Every Living Thing Read online

  “Well, that’s wonderful, Mr. Dowson. I’m so pleased to hear it.” I shook my head to dispel the mists of fantasy that had begun to billow around me. I am a run-of-the-mill veterinary surgeon, hard-working and conscientious, but that’s all, and it knocks me out of my stride to be hailed as a genius, but as always, listening to Mr. Dowson was like soothing oil being poured on my oft-bruised ego. I had to admit I enjoyed it, and I didn’t demur when he went on.

  “And while you’re ’ere, just have a look at this pig.” He took my arm and led me into an outbuilding. “There she is,” he said, leaning over a pen and pointing to a fine big sow stretched on the straw with a litter of piglets sucking busily at her teats. “That’s the one that had that nasty great swelling on her foot. Dead lame she was, and I was right worried about ’er. You gave her a jab and left me some salve to rub on the lump and next morning it was gone!”

  “You mean…it vanished overnight? All of it?”

  “Aye, that’s right, ah’m not jokin’ nor jestin’. It was gone!”

  “Well…that’s quite amazing.”

  “Not to me, it isn’t, Mr. Herriot. Everything you do for me turns out right. Ah don’t know what I’d do without you.”

  Even through my confusion I found his faith touching. I hoped it would never be shattered.

  I thought that moment had arrived when Mr. Dowson called me to his farm a few weeks later.

  “What’s the trouble this time?” I asked.

  The old man rubbed his chin. “Well, it’s a funny one, I tell you. It’s this calf.” He pointed to a sturdy young animal about a month old. “He won’t drink ’is milk properly. Look. I’ll show ye.” He tipped some milk into a big bucket and set it down in front of the little creature, but the calf, instead of drinking, put his head down and, with a fierce butt, sent the bucket flying, spilling the milk in all directions.

  “Does he do this every time?”

  “Aye, knocks it over every time. It’s a dang nuisance. Wastes me good milk, too.”

  I examined the calf, then turned to the farmer. “He seems perfectly healthy to me.”

  “Oh, aye, he is. Fit as a flea and full o’ life. It’s just this one thing wi’ the bucket. I thought you’d maybe be able to give ’im one of your magic injections to stop him doin’ it.”

  “Well, really, Mr. Dowson,” I said, laughing. “This isn’t a medical problem, it’s psychological. He just doesn’t like buckets. I’m afraid I can’t do anything for you this time. Can’t you hold the bucket while he drinks?”

  “Yes, that’s what I have to do, but even then ’e keeps bashin’ at it with his head.” He dug his hands into his pockets and gave me a crestfallen look. “Ah’m sure you could do something. You say it’s not a medical problem, but it’s an animal problem and everythin’ you’ve done for me wi’ animals has been successful. I wish you’d have a try. Go on, give ’im an injection.”

  I looked at the old man’s doleful face. I had a feeling that if I walked off the farm without doing something, he would be truly upset. How could I please him without being an absolute charlatan? If I didn’t inject something it was going to break his heart, but what…what…? Mentally I searched the contents of my car boot and was beginning to despair when in my mind’s eye I saw the bottle of thiamine—vitamin B injection. We used it for a brain disease called cerebrocortical necrosis and, of course, the calf wasn’t suffering from that or anything like it, but at least it had to do with the head. Anyway, I stilled my conscience with the thought that I wouldn’t charge the old man anything.

  I hurried to the car. “I’ll give him a shot of this,” I said and was rewarded by a radiant smile lighting up Mr. Dowson’s face. I injected a few c.c.’s with the knowledge that I wasn’t doing any harm. The injection would be useless, but it was serving its purpose. The old man was happy, and, really, when I thought about it, it would be no bad thing if, for once, my treatment was ineffective. My mantle of infallibility would be stripped from me and I wouldn’t be expected to do the impossible any more.

  It was more than a month before I saw Mr. Dowson again. He was leaning over a rail at the cattle market and he waved and came over to me. I was intrigued at the prospect that for the first time ever he would have to report a failure. What words would he employ? He had never had to do it before. And I was pretty sure that he would hate telling me.

  He looked up at me with wide eyes. “Well, you’ve done it again, Mr. Herriot!”

  “Done it again…?” I looked at him blankly.

  “Aye, that calf. Your injection worked.”

  “What!”

  “It did an’ all.” The familiar happy smile flooded over his face. “He’s never butted a bucket since that day!”

  Chapter 14

  SOMETIMES, WHEN OUR DOG and cat patients died the owners brought them in for us to dispose of them. It was always a sad occasion and I had a sense of foreboding when I saw old Dick Fawcett’s face.

  He put the improvised cat box on the surgery table and looked at me with unhappy eyes.

  “It’s Frisk,” he said. His lips trembled as though he was unable to say more.

  I didn’t ask any questions, but began to undo the strings on the cardboard container. Dick couldn’t afford a proper cat box, but he had used this one before, a home-made affair with holes punched in the sides.

  I untied the last knot and looked inside at the motionless body. Frisk. The glossy black, playful little creature I knew so well, always purring and affectionate and Dick’s companion and friend.

  “When did he die, Dick?” I asked.

  He passed a hand over his haggard face and through the straggling grey hairs. “Well, I just found ’im stretched out by my bed this morning. But…I don’t rightly know if he’s dead yet, Mr. Herriot.”

  I looked again inside the box. There was no sign of breathing. I lifted the limp form onto the table and touched the cornea of the unseeing eye. No reflex. I reached for my stethoscope and placed it over the chest.

  “The heart’s still going, Dick, but it’s a very faint beat.”

  “Might stop any time, you mean?”

  I hesitated. “Well, that’s the way it sounds, I’m afraid.”

  As I spoke, the little cat’s rib-cage lifted slightly, then subsided.

  “He’s still breathing,” I said. “But only just.” I examined the cat thoroughly and found nothing unusual. The conjunctiva of the eye was a good colour. In fact there was no abnormality.

  I passed a hand over the sleek little body. “This is a puzzler, Dick. He’s always been so lively—lived up to his name, in fact, yet here he is, flat out, and I can’t find any reason for it.”

  “Could he have ’ad a stroke or summat?”

  “I suppose it’s just possible, but I wouldn’t expect him to be totally unconscious. I’m wondering if he might have had a blow on the head.”

  “I don’t think so. He was as right as rain when I went to bed, and he was never out during t’night.” The old man shrugged his shoulders. “Any road, it’s a poor look-out for ’im?”

  “Afraid so, Dick. He’s only just alive. But I’ll give him a stimulant injection and then you must take him home and keep him warm. If he’s still around tomorrow morning bring him in and I’ll see how he’s going on.”

  I was trying to strike an optimistic note, but I was pretty sure that I would never see Frisk again and I knew the old man felt the same.

  His hands shook as he tied up the box and he didn’t speak until we reached the front door. He turned briefly to me and nodded. “Thank ye, Mr. Herriot.”

  I watched him as he walked with shuffling steps down the street. He was going back to an empty little house with his dying pet. He had lost his wife many years ago—I had never known a Mrs. Fawcett—and he lived alone on his old-age pension. It wasn’t much of a life. He was a quiet, kindly man who didn’t go out much and seemed to have few friends, but he had Frisk. The little cat had walked in on him six years ago and had transformed his life,