Pets in a Pickle (18 page)

‘She’s just a lazy cow then,’ said Alex.

‘She’s a pig, not a cow, Daddy,’ said Emily crossly.

I picked up Pinky. ‘You’ve been looking after her very well, Emily,’ I said, holding up the fat, little piglet. It squealed and wriggled in my hand like an animated sausage – a pork sausage, of course.

Miss Piggy jerked her head up, her piggy, grey eyes stared at me. All of a sudden, there was a whirlwind of straw, bedding flying everywhere, a scrabbling of trotters, shrieks and squeals, a dropped Pinky … and me frantically vaulting the pallets as Miss Piggy reared to her feet and lunged at my fast disappearing legs.

As I crumpled in a heap at their feet, the Rymans leapt up and down with glee, Alex hugging Jill, a squealing Emily wheeling round in circles, arms outstretched – even serious Joshua was jigging, a broad grin etched on his face. The cause of such merriment was Miss Piggy who, as I got to my feet, remained standing on hers; with snout swinging from side to side, she swept away the straw, tracking down her scattered offspring, and drew them to her with a series of deep grunts. When her piglets were gathered round her, she gave another maternal ‘Oink’, tossed aside the Smarties and crisps and buried her snout in the trough of pig nuts.

When the Rymans finally stopped their tribal dance and calmed down, it was Jill who spoke. ‘Wonderful … absolutely wonderful. We can’t thank you enough.’ Her voice trailed off as it seemed, unusual for her, she became lost for words.

Then Emily started skipping around singing, softly at first and then louder: ‘
Our Miss Piggy goes “Oink, oink, oink … oink, oink, oink … oink, oink, oink …”’

Jill joined in, ‘
Our Miss Piggy goes …
’

‘
“Oink, oink, oink …”
’ sang Alex.

‘
“Oink, oink, oink …”
’ I think I heard Joshua mutter, shoulders hunched, hands stuffed in his pockets. Certainly his lips were moving.

Miss – or rather Mrs as the Rymans now decided to call her – Piggy continued to munch without so much as an ‘oink’ of her own – but all day long.

When I returned to Prospect House, I half-expected Beryl to be in full Nazi uniform, sporting a pencil moustache. Of course, she was just in her standard uniform of black trousers and long-sleeved black top; though there seemed to be a dark shadow on her upper lip – but that could just have been a trick of the light.

She immediately spotted the parcel I was carrying under one arm, its contents wrapped in a white carrier bag. I could see she was dying to ask what it was.

I wasn’t going to tell her just yet. ‘Spoils of war,’ I said mysteriously. ‘From the enemy lines. Just need to pop it in the fridge for the time being.’ That had been my plan, but I hadn’t thought it through properly. Nor had I predicted the consequences of what could happen in the event of it being discovered – or rather uncovered.

The fridge was home to the vaccines and the cartons of milk used for coffee and tea. It was inevitably going to be opened several times during the course of the afternoon. And we are all curious. So I should not have been surprised that when 4.00pm came and we were in the office having tea, with everyone present – Crystal, Eric, Beryl and me – knowing the bag contained a large hand of pork. And everyone had read the attached ticket inside saying, ‘Many thanks from the Rymans’. I dare say Mandy and Lucy also knew but they were down in the prep room having their break separately.

Crystal was the first to mention it, addressing Eric from behind the desk as she did so. ‘You didn’t tell me the Rymans had had a problem.’

Eric’s mug twitched in his hand, tea slopped over the side. ‘It was their sow … Miss Piggy.’ He shuffled his feet and scraped his chair back a little from the desk.

‘What was wrong with her?’ Crystal leaned forward, elbows either side of her mug, hands folded above it.

Eric seemed to flinch. ‘A difficult farrowing, I believe.’

Crystal’s eyes narrowed. ‘You believe?’ She sat up straight, her hands parted, her fingertips formed a pyramid.

I almost felt the urge to say, ‘My Lord,’ and come to Eric’s defence. Beryl was agog, a jury of one, her head twisting from Crystal to Eric as each of them spoke.

‘Well, yes it was. A difficult farrowing,’ admitted Eric. He gave me a pleading look.

Now what part did I play in this little drama? If anything, I was piggy-in-the-middle. Did I now save his bacon or my own?

But I needn’t have worried. Crystal’s customary shrewdness and ability to suss out a situation seemed to be completely out of kilter on this occasion, possibly due to lack of evidence. I could thank Beryl for that. Crystal assumed Eric had successfully dealt with the case and that the hand of pork was intended for them. ‘The Rymans cure their own pork,’ she said as an aside to me. ‘And very good it is, too. Maybe you’ll get the chance to try some one day.’

For once, despite those gorgeous eyes, I didn’t feel like skipping up a mountain with her – more like pushing her over the side.

Later, as I was just about to leave, Eric expressed his thanks.

‘You saved my bacon,’ he said. ‘Much appreciated.’ He patted the plastic bag under his arm. ‘Sorry about this. But if it’s any consolation, it’s a side of Hogmanay.’

‘Hogmanay?’

‘Miss Piggy’s brother. Had to treat him for foot-rot not so long ago. Alex said he’d be next in line for the chop. I reckon he’ll be tough as old boots.’ He chuckled. ‘Least it will give Crystal something to chew over.’

Yes, indeed. Oh yes, indeed.
Odl lay hee hee
.

T
he basic routines at Prospect House continued without too many interruptions. I accepted one never knew from day to day what illnesses, accidents and distraught owners might alter the pattern of those routines. Certainly the Wednesday morning for Crystal’s tennis and the afternoon for Eric’s golf remained sacrosanct. Tuesday mornings continued to be kept by for Crystal’s ops. And Beryl masterminded the appointments to ensure Crystal saw her specials and anyone else Beryl thought merited Crystal’s ‘kid glove’ approach. Eric and I were left to mop up the rest – the ‘rubber glove’ end of the spectrum.

Despite Beryl’s control over appointments, it didn’t always work out the way she would have liked. One Wednesday morning, she was definitely overwhelmed … star-struck, even … in awe … completely bedazzled.

‘Paul, you’ll never guess,’ she crowed, flying into the prep room where I was discussing the morning’s list of spays and castrations with Mandy, having finished my appointments earlier than anticipated. ‘I’ve got the actress from that TV series up in reception … insisting she been seen.’ She saw my blank face. ‘You know … whatshername …’ She flapped her hands and tutted with exasperation. ‘Oh, you’ll know her when you see her.’

Oh really, I thought. Who said I was seeing her?

Mandy dropped the pack of swabs she was holding. ‘I’m going to take a peek,’ she said, bumping into Lucy just as she was entering the room. ‘Hey, Lucy, we’ve got someone from TV up in reception,’ she said her voice already sounding star-struck.

‘Oooh, I’ll come as well then,’ said Lucy and the two of them rapidly elbowed each other out of the room leaving Beryl to dance around the prep table.

‘Her name’s on the tip of my tongue,’ she said. ‘I’m sure you’ll recognise her.’

‘I shall?’

‘Yes … I think she’d like to be seen now … and as you finished your appointments early today, I thought you’d jump at the chance. You know … rub shoulders with someone famous. It’s Crystal’s morning off, otherwise I’m sure she would have seen her,’ she added pointedly.

‘Whoever she might be,’ I said dryly.

‘It will come to me. I can picture her now. I’m sure she was in one of those costume dramas on BBC.’

‘
Pride and Prejudice
?’

‘Is that the one where that chap walks out of the lake, his breeches dripping wet?’

‘Yes.’

‘That was a great series … very well done. I really enjoyed it.’

‘She was in that then?’

‘No she wasn’t.’

‘
The Mayor of Casterbridge
?’

‘No.’

‘
Vanity Fair
?’

‘Never saw that one.’ Beryl clasped her chin. ‘It’s on the tip of my tongue.’ Several classics later and running out of titles I was still none the wiser and about to give up when she said, ‘
Beat the Clock
. That was it.’

‘What?’

‘She used to be on
Sunday Night at the London Palladium
with that … er … Bruce Forsythe.’

It didn’t mean much to me as it was way before my time. Sixties stuff I think. But I did know it had been a variety show – certainly not a costume drama. I pointed this out.

‘So?’ Beryl fired a look at me that could have stopped a charging rhino in its tracks. ‘It was still a series.’

It’s nice not to argue, to argue’s … not nice. So I didn’t say a word.

When Mandy and Lucy returned, they looked disappointed. Neither had recognised the woman, though Mandy thought she might have seen her in an advert for cat food, but wasn’t sure.

Whatever, this so-called celebrity of Beryl’s was clearly not A-list – more Z by the sound of it. When I went up to reception to meet her, however, the act she put on suggested she thought she was way above the likes of those who advertised cat food, even if it were top quality, came wrapped in silver foil and was fit for a queen.

‘Daaaahling,’ she drawled in a mid-Atlantic accent, an arm flamboyantly flung out to greet me as she strode across reception. ‘If you could see me now I’d be so,
so
grateful.’

It was so,
so
very Katherine Hepburn that I half expected her to have a leopard on a lead as the actress did in
Bringing Up Baby
when co-starring with Cary Grant. Now that would have been something. I could picture the headlines in the
Westcott Gazette
:
YOUNG VET TREATS LEOPARD OF FAMOUS ACTRESS
. Not that I considered myself a Cary Grant. More a
Carry On
– a Sid James sort.

‘I’m Francesca Cavendish,’ the woman was saying. ‘You may have seen something of me on TV.’

A woman on a sofa with a leopard … sorry – a cat … purring round her legs waiting for her to open a pouch of tuna. Yes; maybe I had.

This Francesca Cavendish was certainly theatrical in appearance, though the vibrant clashes of colours and styles made her, to my mind, more a dame of the pantomime rather than the theatre. The crimson, blue and yellow turban, from which a cowlick of blue and grey hair hung across her forehead could have come from Ali Baba; the purple corduroy breeches were very Prince Charming; and the brown leather boots laced to the knees recalled Dick Whittington. It was difficult to place an age on her. Beryl had reckoned on seeing her in
Beat the Clock
, and I guessed the woman was still trying to do just that: arrest the march of time. Her face was wrinkle-free, no loose chins, the skin drawn taunt over prominent cheek bones as if it had been gathered up in a knot and tied beneath her turban. The porcelain features were given further doll-like attributes by ruby-red lips, the large bottom one of which constantly dropped down, and long, false eyelashes that fluttered like bats’ wings at me.

Beryl had bustled back in and was now tapping details into the computer. Francesca Cavendish gave an address in Belgravia, London. ‘I’m just down here for the summer …’ she explained, pushing back the loop of a blue pashmina shawl that hung from her shoulder, ‘… resting.’

Beryl insisted on having her ‘resting’ address which was a block of flats behind the multi-storey car-park off Westcott’s seafront.

Cat ads finished then, I thought. Now, now, put your claws away, Paul.

‘So you will see me?’

‘I can squeeze you in.’

‘So kind.’ The bats’ wings gave another frenzied flap. ‘I’ll just get the chauffeur to bring my Oscar in then.’

What? An Oscar? Was this actress more talented than I’d imagined? Francesca Cavendish turned and gracefully floated across to the open front door, the ends of her pashmina billowing behind her. Here she paused, hand on her hip, and beckoned. A minute or so later, a man appeared carrying a dog that looked like a small, fluffed-up cushion. It was a bundle of white, silky-haired, from which peered two button-black, red-rimmed eyes. Not quite the Oscar I’d had in mind. I recognised the man as being the taxi driver who’d brought me up from the station for my interview. He looked at me and winked as he handed the dog over to Miss Cavendish.