Trust Me, I'm a Vet (17 page)

I offer her a tissue from the box I keep handy on top of the computer monitor. She takes several and blows her nose.

‘I never thought I’d get so fond of a hamster.’

It is indeed difficult to comprehend, I think, looking into the box. A pair of eyes like black pinheads stare back. An impressive set of whiskers twitch in a highly threatening manner.

‘She’s very friendly,’ Ally goes on.

Almost reassured, I reach out to pick her up, making sure I’ve scruffed up all the loose skin around her neck, so she can’t twist round and clamp her jaws around my finger.

‘She’s only drawn blood once,’ Ally adds, as I lift Harriet onto the palm of my hand. ‘Can you see the lump? It’s under her tail. Is it . . .?’

I can see two lumps, not one.

‘It isn’t cancer. Harriet’s having a problem with her gender identity. Those lumps are supposed to be there. She’s a boy.’

‘A boy?’ Ally blushes. ‘You’d have thought I’d have known the difference by now – I’ve had three children.’

I lower the hamster back into the box, release it and put the lid back on very quickly.

‘I’ll settle up at Reception, shall I?’ Ally says.

‘There’s no charge.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘Really.’

‘Thank you. You’re all so very kind here.’

‘That’s the second consultation you haven’t taken any money for,’ Frances says in a low voice, once Ally has gone. ‘Emma would have charged for it.’

‘All I did was sex a hamster. It took two seconds.’

‘We’ll have every Tom, Dick and Harry coming in, expecting a freebie.’

‘We’ll only have Tom and Dick,’ I say lightly. ‘I’ve just seen Harry,’ and try as I might, I couldn’t justify charging a fee for what I did. However, I realise Frances has a point. I’m running Emma’s business, not a charity. I turn to the waiting clients and call in the next one, a middle-aged woman who’s red-faced with embarrassment because her spaniel has just cocked his leg against one of the chairs.

‘Don’t worry,’ I say. ‘These things happen. We’re used to it.’

‘I’ll fetch Izzy,’ Frances says.

‘She’ll be in the middle of bathing Freddie,’ I say. ‘I don’t mind clearing up. It’ll only take me two minutes.’

On balance, it’s been a pretty good day, I think when I’ve seen my last appointment and dealt with the last message in the daybook. I reckon Emma would be proud of me.

‘Goodnight, Maz,’ Izzy says on her way out. Frances has already left. ‘I hope it’s a quiet one.’

It is quiet. The phone remains silent for the rest of the evening, giving me the chance to eat dinner uninterrupted, watch a bit of television and skim through
Vet News
before I shower, change and fall into bed at eleven.

An hour or so later, I’m woken by a thumping sound and shouting from outside. Wrapped in my duvet, I crawl out of bed and peer out of the side window. There’s a four-by-four in the car park and a figure standing in the shadows at the entrance. Yawning, and slightly annoyed at someone turning up without phoning ahead first, I pull a sweatshirt over my pyjamas and head downstairs, switching all the lights on as I go.

When I reach Reception I can see a man standing in the porch with a jacket or something similar bundled up against his chest. As I move closer, I can make out his features and the colour of his hair. It’s Alex Fox-Gifford. All I can think is, what the hell is he doing here?

‘I’m sorry to disturb you, Maz,’ he says as I hurry him straight through to the consulting room, having ascertained from the tail which sticks out from the bundle in his arms that he’s bringing a potential patient with him. Blood trickles down Alex’s wrists from scratches on his hands, and his face is pale beneath the bright artificial light as he places the bundle ever so gently on the table.

‘Don’t you have your own practice to go to?’ I ask flippantly, then wish I hadn’t. This isn’t the time.

‘I hit the poor sod in Market Square.’ Alex unwraps the rest of what turns out to be a black-and-white jigsaw puzzle of a cat. Its ears are flattened against its skull. Its mouth is wide open as it struggles to breathe. ‘It shot out in front of my car and I’m not carrying any drugs,’ Alex continues, ‘otherwise I’d have finished him off myself.’

‘Hang on a mo.’ Did I hear him right? ‘What did you say? Finish him off?’ The cat gazes up at me, helpless yet trusting, and my hackles rise with resentment at Alex’s lack of initiative. If I’d run the cat over, I’d be doing my utmost to restore him to health. ‘Let’s not be too hasty.’

‘I had a quick look before I wrapped him up. He’s lost most of one leg and he’s in a lot of pain. I thought it would be quicker to stop by here than drive up to the Manor . . .’ Alex looks up, his lips curving into a weak smile. ‘I did say I hoped to see you again soon.’

‘You could have just rung me, you know – you didn’t have to half kill a cat,’ I say, feeling sorry now for Alex as well as the cat. They both appear to be in shock.

I touch the cat’s head – his chunky cheeks are scarred and he stinks of pee, confirming that he’s an entire tom. ‘He looks a bit scruffy and unloved.’

‘Like me,’ Alex says, but he isn’t smiling any longer.

I take a couple of quick chest X-rays – the machine’s new, all-singing, all-dancing, and it’s taken me a while to learn how to use it – and check with the scanner for a microchip. As I suspected, there isn’t one. There’s nothing to identify the poor cat’s owner, even if he has one. I check the radiographs once Alex has put the films through the automatic processor – there’s no evidence of a chest injury at least.

‘Good news.’ I show Alex the cat’s jaw. ‘I can wire that and I’ll amputate what’s left of the leg.’

The cat utters a barely audible meow, reminding me I should get on with the surgery.

‘Are you staying?’ I ask.

‘You’re going to do it now?’

‘There’ll be less risk of complications, osteomyelitis, septicaemia . . .’

‘It’s all right – you don’t have to give me a lecture.’

Biting back my irritation at Alex’s abrupt and rather dismissive attitude, which suggests – to me anyway – that he doesn’t really care about what happens to our patient, I pick up the cat and take him through to the prep area.

‘You can’t have qualified all that long after I did,’ Alex says, following close behind.

‘Ten years,’ and then I wish I’d kept that piece of knowledge to myself too. A flush of heat creeps up my neck as I confess, ‘I looked you up in the Register.’

‘So you know that I didn’t go to Cambridge . . .’ He pauses. ‘I looked you up too. I hated the idea of being accused of nepotism, of relying on the old boy network. My father’s old college did offer me a place, but I turned it down.’

I take a quick guilt trip around the prep area, collecting up the equipment I’m going to need. I like to pretend that I got into Cambridge on merit, but it was Jack Wilson who opened the door for me. In a way, I relied on the very same network of privilege that Alex avoided.

‘What can I do?’ Alex offers.

‘There’s no need. I’ll call Izzy.’

‘No, don’t disturb her.’ A smile plays on his lips as he goes on, ‘I’ll be nurse.’

‘OK, you can set up the drip’ – I hand him a plastic pinny, thinking, what on earth is he doing, flirting with me when he’s dating the drug rep? – ‘while I draw up some anaesthetic.’

Pretty soon, the cat is out for the count, shaved and prepped, picked up by the spotlight in theatre, like an actor on stage. I’m gowned, masked and gloved, and Alex is perched on a stool the opposite side of the table, checking and rechecking the cat’s condition. I notice how gentle he is. Somehow I imagined him treating a cat as if it was a horse or cow. It’s only now that I notice how subdued he is compared with the last time I saw him. His eyes are ringed with shadows, his hair is messed up and his skin looks sallow.

‘Ready to go?’ I ask, returning to the task in hand.

Alex nods.

I slip a blade onto a scalpel handle, pick up a swab and gaze at the mangled limb in front of me, working out how best to tackle it.

‘I thought this would give me an excuse to get Emma’s Meccano set out, but it’s too far gone to repair,’ I say.

‘I never got to play with Meccano when I was a boy.’

‘What did you use to play with then?’ I look up from the cat, wishing I hadn’t put it like that, because Alex has a wicked, unsettling grin on his face. I smile back. I can’t help it.

‘I used to have a rocking horse. My mother tells me that she caught me with my hand up its rear end when I was about four – I’d been out on calls with my father, I hasten to add.’

‘Is that why you wanted to be a vet?’

‘I was expected to follow in my father’s – and my grandfather’s – footsteps, and take over the practice.’

‘You make it sound as if you have regrets.’

Alex shakes his head. ‘It has its moments, but on the whole I love being out and about. I love my job.’

‘I was driving too fast,’ Alex begins again, as I start the first cut. ‘Tonight. I’ve been to see my ex-wife.’

‘Oh?’ I say, wondering why he’s chosen to confide in me.

‘She’s getting married again,’ he goes on morosely.

Keeping my eyes fixed on the cat, I cut through a block of muscle and an artery, which starts to spurt pulses of blood. I clamp it off, clamping down my emotions at the same time, because Alex has confused me now. It’s difficult to remain cool and professional when one minute he’s gentle and teasing and the next he’s deadly serious.

‘As far as I’m concerned,’ Alex goes on, ‘she can marry whoever she likes, as long as it doesn’t affect the children, but she wants to drag them off to Australia with this . . .’ He swears. ‘She knows how to pick them. When will I see them if they’re on the other side of the world? What about my weekends? What about my rights as a dad?’ The table shudders as Alex thumps it with his fist.

‘Hey, careful.’

‘I’m sorry. It’s just – well, she knows exactly how to wind me up, the selfish bitch.’

‘How old are your children?’ I ask, feeling quite smug at the thought that Alex Fox-Gifford is human after all.

‘Lucie’s five and Sebastian’s three, so I’ll miss all their growing up.’ Alex stands. ‘They’ll forget me, they’ll forget they ever had a real dad.’

‘That’s terrible.’ I carry on cutting and picking out fragments of bone, then I look up and our eyes meet. I know exactly what it’s like to be a child without a parent.

‘My father walked out on me and my brother when I was twelve.’ I still find it difficult to talk about it. ‘I’ve never forgotten him.’

‘Yes, but how many times did you see him after that? Every week? Once a month?’

‘Never.’ I look up to find Alex gazing at me with disbelief.

One Saturday, my mother and I took the bus to the Ark – we got off one stop early and walked the rest of the way so she could give the impression she’d parked the car in one of the side roads. We didn’t have a car, but if we’d had one, Mum said we’d have had a Porsche with pop-up headlights for weekdays, and a camper van for weekends down at the coast.

I followed her as she flounced into Jack Wilson’s consulting room in a purple tie-dyed skirt, sequinned top and red patent boots, her hair very short and freshly bleached. Jack looked up from where King was curled up in a basket on the table.

‘I’m sorry for dragging you all the way over here, Mrs Harwood —’

‘It’s Ms, not Mrs,’ my mother interrupted brusquely, and my heart clenched into a ball as I prayed she hadn’t blown it for me and King.

‘You look so much like Amanda,’ Jack went on smoothly, oozing charm as he did with the majority of his female clients. (I think that’s one of the reasons he had such a loyal following. As well as being a good vet, of course.) ‘In fact, I can hardly believe you aren’t sisters.’

‘Flattery will get you everywhere, Mr Wilson.’ Mum smiled, tilted her head and popped her eyes at him, and I wanted to hide away under the table because I knew – and she didn’t – that he was only humouring her.

‘Do call me Jack.’

‘If you’ll call me Trish.’

‘Well, Trish, let me first say that your daughter is an enthusiastic, intelligent and compassionate girl.’ My face burned as I watched my mother glowing in my reflected glory, and Jack went on, ‘and I’m sure she’d make a great owner for King, but —’

But? My heart sank. I turned away, and whispered King’s name. He raised his head and stretched out one paw. The ruff of fur covering his throat began to vibrate – his purr seemed too loud for such a small cat. He was only about six weeks old and I wondered if he’d ever grow into it.

‘I need to be sure that you’re happy to take him on. I’d hate to think of him ending up back on the street.’

‘Well, why don’t you come and vet our home?’ My mother stood straight, one hand on her hip, her stomach sucked in and her breasts thrust out.

‘Oh, I don’t think that’ll be necessary.’ Jack backed off hurriedly to the opposite side of the table, and I wondered momentarily if he was about to press the panic button he’d had installed since he’d been threatened by a druggie with a knife out of hours one evening. ‘Er, you do have some idea yourself of what’s involved?’ He flashed her another of his winning smiles. ‘Looking after a pet can bring a lot of pleasure but it also means making a long-term commitment.’