Lord God Made Them All (7 page)

“Yes, yes, I think so. But I do apologise for rushing out like that. It was really too bad of me to …”

Mr. Garrett laid his hand on my shoulder. “Say no more, Mr. Herriot, I have children of my own.” And then he spoke the words that have become engraven on my heart. “You need nerves of steel to be a parent.”

Later at tea I watched my son demolishing a poached egg on toast, then he started to slap plum jam on a slice of bread. Thank heaven he was no worse for his fall, but still I had to remonstrate with him.

“Look, young man,” I said. “That was a very naughty thing you did out there. I’ve told you again and again not to climb the wistaria.”

Jimmy bit into his bread and jam and regarded me impassively. I have a big streak of old hen in my nature and down through the years, even to this day, he and later my daughter, Rosie, have recognised this and developed a disconcerting habit of making irreverent clucking noises at my over-fussiness. At this moment I could see that whatever I was going to say he wasn’t going to take too seriously.

“If you’re going to behave like this,” I went on, “I’m not going to take you round the farms with me. I’ll just have to find another little boy to help me with my cases.”

His chewing slowed down, and I looked for some reaction in this morsel of humanity who was later to become a far better veterinary surgeon than I could ever be, in fact, to quote thirty years later a dry Scottish colleague who had been through college with me and didn’t mince words, “A helluva improvement on his old man.”

Jimmy dropped the bread on his plate. “Another little boy?” he enquired.

“That’s right. I can’t have naughty boys with me. I’ll have to find somebody else.”

Jimmy thought this over for a minute or so, then he shrugged and appeared to accept the situation philosophically. He started again on the bread and jam.

Then in a flash his
sang froid
evaporated. He stopped in mid-chew and looked up at me in wide-eyed alarm.

His voice came out in a high quaver. “Would he have my boots?”

“B
Y GAW, IT’S DOCTOR
Fu Manchu!”

The farmer dropped the buttered scone onto his plate and stared, horror-struck, through the kitchen window.

I was drinking a cup of tea with him and I almost choked in mid-sip as I followed his gaze.

Beyond the glass an enormous Oriental was standing. Slit eyes regarded us menacingly from a pock-marked face whose left cheek was hideously scarred from ear to chin, but the most arresting feature was the one-sided mustachio, black and greasy, with its single end dangling several inches from the upper lip. A robe of exotic colouring flowed from the man’s shoulders and his hands, held across his body, were tucked deeply into the sleeves.

The farmer’s wife screamed and jumped from the table, but I sat transfixed. I couldn’t believe this apparition, framed as it was against the buildings and pastures of a Yorkshire farm.

The wife’s rising screams were bordering on hysteria when suddenly she stopped and advanced slowly to the window. As she came close the big man’s mouth relaxed into a friendly leer, then he withdrew a hand from the sleeve and waggled the fingers at her in Oliver Hardy fashion.

“It’s Igor!” she gasped and swung round on her husband. “And that’s me good house coat he’s got on. You rotten devil, you put him up to this!”

The farmer rolled about in his chair, laughing helplessly. He couldn’t have asked for a better response to his little joke.

Igor was one of a batch of prisoners of war who had recently arrived to work on the farm. There were hundreds of these men employed on the land at the end of the war and it was a happy arrangement all round. The farmers had a windfall in the shape of abundant labour, and the prisoners were content to spend their pre-repatriation time in the open air with ample farm meals to sustain them in a world of food rationing. I personally had a respite from one of my constant problems—the lack of help in my job. I found now that there were always willing hands to assist me in the rough-and-tumble of large-animal practice.

The prisoners were, of course, mainly German, but there were a number of Italians and, strangely, Russians. It baffled me at first when I saw hundreds of men who looked like Chinese in German uniforms disembarking at Darrowby railway station. I learned later that they were Mongolian Russians who had been pressed into fighting for the Germans and later were captured by the British. Igor was one of these.

I know of farming families who to this day spend their holidays at the homes of the Germans and Italians whom they befriended at this time.

I was still laughing after the Igor incident and the farmer was still receiving a tongue lashing from his wife when I climbed into my car and consulted the list of calls.

“Preston, Scarth Lodge, lame cow,” I read. It was twenty minutes’ drive away and, as always, I idly turned over the possibilities in my mind. Probably foul, maybe pus in the foot, which would entail some hacking with my hoof knife. Or it could be a strain. I’d soon see.

Hal Preston was bringing my patient in from the field as I arrived, and I didn’t even have to get out of the car to make my diagnosis. It was one which gave me no joy.

The cow was hobbling slowly, her right hind foot barely touching the ground. The limb was shortened and carried underneath the body, while a bulge in the pelvic region showed where the great trochanter of the femur pushed against the skin. Upward displacement. Absolutely typical.

“Just happened this mornin’,” the farmer said. “She was as right as rain last night. Ah can’t think …”

“Say no more, Mr. Preston,” I said. “I know what it is. She’s got a dislocated hip.”

“Is that serious?”

“Yes, it is. You see, it takes tremendous force to pull the head of the displaced bone back into its socket. Even in a dog it is a difficult job, but in cattle it’s sometimes impossible.”

The farmer looked glum. “That’s a beggar. This is a right good cow, smashin’ milker. What ’appens if you can’t get it back?”

“I’m afraid she’d always be a bit of a cripple,” I replied. “Dogs usually form a very good false joint, but it’s different with a cow. In fact, many farmers decide to slaughter the animal.”

“Oh, ’ell, I don’t want that!” Hal Preston rubbed his chin vigorously. “We’ll have to have a go.”

“Good, that’s what I want.” I turned towards my car. “I’m going back to the surgery for the chloroform muzzle, and, in the meantime, will you go round your neighbours and get a few strong chaps? We’ll need all the manpower we can find.”

The farmer looked round the rolling green miles with not another dwelling in sight. “Me neighbours are a long way away, but I don’t need ’em today. Look ’ere.”

He led the way into the farm kitchen where the savoury aroma of roast bacon was heavy in the air. Four burly Germans were seated at the table. In front of each lay a plate mounded high with potatoes, cabbage, bacon and sausage.

“They’ve sent me these fellers to help with haytime,” Mr. Preston explained. “I reckon they look pretty useful.”

“They do indeed.” I smiled at the men and waved my hand in greeting. They jumped to their feet and bowed. “Right,” I said to the farmer, “you can be having your dinners while I’m gone. I’ll be back in about half an hour.”

When I returned, we led the cow to a patch of soft grass. Her progress was painfully slow as she trailed her almost useless hind leg.

I buckled the muzzle to her head and dribbled the chloroform onto the sponge. As she inhaled the strange vapour her eyes widened in surprise, then she stumbled forward and sank to the turf.

I slipped a round stake into the animal’s groin and stationed the two biggest men at either end of it, then I fastened a rope above the fetlock and gave the other end to Mr. Preston and the remaining two Germans.

The stage was set. I crouched over the pelvis and placed both hands on the bulging head of the femur. Would it stay obstinately still or would I feel it riding up the side of the acetabulum on the way to its proper home?

Anyway, this was the moment, and I took a deep breath. “Pull!” I shouted, and the three men on the rope hauled away, while the brown corded arms on each side of me took the strain on the stake.

No doubt an unedifying spectacle, this tug of war with the sleeping animal in the middle. Not much science in evidence, but country practice is often like that.

However, I had no time for theorising—all my mind was concentrated on that jutting bone under my hands. “Pull!” I yelled again, and fresh grunts of effort came back in reply.

I clenched my teeth. The thing wasn’t moving. I couldn’t believe it could resist the terrific traction, but it was like a rock.

Then, when the feeling of defeat was rising, I felt a stirring beneath my fingers. It all happened in seconds after that—the lifting of the femoral head as I pushed frantically at it and the loud click as it flopped into its socket. We had won.

I waved my arms in delight. “All right, let go!” I crawled to the cow’s head and whipped off the muzzle.

We heaved her onto her chest, and she lay there, blinking and shaking her head as consciousness returned. I could hardly wait for what is one of the most rewarding moments in veterinary practice, and it came when the cow rose to her feet and strolled over the grass without the trace of a limp. The five faces, sweating in the hot sunshine, watched in happy amazement, and though I had seen it all before, I felt the warm flush of triumph that is always new.

I handed cigarettes round the prisoners, and before I left I drew on my scanty store of German.

“Danke schoen!”
I said fervently, and I really meant it.

“Bitte! Bitte!”
they cried, all smiles. They had enjoyed the whole thing, and I had the feeling that this would be one of the tales they would tell when they returned to their homes.

A few days later, Siegfried and I alighted at Village Farm, Harford. We had come together because we had been told that our patient, a Red Poll bullock, was of an uncooperative disposition, and we thought that a combined operation was indicated.

The farmer led us to the fold yard where about twenty cattle were eating turnips. “That’s the one,” he said, pointing to an enormously fat beast, “and that’s the thing I was tellin’ ye about.” He indicated a growth as big as a football dangling from the animal’s belly.

Siegfried gave him a hard look. “Really, Mr. Harrison, you should have called us out to this long ago. Why did you let it get so big?”

The farmer took off his hat and scratched his balding head ruminatively. “Aye, well, you know how it is. Ah kept meanin’ to give you a ring, but it slipped me mind and time went on.”

“It’s a hell of a size now,” Siegfried grunted.

“Ah know, ah know. I allus had the hope that it might drop off because he’s a right wild sod. You can’t do much with ’im.”

“All right, then.” Siegfried shrugged. “Bring a halter, and we’ll drive him into that box over there.”

The farmer left, and my partner turned to me. “You know, James, that tumour isn’t as fearsome as it looks. It’s beautifully pedunculated, and if we can get a shot of local into that narrow neck we can ligate it and have it off in no time.”

The farmer returned with the halter, and he was accompanied by a dark little man in denims.

“This is Luigi,” he said. “Italian prisoner. Don’t speak no English, but ’e’s very handy at all sorts o’ jobs.”

I could imagine Luigi being handy. He was short in stature, but his wide spread of shoulder and muscular arms suggested great strength.

We said hello, and the Italian returned our greetings with an inclination of his head and a grave smile. He carried an aura of dignity and self-assurance.

After a bit of galloping round the fold yard, we managed to get our patient into the box, but we soon realised that our troubles were only beginning.

Red Polls are big cattle, and an ill-natured one can be a problem. This fat creature had a mean look in his eyes, and all our attempts to halter him were unavailing. He either whipped away from the rope or shook his head threateningly at us. Once, as he thundered past me I got my fingers into his nose, but he brushed me off like a fly and lashed out with a hind leg, catching me a glancing blow on the thigh.

“He’s like an elephant,” I gasped. “God only knows how we’re going to catch him.”

The sedative injections for such animals and the metal crushes to restrain them were still years in the future, and Siegfried and I were looking gloomily at the bullock when Luigi stepped forward.

He held up a hand and loosed off a burst of Italian at us. None of us could understand him, but we took his point as he ushered us back against the wall with great ceremony. Plainly he was going to do something, but what?

He advanced stealthily on the bullock, then with a lightning movement he seized one of the ears in both hands. The animal took off immediately but without its previous abandon. Luigi was screwing the ear round on its long axis, and it seemed to act as a brake because the beast slowed to a halt and stood there, head on one side, glancing almost plaintively up at the little man.

I was reminded irresistibly of pictures of Billy Bunter being held by a Greyfriars prefect, and I almost expected the bullock to cry, “Ouch! Yaroo! Leggo my ear!”

But I didn’t have much time for musing because Luigi, in full command of the situation, jerked his head towards the hanging tumour.

Siegfried and I leaped forward. We had never seen anybody catch a beast by the ear before, but we weren’t going to discuss it. This was our chance.

I cradled the growth in my hands while Siegfried injected the local into the neck. As the needle entered the skin the hairy leg twitched, and under ordinary circumstances we would have been kicked out of the box, but Luigi took another half-turn on the ear and rapped out a colourful reprimand. The animal subsided immediately and stood motionless as we worked.

Siegfried applied a strong ligature and severed the neck of the growth bloodlessly with an ecraseur. The tumour thudded onto the straw. The operation was over.

Luigi released the ear and received our congratulations with a half-smile and a gracious nod of his head. He really was a man of enormous presence.