James Herriot's Dog Stories Read online

  Mrs Holroyd also took telephone messages when I wasn’t around. There weren’t many outside visits but two have stuck in my memory.

  The first was when I looked on the pad and read, ‘Go to Mr Pimmarov to see Bulldog,’ in Mrs Holroyd’s careful back-sloped script.

  ‘Pimmarov?’ I asked her. ‘Was he a Russian gentleman?’

  ‘Dunno, luv, never asked ’im.’

  ‘Well – did he sound foreign? I mean did he speak broken English?’

  ‘Nay, luv, Yorkshire as me, ’e were.’

  ‘Ah well, never mind, Mrs Holroyd. What’s his address?’

  She gave me a surprised look. ‘How should ah know? He never said.’

  ‘But . . . but, Mrs Holroyd. How can I visit him when I don’t know where he lives?’

  ‘Well you’ll know best about that, luv.’

  I was baffled. ‘But he must have told you.’

  ‘Now then, young man, Pimmarov was all ’e told me. Said you would know.’ She stuck out her chin, her cigarette quivered and she regarded me stonily. Maybe she had had similar sessions with Stewie, but she left me in no doubt that the interview was over.

  During the day I tried not to think about it, but the knowledge that somewhere in the neighbourhood there was an ailing Bulldog that I could not succour was worrying. I just hoped it was nothing fatal.

  A phone call at seven p.m. resolved my fears.

  ‘Is that t’vet?’ The voice was gruff and grumpy.

  ‘Yes . . . speaking.’

  ‘Well, ah’ve been waitin’ all day for tha. When are you comin’ to see ma flippin’ Bulldog?’

  A light glimmered. But still . . . that accent . . . no suggestion of the Kremlin . . . not a hint of the Steppes.

  ‘Oh, I’m terribly sorry,’ I gabbled. ‘I’m afraid there’s been a little misunderstanding. I’m doing Mr Brannan’s work and I don’t know the district. I do hope your dog isn’t seriously ill.’

  ‘Nay, nay, nobbut a bit o’ cough, but ah want ’im seein’ to.’

  ‘Certainly, certainly, I’ll be right out, Mr . . . er . . .’

  ‘Pym’s ma name and ah live next to t’post office in Roff village.’

  ‘Roff?’

  ‘Aye, two miles outside Hensfield.’

  I sighed with relief. ‘Very good, Mr Pym, I’m on my way.’

  ‘Thank ye.’ The voice sounded mollified. ‘Well, tha knows me now, don’t tha – Pym o’ Roff.’

  The light was blinding. ‘Pym o’ Roff!’ Such a simple explanation.

  A lot of Mrs Holroyd’s messages were eccentric, but I could usually interpret them after some thought. However, one bizarre entry jolted me later in the week. It read simply: ‘Johnson, 12, Back Lane, Smiling Harry Syphilis.’

  I wrestled with this for a long time before making a diffident approach to Mrs Holroyd.

  She was kneading dough for scones and didn’t look up as I entered the kitchen.

  ‘Ah, Mrs Holroyd,’ I rubbed my hands nervously, ‘I see you have written down that I have to go to Mr Johnson’s.’

  ‘That’s right, luv.’

  ‘Well, er . . . fine, but I don’t quite understand the other part – the Smiling Harry Syphilis.’

  She shot a sidelong glance at me. ‘Well that’s ’ow you spell that word, isn’t it? Ah looked it up once in a doctor’s book in our ’ouse,’ she said defensively.

  ‘Oh yes, of course, yes, you’ve spelled it correctly. It’s just the Smiling . . . and the Harry.’

  Her eyes glinted dangerously and she blew a puff of smoke at me. ‘Well, that’s what t’feller said. Repeated it three times. Couldn’t make no mistake.’

  ‘I see. But did he mention any particular animal?’

  ‘Naw, ’e didn’t. That was what ’e said. That and no more.’ A grey spicule of ash toppled into the basin and was immediately incorporated in the scones. ‘Ah do ma best, tha knows!’

  ‘Of course you do, Mrs Holroyd,’ I said hastily. ‘I’ll just pop round to Back Lane now.’

  And Mr Johnson put everything right within seconds as he led me to a shed on his allotment.

  ‘It’s me pig, guvnor. Covered wi’ big red spots. Reckon it’s Swine Erysipelas.’

  Only he pronounced it arrysipelas and he did have a slurring mode of speech. I really couldn’t blame Mrs Holroyd.

  Little things like that enlivened the week, but the tension still mounted as I awaited the return of Kim. And even when the seventh day came round I was still in suspense because the Gillards did not appear at the morning surgery. When they failed to show up at the afternoon session I began to conclude that they had had the good sense to return south to a more sophisticated establishment. But at five thirty they were there.

  I knew it even before I pulled the curtains apart. The smell of doom was everywhere, filling the premises, and when I went through the curtains it hit me: the sickening stink of putrefaction.

  Gangrene. It was the fear which had haunted me all week and now it was realised.

  There were about half a dozen other people in the waiting-room, all keeping as far away as possible from the young couple, who looked up at me with strained smiles. Kim tried to rise when he saw me, but I had eyes only for the dangling useless hind limb where my once stone-hard plaster hung in sodden folds.

  Of course it had to happen that the Gillards were last in and I was forced to see all the other animals first. I examined them and prescribed treatment in a stupor of misery and shame. What had I done to that beautiful dog out there? I had been crazy to try that experiment. A gangrenous leg meant that even amputation might be too late to save his life. Death from septicaemia was likely now and what the hell could I do for him in this ramshackle surgery?

  When at last it was their turn, the Gillards came in with Kim limping between them, and it was an extra stab to realise afresh what a handsome animal he was. I bent over the great golden head and for a moment the friendly eyes looked into mine and the tail waved.

  ‘Right,’ I said to Peter Gillard, putting my arms under the chest. ‘You take the back end and we’ll lift him up.’

  As we hoisted the heavy dog on to the table the flimsy structure disintegrated immediately, but this time the young people were ready for it and thrust their legs under the struts like a well-trained team till the surface was level again.

  With Kim stretched on his side I fingered the bandage. It usually took time and patience with a special saw to remove a plaster, but this was just a stinking pulp. My hand shook as I cut the bandage lengthways with scissors and removed it.

  I had steeled myself against the sight of the cold dead limb with its green flesh, but though there was pus and serous fluid everywhere the exposed flesh was a surprising, healthy pink. I took the foot in my hand and my heart gave a great bound. It was warm and so was the leg, right up to the hock. There was no gangrene.

  Feeling suddenly weak I leaned against the table. ‘I’m sorry about the terrible smell. All the pus and discharge have been decomposing under the bandage for a week, but despite the mess it’s not as bad as I feared.’

  ‘Do you . . . do you think you can save his leg?’ Marjorie Gillard’s voice trembled.

  ‘I don’t know. I honestly don’t know. So much has to happen. But I’d say it was a case of so far so good.’

  I cleaned the area thoroughly with spirit, gave a dusting of iodoform, and applied fresh lint and two more plaster bandages.

  ‘You’ll feel a lot more comfortable now, Kim,’ I said, and the big dog flapped his tail against the wood at the sound of his name.

  I turned to his owners. ‘I want him to have another week in plaster, so what would you like to do?’

  ‘Oh, we’ll stay around Hensfield,’ Peter Gillard replied. ‘We’ve found a place for our caravan by the river – it’s not too bad.’

  ‘Very well, till next Saturday, then.’ I watched Kim hobble out, holding his new white cast high, and as I went back into the house relief flowed over me in a warm wave.