It Shouldn't Happen to a Vet Read online

Back to the tray again. "Just a touch of powder before I stitch the

  skin," he said lightly and seized a two pound carton. He poised for a

  moment over the wound then began to dispense the powder with extravagant

  jerks of the wrist. A considerable amount did go into the wound but much

  more floated over other parts of the horse, over me, over the

  buttercups, and a particularly wayward flick obscured the sweating face

  of the man on the foot rope. When he had finished coughing he looked

  very like Coco the clown.

  Siegfried completed the closure of the skin, using several yards of

  silk, and when he stood back and surveyed the tidy result I could see he

  was in excellent humour.

  "Well now, that's fine. A young horse like that will heal in no time.

  Shouldn't be surprised if it doesn't even leave a mark."

  He came over and addressed me as I washed the instruments in the bucket.

  "Sorry I pushed you out like that, James, but honestly I couldn't think

  what had come over you - you were like an old hen. You know it looks bad

  trying to work with piddling little amounts of materials. One has to

  operate with a certain ... well ... panache, if I can put it that way,

  and you just can't do that if you stint yourself."

  I finished washing the instruments) dried them off and laid them on the

  enamel tray. Then I lifted the tray and set off for the gate at the end

  of the field. Siegfried, walking alongside me, laid his hand on my

  shoulder. "Mind you, don't think I'm blaming you, James. It's probably

  your Scottish upbringing. And don't misunderstand me, this same

  upbringing has inculcated in you so many of the qualities I admire

  integrity, industry, loyalty. But I'm sure you will be the first to

  admit," and here he stopped and wagged a finger at me 'that you Scots

  sometimes overdo the thrift." He gave a light laugh. "So remember,

  James, don't be too - er - canny when you are operating."

  I measured him up. If I dropped the tray quickly I felt sure I could

  fell him with a right hook.

  Siegfried went on. "But I know I don't have to ramble on at you, James.

  You always pay attention to what I say, don't you."

  I tucked the tray under my arm and set off again. "Yes," I replied. "I

  do. Every single time."

  Chapter Seven.

  1

  "I can see you like pigs," said Mr. Worley as I edged my way into the

  pen.

  "You can."

  "Oh yes, I can always tell. As soon as you went in there nice and quiet

  and scratched Queenie's back and spoke to her I said "There's a young

  man as likes pigs"."

  "Oh good. Well, as a matter of fact you're absolutely right. I do like

  pigs." I had, in truth, been creeping very cautiously past Queenie,

  wondering just how she was going to react. She was a huge animal and

  sows with litters can be very hostile to strangers. When I had come into

  the building she had got up from where she was suckling her piglets and

  eyed me with a non-committal grunt, reminding me of the number of times

  I had left a pig pen a lot quicker than I had gone in. A big, barking,

  gaping-mouthed sow has always been able to make me move very smartly.

  Now that I was right inside the narrow pen, Queenie seemed to have

  accepted me. She grunted again, but peaceably, then carefully collapsed

  on the straw and |

  exposed her udder to the eager little mouths. When she was in this

  position I was able to examine her foot. I "Aye, that's the one," Mr.

  Worley said anxiously. "She could hardly hobble ~ when she got up this

  morning." I There didn't seem to be much wrong. A flap of the horn of

  one claw was a |

  bit overgrown and was rubbing on the sensitive sole, but we didn't

  usually get called out for little things like that. I cut away the

  overgrown part and dressed the sore place with our multi-purpose

  ointment, ung pini sedativom, while all the time Mr. Worley knelt by

  Queenie's head and patted her and sort of crooned into her ear. I

  couldn't make out the words he used - maybe it was pig language because

  the sow really seemed to be answering him with little soft grunts.

  Anyway, it worked better than an anaesthetic and everybody was happy

  including the long row of piglets working busily at the double line of

  teats.

  "Right, Mr. Worley." I straightened up and handed him the jar of ung

  pint. "Keep rubbing in a little of that twice a day and I think she'll

  be sound in no time.

  "Thank ye, thank ye, I'm very grateful." He shook my hand vigorously as

  though I had saved the animal's life. "I'm very glad to meet you for the

  first time, Mr. Herriot. I've know Mr. Farnon for a year or two, of

  course, and I think a bit about him. Loves pigs does that man, loves

  them. And his young brother's been here once or twice - I reckon he's

  fond of pigs, too."

  "Devoted to them, Mr. Worley."

  "Ah yes, I thought so. I can always tell." He regarded me for a while

  with a moist eye, then smiled, well satisfied.

  We went out into what was really the back yard of an inn. Because Mr.

  Worley wasn't a regular farmer, he was the landlord of the Langthorpe

  Falls Hotel and his precious livestock were crammed into what had once

  been the stables and coach houses of the inn. They were all Tamworths

  and whichever door you opened you found yourself staring into the eyes

  of ginger-haired pigs;

  L there were a few porkers and the odd one being fattened for bacon but

  Mr. Worley's pride was his sows. He had six of them - Queenie, Princess,

  Ruby, Marigold, Delilah and Primrose.

  For years expert farmers had been assuring Mr. Worley that he'd never do

  any good with his sows. If you were going in for breeding, they said,

  you had to have proper premises; it wasn't a bit of use shoving sows

  into converted buildings like his. And for years Mr. Worley's sows had

  responded by producing litters of unprecedented size and raising them

  with tender care. They were all good mothers and didn't savage their

  families or crush them clumsily under their bodies so it turned out with

  uncanny regularity that at the end of eight weeks Mr. Worley had around

  twelve chunky weaners to take to market.

  It must have spoiled the farmers' beer - none of them could equal that,

  and the pill was all the more bitter because the landlord had come from

  the industrial West Riding - Halifax, I think it was - a frail,

  short-sighted little retired newsagent with no agricultural background.

  By all the laws he just didn't have a chance.

  Leaving the yard we came on to the quiet loop of road where my car was

  parked. Just beyond, the road dipped steeply into a tree-lined ravine

  where the Darrow hurled itself over a great broken shelf of rock in its

  passage to the lower Dale. I couldn't see down there from where I was

  standing, but I could hear the faint roar of the water and could picture

  the black cliff lifting sheer from the boiling river and on the other

  bank the gentle slope of turf where people from the towns came to sit

  and look in wonder.

  Some of them were here now. A big, shiny car had drawn up and its