Having watched, spellbound, this finely executed performance, I tried to collect my thoughts as to what might have precipitated Billy’s condition. I was a bit puzzled, especially as the laboratory screening had been clear. I reminded Mrs Tidy of those negative results.
‘Ah, but there are some bugs you can miss,’ said Mrs Tidy. ‘George found that out on the Internet, didn’t you, George?’
He nodded, with a muted whistle, as if about to speak.
‘There’s one in particular that you might not pick up unless you take several samples. Isn’t that right, George?’
There was another whistle.
‘George may not say much but he’s very good at finding things out on Google, aren’t you, George?’
Whistle. Whistle.
‘The name of that … bug (a shudder here) … er … “camp” something or other. What was it, George?’
George had, by now, cranked up a sufficient head of steam to set his dentures in motion. He blew the word out: ‘Campylobacter.’
‘There you go. That’s the one. Heard of it?’ said Mrs Tidy, addressing me.
I had heard of it. Campylobacter was a bacterium that could be carried by dogs, cats and birds. But it could also be carried by quite a high percentage of humans, without symptoms being shown. That was the limit of my knowledge. As to its detection, well, I assumed it could be picked up by faecal screening, though, from what Mrs Tidy was telling me, that could be missed if only one sample was taken. But then if detected, so what? It was carried by animals without symptoms being shown. Ah, yes, but Billy was showing symptoms, wasn’t he? But then not symptoms of any serious illness – he was bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. Well, feather-tailed, to be more precise. Oh dear, I was beginning to tie myself in knots here.
I questioned Mrs Tidy further and was able to verify that Billy, indeed, was still bright and perky, eating and drinking as normal.
A little bell started to ring in my brain. Eating … appetite … food.
‘What exactly do you give him to eat?’ I ventured to ask, prompted by further sparking in my neurons.
‘Come through and I’ll show you,’ replied Mrs Tidy, and marched me through a scrupulously clean kitchen to an extension at the back which served as a utility room – washing machine, boiler, Belfast sink and scrubbed draining board, with wall and floor units to each side. Mrs Tidy flung open the wall unit to the left of the sink. There, displayed on two shelves, were large, white, plastic containers, with screw tops, each neatly labelled with its contents – peanuts, sunflower seed, sesame seed, millet. ‘I make sure they’re all washed and dust free before I give them to Billy,’ said Mrs Tidy, proudly.
I could picture her sitting at the kitchen table, dusting and polishing each single seed, lining them up in ranks for inspection to see if they would pass muster.
‘What about fruit?’ I asked.
‘Yes, of course.’ Mrs Tidy bent down and swung open one of the units next to the sink. ‘I keep most of it down here.’ She pointed to the white, plastic vegetable rack wedged inside. Each of its three tiers held a different fruit or vegetable. Shiny red apples in the top rack, pears in the middle and sprouts at the bottom. ‘I steam the lot of them,’ she added, straightening up. ‘I feel happier doing that. At least it lessens the chances of Billy picking up one of those you-know-whats.’ Her lips drew into a thin line at her oblique reference to the bugs, which she seemed convinced were ever-present, constantly threatening to invade and exterminate all life on Earth.
It was at that point I decided to take the risk and challenge her misconceptions; and just hoped it would be the right move.
‘Mrs Tidy,’ I started tentatively, ‘I’ve a feeling that Billy’s environment is maybe just a little too sterile.’ I saw her eyebrows begin to rise, her eyes narrow, but, undaunted, I went on: ‘He needs a few bugs around to build up his immunity.’ Her eyebrows continued to rise, only stopping when the creases on her forehead looked as if a tyre had just driven across it. I ploughed on: ‘He needs a more down-to-earth diet.’
Perhaps I should have chosen my words a little more carefully as I saw Mrs Tidy visibly flinch. Her response to ‘bug’ was no surprise, but the flinch detected at the mention of ‘earth’ was a bit worrying. It seemed this lady really did have a problem with her concepts of hygiene; but I dug my heels in and stuck to my guns, even though it meant being subjected to great shovelfuls of scepticism from her. But my persistence paid off and, eventually, I managed to get her to acquiesce. I left, having got her to promise to feed Billy a more natural diet without resorting to scrubbing and steaming every morsel of his food.
Mind you, as I negotiated my way out of Shepherd’s Close, Lark Rise, Drovers Drive and Downs View Drive, I wasn’t entirely convinced I was on the right track in my diagnosis of Billy’s condition. I could be heading up a blind alley in much the same way I found myself in a dead end when I took the wrong turning out of Drovers Drive and ended up having to reverse out of a Downside Close, whose name I hoped didn’t reflect on what was going to happen next.
They say you shouldn’t take your work home with you, but I just couldn’t get Billy out of my mind; and that evening, I found myself in front of the computer, bringing up Google and typing in a search for diseases transmitted from birds to humans. I tapped into the first one shown, and up came a very simple summary of bacteria that could be carried by dogs, cats and birds and which could be passed to humans, with the symptoms to be seen should a human contract the disease. It might have been a simple summary but, even without explicit details, it was enough to make me scared witless, so I could just imagine how Mrs Tidy must have felt, as I was sure her husband would have shown it to her, his dentures all of a rattle as he did so. Diarrhoea … vomiting … abdominal pains … fever. All of these symptoms were attributable to campylobacter if caught from dogs, cats or birds. And Mr Tidy had been right – faecal screening for the bug could be inconclusive unless a series of tests were carried out. I felt my bowels contract on reading that. Oh Lord … perhaps my diagnosis had been wrong. Heaven help me if the Tidys also went down with enteritis. But hang on, that was highly unlikely as they were so thorough in their cleaning of Billy’s cage. As for Billy, we’d have to see. I had left instructions with Mrs Tidy to get in contact should things not improve and, as a week passed and I heard nothing, I assumed he was on the mend. Until the parcel arrived.
‘It’s addressed to you,’ said Beryl, sorting through the morning’s stack of mail. She slid the parcel across the counter. ‘Looks a bit suspicious if you ask me.’
I wasn’t asking her but it did look a little unusual all the same. It was a standard A4 Jiffy bag, but there was nothing standard about the way it was taped all round its edges and had a biohazard label back and front and a handwritten ‘Handle with Care’ next to my name, an unintentional juxtaposition I felt sure. The bag bulged in its centre so there was clearly more in it than just paperwork.
Beryl adopted her ‘eye-wide-open, jaw-dropped, brick-bashed-owl’ look as she contemplated me holding the packet. ‘I wouldn’t open it if I were you, Paul,’ she warned, giving a little shake of her head. ‘Don’t you remember the letter bomb in that London office last year. It blew the bloke’s hand off.’
My hand, which had been holding the parcel, rapidly detached itself from said packet and I hastily replaced the suspect package back on the counter, an action which had Beryl spring from her chair, her wings of lacquered hair flapping. She backed rapidly through the archway and bumped into Eric, who was just bouncing up the steps from the office. As usual, he’d been going at a rate of knots, so the velocity of their impact was considerable. So was the point of their impact. In her startled state, Beryl had backed away with one hand in front of her and one behind. It was the one behind, with its plethora of spiky talons, that drove straight into Eric’s genitals.
‘Bloody hell, Beryl,’ he gasped, his face going puce with pain. ‘I’m knackered enough as it is without you grabbing my goolies.’
‘What?’ shouted Eric, looking over Beryl’s shoulder and spotting the parcel. ‘Oh my God,’ he added anxiously. ‘Paul, don’t be a prat. Move away … NOW!’
‘What’s going on up there?’ It was the sharp, clear tone of Crystal’s voice echoing up the corridor from the kennels where she’d been doing her ward round with Mandy, checking her orthopaedic ops from the previous day.
‘Nothing to worry about, dear,’ Eric cried in response. ‘We’ve just got a bomb in reception.’
‘Christ, Eric, what on earth are you talking about? What bomb?’ Crystal’s voice came closer, until I could see her squeezing her way between Eric and Beryl, the three of them now crammed in the archway. Then the top of Mandy’s head with its starched cap hove into view behind them, swiftly followed by a flash of blonde as Lucy joined her from the dispensary. If what I had in front of me was indeed a bomb, then with one quick rip of the Jiffy bag being opened I could have blown the entire staff of Prospect House to smithereens in one fell swoop.
‘Shall I nip down to the office and call the police?’ I heard Mandy say.
‘Just hang on a minute,’ declared Crystal. ‘Just let’s see what we’re talking about here.’ She was about to move forward when Beryl put out a restraining hand and, in a hushed voice, turned to dramatically remind everyone of the arm that had been blown off by the London letter bomb. Uhmm, I thought, give her yet another chance to recall the story and it would be a torso blown to smithereens; then perhaps a leg or two tossed in as well.
‘Paul,’ Eric called out. ‘Did you touch the device?’
It was Beryl who answered. ‘Yes, he did. And he was about to peel it open, when I reminded him about the man who got blown to smithereens by that London letter bomb.’
There, what did I tell you?
‘Mmm,’ said Eric. ‘In which case, it could now be unstable. Liable to go off at any minute.’ It was a statement which hung in the air for a few seconds – enough time for the five figures to vanish from the archway, Crystal being pulled out of sight by Eric. Sounds of a heated discussion followed.
‘We can’t be too careful,’ I heard Eric saying. ‘Remember that vet friend of ours who worked at Porton Down?’
‘So? What of it?’ That was Crystal, her tone irritated. ‘And do let go of me Eric, for heaven’s sake.’
‘Sorry, love, but I don’t want you taking any chances. And there was that vet who had one under her car. She scrabbled out just in time before it blew up.’
‘Really?’ That was Beryl. ‘Well, I’ll be blowed.’ An unfortunate choice of verb, I thought, considering current circumstances.
‘It’s like those thingies in Iraq,’ Mandy had chipped in.
‘You mean IEDs.’ Lucy this time.
‘Step on one of those, you’d know it.’ Mandy again.
‘We’d better watch our step then.’ Beryl once more.
‘Er, excuse me,’ I called out, a hand raised.
Beryl’s head popped round the corner. ‘What is it, Paul?’
‘Er … well …’ I pointed down at the package. ‘Are we going to … er … do something about this?’
‘We most certainly are,’ said Crystal, appearing in the archway, smoothing out the creases on the jacket sleeve to which Eric had been clinging. She stepped forward with a determined look on her face, while the other four members of her bomb disposal unit jostled for best viewing position behind her, ready to scarper if she gave the word.
She reached the counter and, with her forefinger, eased the package round to face her and read the label. ‘It’s addressed to you,’ she said, looking up at me. ‘It’s nothing you were expecting?’
I shook my head.
With finger and thumb, she lifted the package and turned it over – an action which evoked an admiring gasp from her onlookers, apart from me. I was in the front line, hardly daring to breathe. She prodded the bag gently, evoking another admiring gasp. ‘Can’t see this being a bomb,’ she continued. ‘Let’s see what’s inside.’
Her admirers gave a final gasp and vanished. Crystal carefully eased one of her dainty fingernails under the flap and slid it along until the seal loosened and she was able to lift it up and peer inside. ‘There seems to be another package in here,’ she said, tilting the Jiffy bag to allow its contents to slip onto the counter. Between us now lay a cylindrical parcel about the length of a biro, heavily encased in bubble wrap. As on the outside of the Jiffy bag, this had a label, although smaller, but with what appeared to be similar-styled handwriting on it, although I couldn’t read what it said as it was facing away from me. Crystal did the honours. ‘It says “Billy Tidy”.’ She looked across at me. ‘Billy Tidy …’ she repeated. ‘Does that mean anything to you?’
I nodded glumly. It seems we didn’t have a bomb here; nevertheless, those two words detonated an explosion of emotions in my mind as I acknowledged that the words did, indeed, mean something to me. ‘It’s a patient of mine,’ I said.
‘Ex-patient now by the looks of things,’ I heard Beryl mutter.
Thank you, Beryl.
I had reached my metaphorical Downside Close – a dead end – a cockatiel’s corpse buried beneath layers of bubble wrap. I picked up the packet, peeled off the sticky tape and slowly began to unravel the body. But Mrs Tidy, in true belt-and-braces mode, hadn’t simply been satisfied with one layer of mummification. I discovered that when the last of the bubble wrap had been removed, I was left with an opaque, cigar-shaped, plastic tube with a plastic screw cap, secured in place with more sticky tape. The tape I removed, to unscrew the lid, which I began to do very slowly and with a very heavy heart, until reminded by Crystal that the reception counter was not quite the right place to unwrap a dead bird.
Her comment was apt as, at that moment, the first of the morning’s appointments walked in through the front door – a gentleman carrying a budgerigar cage with a chirping occupant. ‘My Billy’s come in to have his beak and nails trimmed,’ he said brightly. ‘I’ve told him it’s nothing to worry about.’ His cheery countenance dissolved into bewilderment as he watched the assembled staff of Prospect House disperse rapidly. Only Beryl was brave enough to confront him, but even she was not quite able to rid herself of her brick-bashed-owl look, saying, ‘Somebody will be with you soon,’ as I snatched up Billy’s body and dodged out, while his namesake in the gentleman’s cage gave an optimistic chirrup.
Down in the prep room I continued where I’d left off, under the watchful eye of Mandy, who had supplied a kidney dish into which I was instructed to deposit the corpse. Having unscrewed the cap, I tipped up the container expecting Billy the stiff to slip out. Only Billy didn’t slip out, due to the fact that he wasn’t the prize in this particularly macabre game of pass-the-parcel. What emerged was a neatly cut out, long, rectangular section of sand sheet, in the middle of which was a solid dropping – green-grey with streaks of white. The perfect poo. Elation shot through me. ‘Whoopee,’ I cried, realising that Billy’s bowels must have returned to normal.
Mandy gave me a withering look which clearly stated, ‘What a sad git you are to get so excited over bird shit.’
But I didn’t care. I was delighted since I now knew that in any future dealings with Mrs Tidy, my advice wouldn’t be pooh-poohed.
REIGNING CATS AND DOG
I might have told Crystal and Eric that things weren’t too bad between Lucy and me – certainly nothing that would affect our working relationship in Prospect House – but outside the practice it was a different story. I just felt we’d reached a stalemate and that things weren’t going anywhere. But then did I want them to go anywhere? Was I looking for a long-term relationship – the type of commitment that would end up with a mortgage and 2.1 children?
Perhaps it was just the mood I was in. It wasn’t
helped by an article I’d read recently in one of the Sunday papers, about when married couples are at their happiest. According to a poll of 4,000 couples conducted by a wedding website, they reach the ‘zenith of their contentment after 2 years, 11 months and 8 days together’. Hmm … Lucy and I reached ours within 20 minutes of tumbling into bed. No – only joking. But this poll stated that at that point in time, the couples were happy with each other’s bad habits.
As for my bad habits … well, I’m not sure I had any. I didn’t leave underpants lying around on the floor – only in the early, eager days of our relationship when they were left under the bed for the duration of activities going on above them. Now, my pants were neatly piled with socks and T-shirts, prior to being placed in our wicker laundry basket – what could one read into that, I wondered? And I didn’t leave the toilet seat up after use. The poll also stated that ‘three years after walking down the aisle, everything seems to come together – making each other laugh and cuddling up in front of the TV … and making gestures like offering to cook dinner and help with the washing up.’ Oh dear. We were already doing that – out of necessity, really. We were both stretched with our jobs, and so domestic duties had to be shared, including the cooking. A top-notch supermarket had recently opened on the outskirts of Westcott, on my route home to Ashton, and they did such a marvellous selection of à la carte ready-meals that it seemed a shame not to sample them. It was just a coincidence that we usually sampled them on those days when I was due to cook.
That report made me think that Lucy and I, although not married, may have peaked 2 years, 11 months and 8 days too early in our relationship, and that a stalemate had now been reached.
Pets on Parade (Prospect House 2) Page 13