two big, strong, remarkably good-loo king young men, so my fears were
groundless.
The little nurse looked at me quizzically. I think she had forgiven
me.
"I suppose you think all your calves and foals are beautiful right from
the moment they are born?"
"Well yes," I replied.
"I have to admit it I think they are."
As I have said before, ideas do not come readily to me, but on the bus
journey back to Scar borough a devilish scheme began to hatch in my
brain.
~I was due for com passionate leave, but why should I take it now?
Helen .~:would be in the Nursing Home for a fortnight and there didn't
seem any sense in my mooning round Darrow by on my own. The thing to
do would be to send myself a telegram a fortnight from now announcing
the birth, and we would be able to spend my leave together. ~ It was
interesting how my moral scruples dissolved in the face of this
attraction, but anyway, I told myself, where was the harm? I wasn't
scrounging any thing extra, I was just altering the time. The RAF or
the war effort in general would suffer no mortal blow. Long before the
darkened vehicle had rolled into the town I had Up my mind and on the
following day I wrote to a friend in Darro nged about the telegram.
a hardened criminal as I thought, because as the days creep in. The
rules at ITW were rigidly strict. I would found out. But the prospect
of a holiday with Helen Nide rations.
rrived my room mates and I were stretched on our i O :) ,N`eat voice
boomed along the corridor.
walk c , ~ (j et's have you, Herriot!"
I hadn't reckoned on Flight Sergeant Blacken i whisky?" ~O ~ Oo ~
maybe an LAC or a corporal, even one of the "Whisky? No ~ ~ ~not the
great man himself.
"Well you've gone tan unsmiling martinet of immense nature I something
to eat." 'jvo inch frame, wide bony shoulders and a "No, no, no
thanks, I've got . ~minish. It was usually the junior NCOs Vets who
dealt with our misdemeanours, but if Flight Sergeant Blacken ever took
a hand it was a withering experience I heard it again. The same bull
bellow which echoed over our heads on the square every morning "Her
riot! Let's be having you, Herriot!"
I was on my way at a brisk trot out of the room and along the polished
surface of the corridor. I came to a halt stiffly in front of the tall
figure.
"Yes, Flight Sergeant."
"You Herriot?"
"Yes, Flight Sergeant."
The telegram between his fingers scuffed softly against the blue serge
of his trousers as he swung his hand to and fro. My pulse rate
accelerated painfully as I waited.
"Well now, lad, I'm pleased to tell you that your wife has had her baby
safely."
He raised the telegram to his eyes.
"It says 'ere,
"A boy, both well. Nurse Brown " Let me be the first to congratulate
you." He held out his hand and as I took it he smiled. Suddenly he
looked very like Gary Cooper.
"Now you'll want to get off right away and see them both, eh?"
I nodded dumbly. He must have thought I was an unemotional
character.
He put a hand on my shoulder and guided me into the orderly room.
"Come on, you lot, get movie'!" The organ tones rolled over the heads
of the airmen seated at the tables.
"This is important. Got a brand new father 'ere.
Leave pass, railway warrant, pay, double quick!"
"Right, Flight. Very good, Flight." The typewriters began to tap.
The big man went over to a railway timetable on the wall.
"You haven't far to go, anyway. Let's see Darrow by, Darrow by . . .
yes, there's a train out of here for York at three twenty." He looked
at his watch.
"You ought to make that if you get your skates on."
A deepening sense of shame threatened to engulf me when he spoke
again.
"Double back to your room and get packed. We'll have your documents
ready."
I changed into my best blue, filled my kit bag and threw it over my
shoulder, then hurried back to the orderly room.
The Flight Sergeant was waiting. He handed me a long envelope.
"It's all there, son, and you've got plenty of time." He looked me up
and down, walked round me and straightened the white flash in my cap.
"Yes, very smart. We've got to have you loo kin' right for your
missus, haven't we?" He gave me the Gary Cooper smile again. He was a
handsome, kind-eyed man and I'd never noticed It.
He strolled with me along the corridor.
"This'll be your first 'un, of course?"
"Yes, Flight."
He nodded.
"Well, it's a great day for you. I've got three of 'em, me self.
Getting big now but I miss 'em like hell with this ruddy war. I really
envy you, walking in that door tonight and seeing your son for the very
first time,"
Guilt drove through me in a searing flood and as we halted at the top
of the stairs I was convinced my shifty eyes and furtive glances would
betray me. But he wasn't really loo king at me.
"You know, lad," he said softly, gazing somewhere over my head.
"This is the best time of your life coming up."
We weren't allowed to use the main stairways and as I clattered down
the narrow stone service stairs I heard the big voice again.
"Give my regards to them both."
I had a wonderful time with Helen, walking for miles, discovering the
delights f pram pushing, with little Jimmy miraculously improved in
appearance.
Everything was so much better than if I had taken my leave at the
official time and there is no doubt my plan was a success.
But I was unable to gloat about it The triumph was dimmed and to this
day I have reservations about the whole thing Flight Sergeant Blacken
spoiled it for me Chapter Fifteen "You must have to be a bit of an
idiot to be a country vet' The young airman was laughing as he said it,
but I felt there was some truth in his words. He had .
been telling me about his job in civil life and when I described my own
working hours and conditions he had been incredulous. .
There was one time I would have agreed with him wholeheartedly. It was
nine o'clock on a filthy wet night and I was still at work. I gripped
the steering wheel more tightly and shifted in my seat, groaning softly
as my tired muscles complained.
Why had I entered this profession? I could have gone in for something
easier and gentler like coal mining or lumber jacking. I had started
feeling sorry for myself three hours ago, driving across Darrow by
market place on the way to a calving. The shops were shut and even
through the wintry drizzle there was a suggestion of repose, of work
done, of firesides and books and drifting tobacco smoke. I had all
those things, plus Helen, back there in our bed-sitter.
I think the iron really entered when I saw the carload of young people
setting off from the front of the Drovers; three girls and three young
fellows, all dressed up and laughing and obviously on their way to a
dance or party. E
verybody was set for comfort and a good time;
everybody except Herriot, rattling towards the cold wet hills and the
certain prospect of toil.
And the case th'hing to raise my spirits.^ skinny little heifer
stretched on her side i-skle open-fronted shed littered with old tin
cans, half bricks a'as difficult to see what I was stumbling over since
the only oil lamp whose flame flickered and dipped in the .
~-C:s ed, easing out the calf inch by inch. It wasn't a ,but the
heifer never rose to her feet and I spent ~, ~ ng among the bricks and
tins, get ting up only sket while the rain hurled itself icily against
back.
, ;~ frozen-faced with my skin chafing under ~, ~ 4:oup of strong men
had been kicking me ~0 ~c, it of the evening I was almost drowninB
village of Cop ton. In the warm days of 'c'~ys of a corner of
Perthshire, with a hillside and a dark drift of trees ~ -~P~ 'e.
ai -c,"-'cv ,h the rain sweeping across the ~vo ttr' ~ ~ for a faint
glow right in the diminishing on the streaming roadw ~1 0 ~l ~0c; ~ ~
.~
.N ~,
.~ walk l, c . . ~c ~ As I le~a ~; ~ c whisky?" ~o ~ Oo "Whisky? No
~ ~ ~ "Well you've gone-~t something to eat." ' "No, no, no thanks,
I've got I Stopped the car under the swinging sign of the Fox and
Hounds and on an impulse opened the door. A beer would do me good.
A pleasant warmth met me as I went into the pub. There was no bar
counter, only high-backed settles and oak tables arranged under the
whitewashed walls of what was simply a converted farm kitchen. At one
end a wood fire crackled in an old black cooking range and above it the
tick of a wall clock sounded above the murmur of voices. It wasn't as
lively as the modern places but it was peaceful.
"Now then, Mr Herriot, you've been work in'," my neighbour said as I
sank into the settle.
"Yes, Ted, how did you know?"
The man glanced over my soiled mackintosh and the welling tons which I
hadn't bothered to change on the farm.
"Well, that's not your Sunday suit, there's blood on your nose end and
cow shit on your ear' Ted Dobson was a burly cowman in his thirties and
his white teeth showed suddenly in a wide grin I smiled too and plied
my handkerchief.
"It's funny how you always want to scratch your nose at times like
that."
I looked around the room. There were about a dozen men drinking from
pint glasses, some of them playing dominoes. They were all farm
workers, the people I saw when I was called from my bed in the darkness
before dawn; hunched figures they were then, shapeless in old
greatcoats, cycling out to the farms, heads down against the wind and
rain, accepting the facts of their hard existence.
I often thought at those times that this happened to me only
occasionally, but they did it every morning.
And they did it for thirty shillings a week; just seeing them here made
me feel a little ashamed.
Mr Waters, the landlord, whose name let him in for a certain amount of
ribbing, filled my glass, holding his tall jug high to produce the
professional froth.
"There yare, Mr Herriot, that'll be sixpence. Cheap at 'elf the
price."
Every drop of beer was brought up in that jug from the wooden barrels
in the cellar. It would have been totally impracticable in a busy
establishment, but the Fox and Hounds was seldom bustling and Mr Waters
would never get rich as a publican. But he had four cows in the little
byre adjoining this room, fifty hens pecked around in his long back
garden and he reared a few litters of pigs every year from his two
sows.
"Thank you, Mr Waters." I took a deep pull at the glass. I had lost
some sweat despite the cold and my thirst welcomed the flow of rich
nutty ale. I had been in here a few times before and the faces were
all familiar. Especially old Albert Close, a retired shepherd who sat
in the same place every night at the end of the settle hard against the
fire.
He sat as always, his hands and chin resting on the tall crook which he
had carried through his working days, his eyes blank. Stretched half
under the seat, half under the table lay his dog, Mick, old and retired
like his master. The animal was clearly in the middle of a vivid
dream; his paws pedalled the air spasmodically, his lips and ears
twitched and now and then he emitted a stifled bark.
Ted Dobson nudged me and laughed.
"Ah reckon awd Mick's still rounding up them sheep."
I nodded. There was little doubt the dog was reliving the great days,
the field at his master's whistle. And Albert himself. What lay
behind those empty eyes? I could imagine him in his youth, striding
the windy uplands, covering endless miles over the moor and rock and
beck, digging that same crook into the turf at every (~2b Vets Mzght
[ly step. There were no fitter men than the Dales shepherds, living in
the open i n all weathers, throwing a sack over their shoulders in snow
and rain.
And there was Albert now, a broken, arthritic old man gazing
apathetically from beneath the ragged peak of an ancient tweed cap. I
noticed he had just drained his glass and I walked across the room.
"Good evening Mr Close," I said.
He cupped an ear with his hand and blinked up at me.
"Eh?"
I raised my voice to a shout.
"How are you, Mr Close?"
"Can't complain, young man," he murmured.
"Can't complain."
"Will you have a drink?"
"Aye, thank ye." He directed a trembling finger at his glass.
"You can put a drop i' there, young man."
I knew a drop meant a pint and beckoned to the landlord who plied his
jug expertly. The old shepherd lifted the re-charged glass and looked
up at me.
"Good 'earth," he grunted.
"All the best," I said and was about to return to my seat when the old
dog sat up. My shouts at his master must have wakened him from his
dream because he stretched sleepily, shook his head a couple of times
and looked around him.
And as he turned and faced me I felt a sudden sense of shock.
His eyes were terrible. In fact I could hardly see them as they winked
painfully at me through a sodden fringe of pus-caked lashes. Rivulets
of discharge showed dark and ugly against the white hair on either side
of the nose.
I stretched my hand out to him and the dog wagged his tail briefly
before closing his eyes and keeping them closed. It seemed he felt
better that way.
I put my hand on Albert's shoulder.
"Mr Close, how long has he been like this ?"
"Eh?"
I increased my volume.
"Mick's eyes. They're in a bad state."
"Oh aye." The old man nodded in comprehension.
"He's got a bit o' caud in 'em. He's all us been subjeck to it ever
since 'e were a pup."
"No, it's more than cold, it's his eyelids'.
"Eh?" ~ I took a deep breath and let go at the top of my voice.
"He's got turned-in eyelids. It's rather a serious thing."
The old man r 1ded again.
"Aye, 'e lies a lot,~wi' his head at foot of t'door.
It's draughty ~wled.
"It's got nothing to do with that. It's a thing called n operation to
put it right."
n." He took a sip at his beer.
"Just a bit o'caud. Ever en subjeck . . ."
>~ ~l returned to my seat. Ted Dobson looked at me ~s~ ~, >,trop ion
is when the eyelids are turned in and ~; ,0 ~uses a lot of pain,
sometimes ulceration or ': ~O ~O mned uncomfortable for a dog."
~,"<i;; ~oticed awd Mick's had mucky eyes for ~,~ :often it's
congenital. I should think ~me reason it's suddenly developed: ~ ~ ,e
old dog, sitting patiently underYo it. ~ ~iminis~it.i~t's like if
you have a speck of dust in your eyes or even one lash turned in. I
should say he feels pretty miserable.
moor awd beggar. Ah never knew it was owt like that." He drew on his
cigarette