Lord God Made Them All (12 page)

He glanced at me quickly. That was what I had used for the phlebitis.

“It really is the best thing,” I went on hurriedly. “Cows like this used to be hopeless to treat, but since the sulpha drugs came on the scene, we do have a chance.”

He gave me one of his long, calm looks. “All right, then, we’d better get started.”

“I’ll keep an eye on her,” I said as I handed over the powders.

And I did keep an eye on her. I was in the Maxwell byre every day. I desperately wanted that cow to live. But after four days there was no improvement; in fact, she was slowly sinking.

I was steeped in gloom as I stood by the farmer’s side and looked at the animal’s jutting ribs and pelvic bones. She was thinner than ever, and still she passed that blood-stained urine.

I could not bear the thought that another tragedy was going to follow so soon after the first one, but the certainty was growing in my mind that death was imminent.

“The sulphonamides are keeping her alive,” I said, “but we need something stronger.”

“Is there anythin’ stronger?”

“Yes, penicillin.”

Penicillin. The marvellous new drug, the first of the antibiotics, but as yet the veterinary profession had no injectable form. All we had were the tiny tubes, each containing 300 mg in an oily base, for the treatment of mastitis. The nozzle of the tube was inserted into the teat canal and the contents squeezed up into the udder. It was a magical improvement on any previous mastitis treatment, but at that stage of my career I had never injected an antibiotic into an animal hypodermically.

I am not usually inventive but I had a sudden idea. I went out to my car, found a box of twelve mastitis tubes and tried the nozzle in the base of a record hypodermic needle. It fitted perfectly.

I am no scientific theorist so I didn’t know whether I was doing the right thing or not, but I plunged the needle into the cow’s rump and squeezed tube after tube into the depths of the muscle until the box was empty. Would the penicillin be absorbed in that form? I didn’t know. But there was comfort in the knowledge that at least it was in there. It was a spark of hope.

I kept this up for three days and on the third I knew I was doing some good.

“Look!” I said to Robert Maxwell. “Her back isn’t arched now. She seems to have relaxed.”

The farmer nodded. “You’re right. She isn’t as tucked up as she was.”

The sight of the cow standing there peacefully, looking around her and occasionally pulling a mouthful of hay from her rack, was like a blast of trumpets to me. The pain in the kidneys was plainly subsiding, and the farmer had said that the urine was not as dark as it had been.

I seemed to go mad after that. With the scent of victory in my nostrils, I pumped my little tubes into the animal day after day. I didn’t know the correct dose for a bovine—nobody did at that time—so I just whacked them in, willy-nilly, sometimes more, sometimes less, and all the time the improvement continued steadily.

There came the happy day when I was quite certain that the battle was won. As I worked on the cow, she straddled her legs and sent out a cascade of crystal-clear urine. I stepped back, and as if for the first time I contemplated the change in my patient. The gaunt frame of that first day was padded with flesh, and the cow’s coat shone with the gloss of health. She had returned to normal just as quickly as she had fallen away. It was remarkable.

I threw down the empty box. “Well, Mr. Maxwell, I think we can say she’s about right. I’ll give her another treatment tomorrow, and that will be the end.”

“You’re comin’ back tomorrow, then?”

“Yes, for the last time.”

The farmer’s face grew grave, and he stepped closer to me. “All right, then, I ’ave a complaint to make about you.”

Oh God, at last he was going to tackle me about that phlebitis. And what a terrible moment to pick, just when I was flushed with success. Human nature could be very strange, and if he had decided to give me hell after all this time, there was nothing I could do about it. I would just have to take it.

“Oh, yes?” I replied shakily. “And what is that?”

He leaned forward and tapped my chest with his forefinger. His face was transfigured, heavy with menace. “D’ye think I’ve got nothin’ better to do than sweep up after you every day?”

“Sweep up … what …” I stared at him stupidly.

He waved an arm over the byre floor. “Just look at all this dang mess! I’ve got to clear it away!”

I looked down at the scattering of empty penicillin tubes, the paper pamphlets which always went with them and the discarded box. Totally unheeding, I had hurled them far and wide as I worked.

“Gosh, I’m sorry,” I muttered. “I didn’t realise …”

I was interrupted by a great burst of laughter from the farmer.

“Nay, I’m just havin’ ye on, lad. Of course you didn’t realise. You were ower busy curin’ me cow.” He thumped me on the shoulder, and I knew it was his way of saying thanks.

That was my first experience of injecting an antibiotic, and even though the method was bizarre, I learned something from it. But I learned more on that farm about the way to live than I did about veterinary science. Over the following thirty years I knew him, the farmer never alluded to that disaster which he could so easily have laid at my door.

During that period there have been occasions when I have suffered misfortunes due to the shortcomings of others, when I have found people at fault and at my mercy if I wished to make trouble for them. At these times I had a standard of conduct to follow. I tried to behave like Robert Maxwell.

“Y
OU KNOW,
J
IM,” SAID
Tristan, pulling thoughtfully at his Woodbine, “I often wonder if there is any other household where the mark of a lady’s favour is expressed in goat shit.”

In quiet moments I often thought about the old bachelor days in Skeldale House, and it was at one of these times that I recalled Tristan’s observation. I could remember looking up at him from the day book in surprise. “Well, isn’t that funny? I’ve just been thinking the same thing. It certainly is rather an odd business.”

We had just come through from the dining room, and my memory of the breakfast table was very clear. Mrs. Hall always placed our letters next to our plates, and there, at Siegfried’s place, dominating the scene like an emblem of triumph, stood the tin of goat droppings from Miss Grantley.

We all knew what it was, despite its wrapping of brown paper, because Miss Grantley always used the same container, an empty cocoa tin about six inches high. Either she collected them from friends or she was very fond of cocoa.

One indisputable thing was that she was very fond of goats. In fact, they seemed almost to rule her existence, which was strange because the care of goats was an unlikely hobby for a blond beauty who could have stepped effortlessly into the film world.

Another odd thing about Miss Grantley was that she had never married. Each time I had been at her house I had marvelled that anybody like her was able to keep the men away. She would be about thirty, with a nicely rounded figure and elegant legs and sometimes when I looked at the fine contours of her face, I wondered whether that rather firm jaw might have frightened prospective suitors. But no, she was cheerful and charming; I decided that she just didn’t want to get married. She had a lovely home and obviously plenty of money. She appeared to be perfectly happy.

There was no doubt at all that the goat droppings were a mark of favour. Miss Grantley took her stock keeping very seriously and insisted on regular laboratory examination of faeces samples for internal parasites or any other abnormality that might be found.

These samples were always addressed personally to Mr. Siegfried Farnon and I had attached no importance to this until one morning, a few days after I had pleased her immensely by removing an embedded piece of chaff from one of her Billies’ eyes, the familiar tin appeared by my breakfast plate and I read, “James Herriot Esq., MRCVS,” on the label.

That was when I realised it was an accolade, a gesture of approval. In ancient days the feudal knights would carry a glove at their saddle bow or a scarf on their lance point as a symbol of their lady’s esteem, but with Miss Grantley it was goat droppings.

On the occasion when I got mine, Siegfried’s face showed the slightest flicker of surprise and I suppose I might have shown a trace of smugness, but he needn’t have worried. Within a week or two the tin reappeared at his end of the table.

And after all, it was the natural thing, because if sheer male attractiveness entered into this situation, there was no doubt that Siegfried was out in front by a street. Tristan pursued the local girls enthusiastically and with considerable success; I had no reason to complain about my share of female company, but Siegfried was in a different class. He seemed to drive women mad.

He didn’t have to chase them; they chased him. I hadn’t known him long before I realised that the tales I had heard about the irresistible appeal of tall, lean-faced men were true. And when you added his natural charm and commanding personality, it was inevitable that the goat droppings would land regularly by his plate.

In fact, that is how it was for a long time even though Tristan and I paid almost as many visits to Miss Grantley’s goats as Siegfried. As I said, she seemed to be quite rich because she called us out to the slightest ailment and was as good a client as some of our big farmers.

However, when I heard her voice on the telephone one morning, I knew that this time it wasn’t for something trivial. She sounded agitated.

“Mr. Herriot, Tina has caught her shoulder on a nail and torn herself rather badly. I do hope you can come out immediately.”

“Yes, as it happens, I can. There is nothing urgent at the moment. I’ll leave right away.”

A mild glow of satisfaction rippled through me. This would be just another stitching job and I liked stitching. It was easy and always impressed the client. I would be on happier ground there than when Miss Grantley was quizzing me about goat diseases. They had taught me practically nothing about goats at college, and though I had tried to catch up by snatches of reading here and there, I realised uncomfortably that I was no expert.

I was leaving the room when Tristan levered himself slowly from the depths of the armchair where he spent a lot of his time. Since breakfast I had been aware of his presence only by the rustle of the
Daily Mirror
under a cloud of Woodbine smoke.

He yawned and stretched. “Miss Grantley’s, eh? Think I’ll come with you. Just feel like a ride out.”

I smiled. “Okay, come on, then.” He was always good company.

Miss Grantley met us in a tight-fitting pale-blue boiler suit of some silky material which did nothing to diminish her attractions.

“Oh, thank you so much for coming,” she said. “Please follow me.

Following her was rewarding. In fact, on entering the goat house Tristan failed to see the step and fell onto his knees. Miss Grantley glanced at him briefly before hurrying to a pen at the far end.

“There she is,” she said and put a hand over her eyes. “I can’t bear to look.”

Tina was a fine white Saanen, but her beauty was ravaged by a huge laceration that had pulled the skin down from her shoulder in a long V, exposing the naked smoothness of the supraspinatus and infraspinatus muscles. The bony spine of the scapula gleamed white through the blood.

It was a mess, but I had to stop myself rubbing my hands. It was all superficial, and I could put it right and look very good in the process. Already I could see myself inserting the last stitch and pointing to the now almost-invisible wound. “There, now, that looks a lot better, doesn’t it?” Miss Grantley would be in raptures.

“Yes … yes …” I murmured in my most professional manner as I probed the damaged area. “It’s nasty, really nasty.”

Miss Grantley clasped her hands together. “But do you think you can save her?”

“Oh, yes.” I nodded weightily. “It will be a big stitching job and take rather a long time, but I feel sure she will pull through.”

“Oh, thank heaven.” She gave a long sigh of relief. “I’ll fetch some hot water.”

Soon I was ready for action. My needles, cotton wool, scissors, suture materials and forceps laid out on a clean towel, Tristan holding Tina’s head, Miss Grantley hovering anxiously, ready to help.

I cleaned the whole area thoroughly, sprinkled dusting powder with a liberal hand, then began to stitch. Miss Grantley was soon in action, passing me the scissors to clip each suture. It was a nice smooth start, but it was a very large wound and this was going to take some time. I searched my mind for light conversation.

Tristan chipped in, apparently thinking the same thing. “Wonderful animal, the goat,” he said lightly.

“Ah, yes.” Miss Grantley looked across at him with a bright smile. “I do agree.”

“When you think about it, they are probably the earliest of the domestic animals,” he went on. “It always thrills me to realise that there is ample evidence of domestication of goats in prehistoric times. There are cave paintings of goats and later, ancient books from all over the world mention their existence. They have been part of the world of man since recorded time. It is a fascinating thought.”

From my squatting position I looked up at him in surprise. In my relationship with Tristan I had discovered several things which fascinated him, but goats were not one of them.

“And another thing,” he went on. “They have such a marvellous metabolism. They will consume food other animals won’t look at, and they will produce abundant milk from that food.”

“Yes, indeed,” breathed Miss Grantley.

Tristan laughed. “They’re such characters, too. Tough and hardy under all climatic conditions, absolutely fearless and ready to tackle any other animal, no matter how large. And, of course, it is a known fact that they can eat with impunity many poisonous plants which would kill most creatures in a very short time.”

“Oh, they
are
amazing.” Miss Grantley gazed at my friend and passed the scissors to me without turning her head.