazing.”

  “Not to me, it isn’t, Mr. Herriot. Everything you do for me turns out right. Ah don’t know what I’d do without you.”

  Even through my confusion I found his faith touching. I hoped it would never be shattered.

  I thought that moment had arrived when Mr. Dowson called me to his farm a few weeks later.

  “What’s the trouble this time?” I asked.

  The old man rubbed his chin. “Well, it’s a funny one, I tell you. It’s this calf.” He pointed to a sturdy young animal about a month old. “He won’t drink ’is milk properly. Look. I’ll show ye.” He tipped some milk into a big bucket and set it down in front of the little creature, but the calf, instead of drinking, put his head down and, with a fierce butt, sent the bucket flying, spilling the milk in all directions.

  “Does he do this every time?”

  “Aye, knocks it over every time. It’s a dang nuisance. Wastes me good milk, too.”

  I examined the calf, then turned to the farmer. “He seems perfectly healthy to me.”

  “Oh, aye, he is. Fit as a flea and full o’ life. It’s just this one thing wi’ the bucket. I thought you’d maybe be able to give ’im one of your magic injections to stop him doin’ it.”

  “Well, really, Mr. Dowson,” I said, laughing. “This isn’t a medical problem, it’s psychological. He just doesn’t like buckets. I’m afraid I can’t do anything for you this time. Can’t you hold the bucket while he drinks?”

  “Yes, that’s what I have to do, but even then ’e keeps bashin’ at it with his head.” He dug his hands into his pockets and gave me a crestfallen look. “Ah’m sure you could do something. You say it’s not a medical problem, but it’s an animal problem and everythin’ you’ve done for me wi’ animals has been successful. I wish you’d have a try. Go on, give ’im an injection.”

  I looked at the old man’s doleful face. I had a feeling that if I walked off the farm without doing something, he would be truly upset. How could I please him without being an absolute charlatan? If I didn’t inject something it was going to break his heart, but what…what…? Mentally I searched the contents of my car boot and was beginning to despair when in my mind’s eye I saw the bottle of thiamine—vitamin B injection. We used it for a brain disease called cerebrocortical necrosis and, of course, the calf wasn’t suffering from that or anything like it, but at least it had to do with the head. Anyway, I stilled my conscience with the thought that I wouldn’t charge the old man anything.

  I hurried to the car. “I’ll give him a shot of this,” I said and was rewarded by a radiant smile lighting up Mr. Dowson’s face. I injected a few c.c.’s with the knowledge that I wasn’t doing any harm. The injection would be useless, but it was serving its purpose. The old man was happy, and, really, when I thought about it, it would be no bad thing if, for once, my treatment was ineffective. My mantle of infallibility would be stripped from me and I wouldn’t be expected to do the impossible any more.

  It was more than a month before I saw Mr. Dowson again. He was leaning over a rail at the cattle market and he waved and came over to me. I was intrigued at the prospect that for the first time ever he would have to report a failure. What words would he employ? He had never had to do it before. And I was pretty sure that he would hate telling me.

  He looked up at me with wide eyes. “Well, you’ve done it again, Mr. Herriot!”

  “Done it again…?” I looked at him blankly.

  “Aye, that calf. Your injection worked.”

  “What!”

  “It did an’ all.” The familiar happy smile flooded over his face. “He’s never butted a bucket since that day!”

  Chapter 14

  SOMETIMES, WHEN OUR DOG and cat patients died the owners brought them in for us to dispose of them. It was always a sad occasion and I had a sense of foreboding when I saw old Dick Fawcett’s face.

  He put the improvised cat box on the surgery table and looked at me with unhappy eyes.

  “It’s Frisk,” he said. His lips trembled as though he was unable to say more.

  I didn’t ask any questions, but began to undo the strings on the cardboard container. Dick couldn’t afford a proper cat box, but he had used this one before, a home-made affair with holes punched in the sides.

  I untied the last knot and looked inside at the motionless body. Frisk. The glossy black, playful little creature I knew so well, always purring and affectionate and Dick’s companion and friend.

  “When did he die, Dick?” I asked.

  He passed a hand over his haggard face and through the straggling grey hairs. “Well, I just found ’im stretched out by my bed this morning. But…I don’t rightly know if he’s dead yet, Mr. Herriot.”

  I looked again inside the box. There was no sign of breathing. I lifted the limp form onto the table and touched the cornea of the unseeing eye. No reflex. I reached for my stethoscope and placed it over the chest.

  “The heart’s still going, Dick, but it’s a very faint beat.”

  “Might stop any time, you mean?”

  I hesitated. “Well, that’s the way it sounds, I’m afraid.”

  As I spoke, the little cat’s rib-cage lifted slightly, then subsided.

  “He’s still breathing,” I said. “But only just.” I examined the cat thoroughly and found nothing unusual. The conjunctiva of the eye was a good colour. In fact there was no abnormality.

  I passed a hand over the sleek little body. “This is a puzzler, Dick. He’s always been so lively—lived up to his name, in fact, yet here he is, flat out, and I can’t find any reason for it.”

  “Could he have ’ad a stroke or summat?”

  “I suppose it’s just possible, but I wouldn’t expect him to be totally unconscious. I’m wondering if he might have had a blow on the head.”

  “I don’t think so. He was as right as rain when I went to bed, and he was never out during t’night.” The old man shrugged his shoulders. “Any road, it’s a poor look-out for ’im?”

  “Afraid so, Dick. He’s only just alive. But I’ll give him a stimulant injection and then you must take him home and keep him warm. If he’s still around tomorrow morning bring him in and I’ll see how he’s going on.”

  I was trying to strike an optimistic note, but I was pretty sure that I would never see Frisk again and I knew the old man felt the same.

  His hands shook as he tied up the box and he didn’t speak until we reached the front door. He turned briefly to me and nodded. “Thank ye, Mr. Herriot.”

  I watched him as he walked with shuffling steps down the street. He was going back to an empty little house with his dying pet. He had lost his wife many years ago—I had never known a Mrs. Fawcett—and he lived alone on his old-age pension. It wasn’t much of a life. He was a quiet, kindly man who didn’t go out much and seemed to have few friends, but he had Frisk. The little cat had walked in on him six years ago and had transformed his life,
bringing a boisterous, happy presence into the silent house, making the old man laugh with his tricks and playfulness, following, him around, rubbing against his legs. Dick wasn’t lonely any more, and I had watched a warm bond of friendship growing stronger over the years. In fact, it was something more—the old man seemed to depend on Frisk. And now this.

  Well, I thought as I walked back down the passage, it was the sort of thing that happened in veterinary practice. Pets didn’t live long enough. But I felt worse this time because I had no idea what ailed my patient. I was in a total fog.

  On the following morning I was surprised to see Dick Fawcett sitting in the waiting room, the cardboard box on his knee.

  I stared at him. “What’s happened?”

  He didn’t answer and his face was inscrutable as we went through to the consulting room and he undid the knots. When he opened the box I prepared for the worst, but to my astonishment the little cat leaped out onto the table and rubbed his face against my hand, purring like a motorcycle.

  The old man laughed, his thin face transfigured. “Well, what d’ye think of that?”

  “I don’t know what to think, Dick!” I examined the little animal carefully. He was completely normal. “All I know is that I’m delighted. It’s like a miracle.”

  “No, it isn’t,” he said. “It was that injection you gave ’im. It’s worked wonders. I’m right grateful.”

  Well, it was kind of him, but it wasn’t as simple as that. There was something here I didn’t understand, but never mind. Thank heaven it had ended happily.

  The incident had receded into a comfortable memory when, three days later, Dick Fawcett reappeared at the surgery with his box. Inside was Frisk, motionless, unconscious, just as before.

  Totally bewildered, I repeated the injection and on the following day the cat was normal. From then on, I was in the situation that every veterinary surgeon knows so well—being involved in a baffling case and waiting with a feeling of impending doom for something tragic to happen.

  Nothing did happen for nearly a week, then Mrs. Duggan, Dick’s neighbour, telephoned.

  “I’m ringin’ on behalf of Mr. Fawcett. His cat’s ill.”

  “In what way?”

  “Oh, just lyin’ stretched out, unconscious, like.”

  I suppressed a scream. “When did this happen?”

  “Just found ’im this morning. And Mr. Fawcett can’t bring him to you—he’s poorly himself. He’s in bed.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that. I’ll come round straight away.”

  And it was just the same as before. An almost lifeless little creature lying prone on Dick’s bed. Dick himself looked terrible—ghastly white and thinner than ever—but he still managed a smile.

  “Looks like ’e needs another of your magic injections, Mr. Herriot.”

  As I filled my syringe, my mind seethed with the thought that there was indeed some kind of magic at work here, but it wasn’t my injection.

  “I’ll drop in tomorrow, Dick,” I said. “And I hope you’ll be feeling better yourself.”

  “Oh, I’ll be awright as long as t’little feller’s better.” The old man stretched out a hand and stroked the cat’s shining fur. The arm was emaciated and the eyes in the skull-like face were desperately worried.

  I looked around the comfortless little room and hoped for another miracle.

  I wasn’t really surprised when I came back next morning and saw Frisk darting about on the bed, pawing at a piece of string the old man was holding up for him. The relief was great but I felt enveloped more suffocatingly than ever in my fog of ignorance. What the hell was it? The whole thing just didn’t make sense. There was no known disease with symptoms like these. I had a strong conviction that reading a whole library of veterinary books wouldn’t help me.

  Anyway, the sight of the little cat arching and purring round my hand was reward enough, and for Dick it was everything. He was relaxed and smiling.

  “You keep gettin’ him right, Mr. Herriot. I can’t thank you enough.” Then the worry flickered again in his eyes. “But is he goin’ to keep doing it? I’m frightened he won’t come round one of these times.”

  Well, that was the question. I was frightened, too, but I had to try to be cheerful. “Maybe it’s just a passing phase, Dick. I hope we’ll have no more trouble now.” But I couldn’t promise anything and the frail man in the bed knew it.

  Mrs. Duggan was showing me out when I saw the district nurse getting out of her car at the front door.

  “Hello, Nurse,” I said. “You’ve come to have a look at Mr. Fawcett? I’m sorry he’s ill.”

  She nodded. “Yes, poor old chap. It’s a great shame.”

  “What do you mean? Is it something serious?”

  “Afraid so.” Her mouth tightened and she looked away from me. “He’s dying. It’s cancer. Getting rapidly worse.”

  “My God! Poor Dick. And a few days ago he was bringing his cat to my surgery. He never said a word. Does he know?”

  “Oh, yes, he knows, but that’s him all over, Mr. Herriot. He’s as game as a pebble. He shouldn’t have been out, really.”

  “Is he…is he…suffering?”

  She shrugged. “Getting a bit of pain now, but we’re keeping him as comfortable as we can with medication. I give him a shot when necessary and he has some stuff he can take himself if I’m not around. He’s very shaky and can’t pour from the bottle into the spoon. Mrs. Duggan would gladly do it for him, but he’s so independent.” She smiled for a moment. “He pours the mixture into a saucer and spoons it up that way.”

  “A saucer…?” Somewhere in the fog a little light glimmered. “What’s in the mixture?”

  “Oh, heroin and pethidine. It’s the usual thing Dr. Allinson prescribes.”

  I seized her arm. “I’m coming back in with you, Nurse.”

  The old man was surprised when I reappeared. “What’s the matter, Mr. Herriot? Have you left summat?”

  “No, Dick, I want to ask you something. Is your medicine pleasant-tasting?”

  “Aye, it’s nice and sweet. It isn’t bad to take at all.”

  “And you put it in a saucer?”

  “That’s right. Me hand’s a bit dothery.”

  “And when you take it last thing at night there’s sometimes a bit left in the saucer?”

  “Aye, there is. Why?”

  “Because you leave that saucer by your bedside, don’t you, and Frisk sleeps on your bed…”

  The old man lay very still as he stared at me. “You mean the little beggar licks it out?”

  “I’ll bet my boots he does.”

  Dick threw back his head and laughed. A long, joyous laugh. “And that sends ’im to sleep! No wonder! It makes me right dozy, too!”

  I laughed with him. “Anyway, we know now, Dick. You’ll put that saucer in the cupboard when you’ve taken your dose, won’t you?”

  “I will that, Mr. Herriot. And Frisk will never pass out like that again?”

  “No, never again.”

  “Eee, that’s grand!” He sat up in bed, lifted the little cat and held him against his face. He gave a sigh of utter content and smiled at me.

  “Mr. Herriot,” he said. “I’ve got nowt to worry about now.”

  Out in the street, as I bade Mrs. Duggan goodbye for the second time, I looked back at the little house. “ ‘Nowt to worry about,’ eh? That’s rather wonderful, coming from him.”

  “Oh aye, and he means it, too. He’s not bothered about himself.”

  I didn’t see Dick again for two weeks. I was visiting a friend in Darrowby’s little cottage hospital when I saw the old man in a bed in a corner of the ward.

  I went over and sat down by his side. His face was desperately thin, but serene.

  “Hello, Dick,” I said.

  He looked at me sleepily and spoke in a whisper. “Now then, Mr. Herriot.” He closed his eyes for a few moments, then he looked up again with the ghost of a smile. “I’m glad we found out what was wrong wi
th t’little cat.”

  “So am I, Dick.”

  Again a pause. “Mrs. Duggan’s got ’im.”

  “Yes. I know. He has a good home there.”

  “Aye…aye…” The voice was fainter. “But oftens I wish I had ’im here.” The bony hand stroked the counterpane and his lips moved again. I bent closer to hear.

  “Frisk…” he was saying, “Frisk…” Then his eyes closed and I saw that he was sleeping.

  I heard next day that Dick Fawcett had died, and it was possible that I was the last person to hear him speak. And it was strange, yet fitting, that those last words were about his cat.

  “Frisk…Frisk…”

  Chapter 15

  I HAVE TO GO back now to those early days when John Crooks departed from the practice and it was difficult to adjust my mind to the fact that he had gone for good. I couldn’t believe that I would never hear that booming voice on the other end of the phone saying okay, I could stay in my bed, and he’d go out into the cold darkness to calve that heifer. And it wasn’t just that. As I have said, I was young enough then to be a friend to an assistant and I was losing a friend now—two, in fact, when John and Heather set off to build their own life in Beverley—and it left me with an empty feeling.

  However, it was no use brooding. We had to have another assistant, and since our advertisement in The Veterinary Record had been successful, there was one on his way to us at this moment. I looked at my watch. It was nearly two thirty. Calum Buchanan’s train would be pulling in to Darrowby in a few minutes. I ran out to the car and drove to the station.

  When the train drew in, only one passenger alighted. He was a tall young man with a huge lurcher dog trotting by his side, and as he came along the platform towards me I took in the battered suitcase, flowing black moustache and very dark eyes, but the most striking feature was a large hairy animal draped over his left shoulder.

  He put out his hand and grinned. “Mr. Herriot?”

  “Yes…yes…” I shook his hand. “You’ll be Calum Buchanan.”