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  Chapter Two.

  I had only to sit up in bed to look right across Darrowby to the hills

  beyond.

  I got up and walked to the window. It was going to be a fine morning and

  the early sun glanced over the weathered reds and greys of the jumbled

  roofs, some of them sagging under their burden of ancient tiles, and

  brightened the tufts of green where trees pushed upwards from the

  gardens among the bristle) of chimney pots. And behind everything the

  calm bulk of the fells.

  It was my good fortune that this was the first shine I saw every

  morning; after Helen, of course, w. which was better still.

  Following our unorthodox tuberculin testing honeymoon we had set up ow

  first home on the top of Skeldale House. Siegfried, my boss up to my

  wedding and now my partner, had offered us free use of these empty rooms

  on the thin storey and we had gratefully accepted; and though it was a

  makeshift arrangement there was an airy charm, an exhilaration in our

  high perch that many would have envied.

  It was makeshift because everything at that time had a temporary

  complexion and we had no idea how long we would be there. Siegfried and

  I had bot volunteered for the RAF and were on deferred service but that

  is all I am going to say about the war. This book is not about such

  things which in any case were so very far from Darrowby; it is the story

  of the months I had with Helen between our marriage and my call-up and

  is about the ordinary things which have always made up our lives, my

  work, the animals, the Dales.

  This front room was our bed-sitter and though it was not luxuriously

  furnished it did have an excellent bed, a carpet, a handsome side table

  which had belonged. to Helen's mother and two armchairs. It had an

  ancient wardrobe, too, but th~ lock didn't work and the only way we kept

  the door closed was by jamming One of my socks in it. The toe always

  dangled outside but it never seemed of an~t importance.

  I went out and across a few feet of landing to our kitchen-dining room

  at t back. This apartment was definitely spartan. I clumped over bare

  boards to bench we had rigged against the wall by the window. This held

  a gas ring a our crockery and cutlery. I seized a tall jug and began my

  long descent to t main kitchen downstairs because one minor snag was

  that there was no water at the top of the house. Down two flights to the

  three rooms on the first storey then down two more and a final gallop

  along the passage to the big stone-flagb kitchen at the end.

  I filled the jug and returned to our eyrie two steps at a time. I

  wouldn't like to do this now whenever I needed water but at that time I

  didn't find it the least ~.

  inconvenience.

  Helen soon had the kettle boiling and we drank our first cup of tea by

  window looking down on the long garden. From up here we had an aerial

  vi' of the unkempt lawns, the fruit trees, the wisteria climbing the

  weathered brick towards our window, and the high walls with their old

  stone copings stretch) away to the cobbled yard under the elms. Every

  day I went up and down t path to the garage in the yard but it looked so

  different from above.

  ~wait a minute, Helen,' I said. "Let me sit on that chair.'

  She had laid the breakfast on the bench where we ate and this was where

  the difficulty arose. Because it was a tall bench and our recently

  acquired high stool fitted it but our chair didn't.

  "No, I'm all right, Jim, really I am.' She smiled at me reassuringly

  from her absurd position, almost at eye level with her plate.

  "You can't be all right,' I retorted. "Your chin's nearly in among your

  cornflakes Please let me sit there.'

  She patted the seat of the stool. "Come on, stop arguing. Sit down and

  have your breakfast.'

  This, I felt, just wouldn't do. I tried a different tack.

  "Helen!' I said severely. "Get off that chair!'

  "No!' she replied without looking at me, her lips pushed forward in a

  characteristic pout which I always found enchanting but which also meant

  she wasn't kidding.

  I was at a loss. I toyed with the idea of pulling her off the chair, but

  she was a big girl. We had had a previous physical try-out when a minor

  disagreement had escalated into a wrestling match and though I

  thoroughly enjoyed the contest and actually won in the end I had been

  surprised by her sheer strength. At this time in the morning I didn't

  feel up to it. I sat on the stool.

  After breakfast Helen began to boil water for the washing-up, the next

  stage in our routine. Meanwhile I went downstairs, collected my gear,

  including suture material for a foal which had cut its leg and went out

  the side door into the garden. Just about opposite the rockery I turned

  and looked up at our window. It was open at the bottom and an arm

  emerged holding a dishcloth. I waved and the dishcloth waved back

  furiously. It was the start to every day.

  And, driving from the yard, it seemed a good start. In fact everything

  was good. The raucous cawing of the rooks in the elms above as I closed

  the double doors, the clean fragrance of the air which greeted me every

  morning, and the challenge and interest of my job.

  The injured foal was at Robert Corner's farm and I hadn't been there

  long before I spotted Jock, his sheepdog. And I began to watch the dog

  because behind a vet's daily chore of treating his patients there is

  always the fascinating kaleidoscope of animal personality and Jock was

  an interesting case.

  A lot of farm dogs are partial to a little light relief from their work.

  They like to play and one of their favourite games is chasing cars off

  the premises. Often I drove off with a hairy form galloping alongside

  and the dog would usually give a final defiant bark after a few hundred

  yards to speed me on my way. But Jock was different.

  He was really dedicated. Car chasing to him was a deadly serious art

  which he practised daily without a trace of levity. Corner's farm was at

  the end of a long track, twisting for nearly a mile between its stone

  walls down through the gently sloping fields to the road below and Jock

  didn't consider he had done his Job properly until he had escorted his

  chosen vehicle right to the very foot. So his hobby was an exacting one.

  I watched him now as I finished stitching the foal's leg and began to

  tie on a bandage. He was slinking about the buildings, a skinny little

  creature who Without his mass of black and white hair would have been an

  almost invisible mite, and he was playing out a transparent charade of

  pretending he was taking no noticed of me - wasn't the least bit

  interested in my presence, in fact. But his furtive glances in the

  direction of the stable, his repeated cries-crossing of my line of

  vision gave him away. He was waiting for his big moment.

  When I was putting on my shoes and throwing my Wellingtons into the boot

  I saw him again. Or rather part of him; just a long nose and one eye

  protruding from beneath a broken door. It wasn't till I had started the

  engine and began to move off