Vets Might Fly Read online

  Vets Might Fly [112-3.0]

  By: James Herriot

  Synopsis:

  In the midst of WW II, James is training for the Royal Air Force, while

  going home to Yorkshire whenever possible to see his very pregnant wife,

  Helen. Musing on past adventures through the dales, visiting with old

  friends, and introducing scores of new and amusing characters--animal and

  human alike--Herriot enthralls readers once again with his uncanny

  ability to spin a most engaging and heartfelt yarn.

  To my dogs, HECTOR and DAN Faithful companions of the daily round.

  The four lines from

  "If I Only Had Wings' are reproduced b, permission of The Peter Maurice

  Music Co. Ltd." 138-140 Charing Cross Road, London WC2H OLD,

  England.

  with Helen. And another part was still loo king out of the rear window

  of the taxi at the green hills receding behind the tiled roofs into the

  morning sunshine; still standing in the corridor of the train as the

  flat terrain of southern England slid past and a great weight built up

  steadily in my chest.

  My first introduction to the RAF was at Lord's cricket ground. Masses

  of forms to fill, medicals, then the issue of an enormous pile of kit.

  I was billeted in a block of flats in St John's Wood luxurious before

  the lush fittings had been removed. But they couldn't take away the

  heavy bathroom ware and one of our blessings was the unlimited hot

  water gushing at our touch into the expensive surroundings.

  After that first crowded day I retired to one of those green-tiled

  sanctuaries and lathered myself with a new bar of a famous toilet soap

  which Helen had put in my bag. I have never been able to use that soap

  since. Scents are too evocative and the merest whiff jerks me back to

  that first night away from my wife, and to the feeling I had then. It

  was a dull, empty ache which never really went away.

  On the second day we marched endlessly; lectures, meals, inoculations.

  I was used to syringes but the very sight of them was too much for many

  of my friends.

  Especially when the doctor took the blood samples; one look at the dark

  fluid flowing from their veins and the young men toppled quietly from

  their chairs, often four or five in a row while the orderlies, grinning

  cheerfully, bore them away.

  We ate in the London Zoo and our meals were made interesting by the

  chatter of monkeys and the roar of lions in the background. But in

  between it was march, march, march, with our new boots giving us

  hell.

  And on this third day the whole thing was still a blur. We had been

  wakened as on my first morning by the hideous 6 a.m. clattering of

  dustbin lids; I hadn't really expected a bugle but I found this noise

  intolerable. However, at the moment my only concern was that we had

  completed the circuit of the park.

  The gates were only a few yards ahead and I staggered up to them and

  halted among my groaning comrades.

  "Round again, lads!" the corporal yelled, and as we stared at him

  aghast he smiled affectionately.

  "You think this is tough? Wait till they get hold of you at ITW. I'm

  just kinda break in' you in gently. You'll thank me for this later.

  Right, at the double! One-two, one-two!"

  Bitter thoughts assailed me as I lurched forward once more. Another

  round of the park would kill me there was not a shadow of a doubt about

  that. You left a loving wife and a happy home to serve king and

  country and this was how they treated ned of Darrow by. I was back in

  old Mr blakin's "ut eyes in the long, drooping-moustached face ':

  ooping height.

  wi' awd Blossom, then," he said, and rested his -o ~:k. It was an

  enormous, work-swollen hand.

  Mr the flesh but the grossly thickened fingers bore iped it into the

  metal box where I carried my yes.

  "Well, it's up to you of course, Mr Dakin, to stitch her teats and I'm

  afraid it's going to tThe farmer bent and examined the row of '-taw,

  you wouldn't believe it could reek such ~it."

  "A cow's hoof is sharp," I said.

  "It's nearly like a knife coming down."

  That was the worst of very old cows. Their udders dropped and their

  teats became larger and more pendulous so that when they lay down in

  their stalls the vital milk-producing organ was pushed away to one side

  into the path of the neighbouring animals. If it wasn't Mabel on the

  right standing on it, it was Buttercup on the other side.

  There were only six cows in the little cobbled byre with its low roof

  and wooden partitions and they all had names. You don't find cows with

  names any more and there aren't any farmers like Mr Dakin, who somehow

  scratched a living from a herd of six milkers plus a few calves, pigs

  and hens.

  "Aye, well," he said.

  "Ah reckon t'awd lass doesn't owe me any thin'. Ah remember the night

  she was born, twelve years ago. She was out of awd Daisy and ah

  carried her out of this very byre on a sack and the snow was com in'

  down hard. Sin' then ah wouldn't like to count how many thousand

  gallons o' milk she's turned out she's still givin' four a day. Naw,

  she doesn't owe me a thing."

  As if she knew she was the topic of conversation Blossom turned her

  head and looked at him. She was the classical picture of an ancient

  bovine; as fleshless as her owner, with jutting pelvic bones, splayed,

  overgrown feet and horns with a multitude of rings along their curving

  length. Beneath her, the udder, once high and tight, drooped forlornly

  almost to the floor.

  She resembled her owner, too, in her quiet, patient demeanour. I had

  infiltrated her teat with a local anaesthetic before stitching but I

  don't think she would have moved if I hadn't used any. Stitching teats

  puts a vet in the ideal position to be kicked, with his head low down

  in front of the hind feet, but there was no danger with Blossom. She

  had never kicked anybody in her life.

  Mr Dakin blew out his cheeks.

  "Well, there's nowt else for it. She'll have to go. I'll tell Jack

  Dodson to picker up for the fat stock market on Thursday.

  She'll be a bit tough for eat in' but ah reckon she'll make a few steak

  pies."

  He was trying to joke but he was unable to smile as he looked at the

  old cow.

  Behind him, beyond the open door, the green hillside ran down to the

  river and the spring sunshine touched the broad sweep of the shallows

  with a million dancing lights. A beach of bleached stones gleamed

  bone-white against the long stretch of grassy bank which rolled up to

  the pastures lining the valley floor.

  I had often felt that this small holding would be an ideal place to

  live, only a mile outside Darrow by, but secluded, and with this

  heart-lifting vista of river and fell. I remarked on this once to Mr

  Dakin and the old man turned to me with a wry smile.

&nbsp