Mr. Dumbleby’s call was no exception but he was more peremptory than might have been expected. There was no question about apologising about ringing at such an hour as most farmers would do. I said I would come immediately but that wasn’t good enough—he wanted to know exactly in minutes how long I would be. In a sleepy attempt at sarcasm I started to recite a programme of so many minutes to get up and dressed, so many to go downstairs and get the car out etc. but I fear it was lost on him.
When I drove into the sleeping village a light was showing in the window of the butcher’s shop. Mr. Dumbleby almost trotted out into the street and paced up and down, muttering, as I fished out my ropes and instruments from the boot. Very impatient, I thought, for a man who hadn’t paid his vet bill for over a year.
We had to go through the shop to get to the byre in the rear. My patient was a big, fat white cow which didn’t seem particularly perturbed by her situation. Now and then she strained, pushing a pair of feet a few inches from her vulva. I took a keen look at those feet—it is the vet’s first indication of how tough the job is going to be. Two huge hooves sticking out of a tiny heifer have always been able to wipe the smile off my face. These feet were big enough but not out of the way, and in truth the mother looked sufficiently roomy. I wondered what was stopping the natural sequence.
“I’ve had me hand in,” said Mr. Dumbleby. “There’s a head there but I can’t shift owt. I’ve been pulling them legs for half an hour.”
As I stripped to the waist (it was still considered vaguely cissy to wear a calving overall) I reflected that things could be a lot worse. So many of the buildings where I had to take my shirt off were primitive and draughty but this was a modern cow house and the six cows provided a very adequate central heating. And there was electricity in place of the usual smoke-blackened oil lamp.
When I had soaped and disinfected my arms I made my first exploration and it wasn’t difficult to find the cause of the trouble.
There was a head and two legs all right, but they belonged to different calves.
“We’ve got twins here,” I said. “These are hind legs you’ve been pulling—a posterior presentation.”
“Arse fust, you mean?”
“If you like. And the calf that’s coming the right way has both his legs back along his sides. I’ll have to push him back out of the way and get the other one first.”
This was going to be a pretty tight squeeze. Normally I like a twin calving because the calves are usually so small, but these seemed to be quite big. I put my hand against the little muzzle in the passage, poked a finger into the mouth and was rewarded by a jerk and flip of the tongue; he was alive, anyway.
I began to push him steadily back into the uterus, wondering at the same time what the little creature was making of it all. He had almost entered the world—his nostrils had been a couple of inches from the outside air—and now he was being returned to the starting post.
The cow didn’t think much of the idea either because she started a series of straining heaves with the object of frustrating me. She did a pretty fair job, too, since a cow is a lot stronger than a man, but I kept my arm rigid against the calf and though each heave forced me back I maintained a steady pressure till I had pushed him to the brim of the pelvis.
I turned to Mr. Dumbleby and gasped: “I’ve got this head out of the way. Get hold of those feet and pull the other calf out.”
The butcher stepped forward ponderously and each of his big, meaty hands engulfed a foot. Then he closed his eyes and with many facial contortions and noises of painful effort he began to go through the motions of tugging. The calf didn’t move an inch and my spirits drooped. Mr. Dumbleby was a grunter. (This expression had its origin in an occasion when Siegfried and a farmer had a foot apiece at a calving and the farmer was making pitiful sounds without exerting himself in the slightest. Siegfried had turned to him and said: “Look, let’s come to an arrangement—you do the pulling and I’ll do the grunting.”)
It was clear I was going to get no help from the big butcher and decided to have one go by myself. I might be lucky. I let go the muzzle and made a quick grab for those hind feet, but the cow was too quick for me. I had just got a slippery grasp when she made a single expulsive effort and pushed calf number two into the passage again. I was back where I started.
Once more I put my hand against the wet little muzzle and began the painful process of repulsion. And as I fought against the big cow’s straining I was reminded that it was 4 a.m. when none of us feels very strong. By the time I had worked the head back to the pelvic inlet I was feeling the beginning of that deadly creeping weakness and it seemed as though somebody had removed most of the bones from my arm.
This time I took a few seconds to get my breath back before I made my dive for the feet, but it was no good. The cow beat me easily with a beautifully timed contraction. Again that intruding head was jammed tight in the passage.
I had had enough. And it occurred to me that the little creature inside must also be getting a little tired of this back and forth business. I shivered my way through the cold, empty shop out into the silent street and collected the local anaesthetic from the car. Eight cc’s into the epidural space and the cow, its uterus completely numbed, lost all interest in the proceedings. In fact she pulled a little hay from her rack and began to chew absently.
From then on it was like working inside a mail bag; whatever I pushed stayed put instead of surging back at me. The only snag was that once I had got everything straight there were no uterine contractions to help me. It was a case of pulling. Leaning back on a hind leg and with Mr. Dumbleby panting in agony on the other, the posterior presentation was soon delivered. He had inhaled a fair amount of placental fluid but I held him upside down till he had coughed it up. When I laid him on the byre floor he shook his head vigorously and tried to sit up.
Then I had to go in after my old friend the second calf. He was lying well inside now, apparently sulking. When I finally brought him snuffling and kicking into the light I couldn’t have blamed him if he had said “Make up your mind, will you!”
Towelling my chest I looked with the sharp stab of pleasure I always felt at the two wet little animals wriggling on the floor as Mr. Dumbleby rubbed them down with a handful of straw.
“Big ’uns for twins,” the butcher muttered.
Even this modest expression of approval surprised me and it seemed I might as well push things along a bit.
“Yes, they’re two grand calves. Twins are often dead when they’re mixed up like that—good job we got them out alive.” I paused a moment. “You know, those two must be worth a fair bit.”
Mr. Dumbleby didn’t answer and I couldn’t tell whether the shaft had gone home.
I got dressed, gathered up my gear and followed him out of the byre and into the silent shop past the rows of beef cuts hanging from hooks, the trays of offal, the mounds of freshly-made sausages. Near the outside door the butcher halted and stood, irresolute, for a moment. He seemed to be thinking hard. Then he turned to me.
“Would you like a few sausages?”
I almost reeled in my astonishment. “Yes, thank you very much, I would.” It was scarcely credible but I must have touched the man’s heart.
He went over, cut about a pound of links, wrapped them quickly in grease-proof paper and handed the parcel to me.
I looked down at the sausages, feeling the cold weight on my hand. I still couldn’t believe it. Then an unworthy thought welled in my mind. It wasn’t fair, I know—the poor fellow couldn’t have known the luxury of many generous impulses—but some inner demon drove me to put him to the test. I put a hand in my trouser pocket, jingled my loose change and looked him in the eye.
“Well, how much will that be?” I asked.
Mr. Dumbleby’s big frame froze suddenly into immobility and he stood for a few seconds perfectly motionless. His face, as he stared at me, was almost without expression, but a single twitch of the cheek and a slowly rising angui
sh in the eyes betrayed the internal battle which was raging. When he did speak it was in a husky whisper as though the words had been forced from him by a power beyond his control.
“That,” he said, “will be two and sixpence.”
FIFTY-SEVEN
IT WAS A NEW experience for me to be standing outside the hospital waiting for the nurses to come off duty, but it was old stuff to Tristan who was to be found there several nights a week. His experience showed in various ways, but mainly in the shrewd position he took up in a dark corner of the doorway of the gas company office just beyond the splash of light thrown by the street lamp. From there he could look straight across the road into the square entrance of the hospital and the long white corridor leading to the nurses’ quarters. And there was the other advantage that if Siegfried should happen to pass that way, Tristan would be invisible and safe.
At half past seven he nudged me. Two girls had come out of the hospital and down the steps and were standing expectantly in the street. Tristan looked warily in both directions before taking my arm. “Come on, Jim, here they are. That’s Connie on the left—the coppery blonde—lovely little thing.”
We went over and Tristan introduced me with characteristic charm. I had to admit that if the evening had indeed been arranged for therapeutic purposes I was beginning to feel better already. There was something healing in the way the two pretty girls looked up at me with parted lips and shining eyes as though I was the answer to every prayer they had ever offered.
They were remarkably alike except for the hair. Brenda was very dark but Connie was fair with a deep, fiery glow where the light from the doorway touched her head. Both of them projected a powerful image of bursting health—fresh cheeks, white teeth, lively eyes and something else which I found particularly easy to take; a simple desire to please.
Tristan opened the back door of the car with a flourish. “Be careful with him in there Connie, he looks quiet but he’s a devil with women. Known far and wide as a great lover.”
The girls giggled and studied me with even greater interest. Tristan leaped into the driver’s seat and we set off at breakneck speed.
As the dark countryside hastened past the windows I leaned back in the corner and listened to Tristan who was in full cry; maybe in a kindly attempt to cheer me or maybe because he just felt that way, but his flow of chatter was unceasing. The girls made an ideal audience because they laughed in delight at everything he said. I could feel Connie shaking against me. She was sitting very close with a long stretch of empty seat on the other side of her. The little car swayed round a sharp corner and threw her against me and she stayed there quite naturally with her head on my shoulder. I felt her hair against my cheek. She didn’t use much perfume but smelt cleanly of soap and antiseptic. My mind went back to Helen—I didn’t think much about her these days. It was just a question of practice; to scotch every thought of her as soon as it came up. I was getting pretty good at it now. Anyway, it was over—all over before it had begun.
I put my arm round Connie and she lifted her face to me. Ah well, I thought as I kissed her. Tristan’s voice rose in song from the front seat, Brenda giggled, the old car sped over the rough road with a thousand rattles.
We came at last to Poulton, a village on the road to nowhere. Its single street straggled untidily up the hillside to a dead end where there was a circular green with an ancient stone cross and a steep mound on which was perched the institute hall.
This was where the dance was to be held, but Tristan had other plans first. “There’s a lovely little pub here. We’ll just have a toothful to get us in the mood.” We got out of the car and Tristan ushered us into a low stone building.
There was nothing of the olde worlde about the place; just a large, square, whitewashed room with a black cooking range enclosing a bright fire and a long high-backed wooden settle facing it. Over the fireplace stretched a single immense beam, gnarled and pitted with the years and blackened with smoke.
We hurried over to the settle, feeling the comfort of it as a screen against the cold outside. We had the place to ourselves.
The landlord came in. He was dressed informally—no jacket, striped, collarless shirt, trousers and braces which were reinforced by a broad, leather belt around his middle. His cheerful round face lit up at the sight of Tristan. “Now then, Mr. Farnon, are you very well?”
“Never better, Mr. Peacock, and how are you?”
“Nicely, sir, very nicely. Can’t complain. And I recognize the other gentleman. Been in my place before, haven’t you?”
I remembered then. A day’s testing in the Poulton district and I had come in here for a meal, freezing and half starved after hours of wrestling with young beasts on the high moor. The landlord had received me unemotionally and had set to immediately with his frying-pan on the old black range while I sat looking at his shirt back and the braces and the shining leather belt. The meal had taken up the whole of the round oak table by the fire—a thick steak of home cured ham overlapping the plate with two fresh eggs nestling on its bosom, a newly baked loaf with the knife sticking in it, a dish of farm butter, some jam, a vast pot of tea and a whole Wensleydale cheese, circular, snow white, about eighteen inches high.
I could remember eating unbelievingly for a long time and finishing with slice after slice of the moist, delicately flavoured cheese. The entire meal had cost me half a crown.
“Yes, Mr. Peacock, I have been here before and if I’m ever starving on a desert island I’ll think of that wonderful meal you gave me.”
The landlord shrugged. “Well it was nowt much, sir. Just t’usual stuff.” But he looked pleased.
“That’s fine, then,” Tristan said impatiently. “But we haven’t come to eat, we’ve come for a drink and Mr. Peacock keeps some of the finest draught Magnet in Yorkshire. I’d welcome your opinion on it, Jim. Perhaps you would be kind enough to bring us up two pints and two halves, Mr. Peacock.”
I noticed there was no question of asking the girls what they would like to have, but they seemed quite happy with the arrangement. The landlord reappeared from the cellar, puffing slightly. He was carrying a tall, white enamelled jug from which he poured a thin brown stream, varying the height expertly till he had produced a white, frothy head on each glass.
Tristan raised his pint and looked at it with quiet reverence. He sniffed it carefully and then took a sip which he retained in his mouth for a few seconds while his jaw moved rapidly up and down. After swallowing he smacked his lips a few times with the utmost solemnity then closed his eyes and took a deep gulp. He kept his eyes closed for a long time and when he opened them they were rapturous, as though he had seen a beautiful vision.
“It’s an experience coming here,” he whispered. “Keeping beer in the wood is a skilful business, but you, Mr. Peacock, are an artist.”
The landlord inclined his head modestly and Tristan, raising his glass in salute, drained it with an easy upward motion of the elbow.
Little oohs of admiration came from the girls but I saw that they, in their turn, had little difficulty in emptying their glasses. With an effort I got my own pint down and the enamel jug was immediately in action again.
I was always at a disadvantage in the company of a virtuoso like Tristan, but as the time passed and the landlord kept revisiting the cellar with his jug it seemed to become easier. In fact, a long time later, as I drew confidently on my eighth pint, I wondered why I had ever had difficulty with large amounts of fluid. It was easy and it soothed and comforted. Tristan was right—I had been needing this.
It puzzled me that I hadn’t realized until now that Connie was one of the most beautiful creatures I had ever seen. Back there in the street outside the hospital she had seemed very attractive, but obviously the light had been bad and I had failed to notice the perfection of her skin, the mysterious greenish depths of her eyes and the wonderful hair catching lights of gold and deep red-bronze from the flickering fire. And the laughing mouth, shining, even teeth and littl
e pink tongue—she hardly ever stopped laughing except to drink her beer. Everything I said was witty, brilliantly funny in fact, and she looked at me all the time, peeping over the top of her glass in open admiration. It was profoundly reassuring.
As the beer flowed, time slowed down and finally lurched to a halt and there was neither past nor future, only Connie’s face and the warm, untroubled present.
I was surprised when Tristan pulled at my arm, I had forgotten he was there and when I focused on him it was the same as with Connie—there was just the face swimming disembodied in an empty room. Only this face was very red and puffy and glassy-eyed.
“Would you care for the mad conductor?” the face said.
I was deeply touched. Here was another sign of my friend’s concern for me. Of all Tristan’s repertoire his imitation of a mad conductor was the most exacting. It involved tremendous expenditure of energy and since Tristan was unused to any form of physical activity, it really took it out of him. Yet here he was, ready and willing to sacrifice himself. A wave of treacly sentiment flooded through me and I wondered for a second if it might not be the proper thing to burst into tears; but instead I contented myself with wringing Tristan’s hand.
“There’s nothing I would like more, my dear, old chap,” I said thickly. “I greatly appreciate the kind thought. And may I take this opportunity of telling you that I consider that in all Yorkshire there is no finer gentleman breathing than T. Farnon.”
The big red face grew very solemn. “You honour me with those words, old friend.”
“Not a bit of it,” I slurred. “My stumbling sentences cannot hope to express my extremely high opinion of you.”
“You are too kind,” hiccuped Tristan.
“Nothing of the sort. It’s a privlish, a rare privlish to know you.”
“Thank you, thank you,” Tristan nodded gravely at me from a distance of about six inches. We were staring into each other’s eyes with intense absorption and the conversation might have gone on for a long time if Brenda hadn’t broken in.