“But I’d have kept her here—in comfort. It must have been terrible out there in the cold when she was so desperately ill—I daren’t think about it. And having kittens, too—I … I wonder how many she did have?”
I shrugged. “I don’t suppose we’ll ever know. Maybe just this one. It happens sometimes. And she brought it to you, didn’t she?”
“Yes … that’s right … she did … she did.” Mrs. Ainsworth reached out and lifted the bedraggled black morsel. She smoothed her finger along the muddy fur and the tiny mouth opened in a soundless miaow. ‘Isn’t it strange? She was dying and she brought her kitten here. And on Christmas Day.”
I bent and put my hand on Debbie’s heart. There was no beat.
I looked up. “I’m afraid she’s gone.” I lifted the small body, almost feather light wrapped it in the sheet which had been spread on the rug and took it out to the car.
When I came back Mrs. Ainsworth was still stroking the kitten. The tears had dried on her cheeks and she was brighteyed as she looked at me.
“I’ve never had a cat before,” she said.
I smiled. “Well it looks as though you’ve got one now.”
And she certainly had. That kitten grew rapidly into a sleek handsome cat with a boisterous nature which earned him the name of Buster. In every way he was the opposite to his timid little mother. Not for him the privations of the secret outdoor life; he stalked the rich carpets of the Ainsworth home like a king and the ornate collar he always wore added something more to his presence.
On my visits I watched his development with delight but the occasion which stays in my mind was the following Christmas Day, a year from his arrival.
I was out on my rounds as usual. I can’t remember when I haven’t had to work on Christmas Day because the animals have never got round to recognising it as a holiday; but with the passage of the years the vague resentment I used to feel has been replaced by philosophical acceptance. After all, as I tramped around the hillside barns in the frosty air I was working up a better appetite for my turkey than all the millions lying in bed or slumped by the fire; and this was aided by the innumerable aperitifs I received from the hospitable farmers.
I was on my way home, bathed in a rosy glow. I had consumed several whiskies—the kind the inexpert Yorkshiremen pour as though it was ginger ale—and I had finished with a glass of old Mrs. Earnshaw’s rhubarb wine which had seared its way straight to my toenails. I heard the cry as I was passing Mrs. Ainsworth’s house.
“Merry Christmas, Mr. Herriot!” She was letting a visitor out of the front door and she waved at me gaily. “Come in and have a drink to warm you up.”
I didn’t need warming up but I pulled in to the kerb without hesitation. In the house there was all the festive cheer of last year and the same glorious whiff of sage and onion which set my gastric juices surging. But there was not the sorrow; there was Buster.
He was darting up to each of the dogs in turn, ears pricked, eyes blazing with devilment, dabbing a paw at them then streaking away.
Mrs. Ainsworth laughed. “You know, he plagues the life out of them. Gives them no peace.”
She was right. To the Bassets, Buster’s arrival was rather like the intrusion of an irreverent outsider into an exclusive London club. For a long time they had led a life of measured grace; regular sedate walks with their mistress, superb food in ample quantities and long snoring sessions on the rugs and armchairs. Their days followed one upon another in unruffled calm. And then came Buster.
He was dancing up to the youngest dog again, sideways this time, head on one side, goading him. When he started boxing with both paws it was too much even for the Basset. He dropped his dignity and rolled over with the cat in a brief wrestling match.
“I want to show you something.” Mrs. Ainsworth lifted a hard rubber ball from the sideboard and went out to the garden, followed by Buster. She threw the ball across the lawn and the cat bounded after it over the frosted grass, the muscles rippling under the black sheen of his coat. He seized the ball in his teeth, brought it back to his mistress, dropped it at her feet and waited expectantly. She threw it and he brought it back again.
I gasped incredulously. A feline retriever!
The Bassets looked on disdainfully. Nothing would ever have induced them to chase a ball, but Buster did it again and again as though he would never tire of it.
Mrs. Ainsworth turned to me. “Have you ever seen anything like that?”
“No,” I replied. “I never have. He is a most remarkable cat.”
She snatched Buster from his play and we went back into the house where she held him close to her face, laughing as the big cat purred and arched himself ecstatically against her cheek.
Looking at him, a picture of health and contentment, my mind went back to his mother. Was it too much to think that that dying little creature with the last of her strength had carried her kitten to the only haven of comfort and warmth she had ever known in the hope that it would be cared for there? Maybe it was.
But it seemed I wasn’t the only one with such fancies. Mrs. Ainsworth turned to me and though she was smiling her eyes were wistful.
“Debbie would be pleased,” she said.
I nodded. “Yes, she would. … It was just a year ago today she brought him, wasn’t it?”
“That’s right.” She hugged Buster to her again. “The best Christmas present I ever had.”
CHAPTER 10
I STARED IN DISBELIEF at the dial of the weighing machine. Nine stone seven pounds! I had lost two stones since joining the RAF. I was cowering in my usual corner in Boots’ Chemist’s shop in Scarborough, where I had developed the habit of a weekly weigh-in to keep a morbid eye on my progressive emaciation. It was incredible and it wasn’t all due to the tough training.
On our arrival in Scarborough we had a talk from our Flight Commander, Flt. Lieut. Barnes. He looked us over with a contemplative eye and said, “You won’t know yourselves when you leave here.” That man knew what he was talking about.
We were never at rest. It was PT and Drill, PT and Drill, over and over. Hours of bending and stretching and twisting down on the prom in singlets and shorts while the wind whipped over us from the wintry sea. Hours of marching under the bellowings of our sergeant; quick march, slow march, about turn. We even marched to our navigation classes, bustling along at the RAF quick time, arms swinging shoulder high.
They marched us regularly to the top of Castle Hill where we fired off every conceivable type of weapon; twelve bores, .22 rifles, revolvers, Browning machine guns. We even stabbed at dummies with bayonets. In between they had us swimming, playing football or rugby or running for miles along the beach and on the cliff tops towards Filey.
At first I was too busy to see any change in myself, but one morning after a few weeks our flight was coming to the end of a five-mile run. We dropped down from the Spa to a long stretch of empty beach and the sergeant shouted, “Right, sprint to those rocks! Let’s see who gets there first!”
We all took off on the last hundred yards’ dash and I was mildly surprised to find that the first man past the post was myself—and I wasn’t really out of breath. That was when the realisation hit me. Mr. Barnes had been right. I didn’t know myself.
When I left Helen I was a cosseted young husband with a little double chin and the beginnings of a spare tyre, and now I was a lithe, tireless greyhound. I was certainly fit, but there was something wrong. I shouldn’t have been as thin as this. Another factor was at work.
In Yorkshire when a man goes into a decline during his wife’s pregnancy they giggle behind their hands and say he is “carrying” the baby. I never laugh at these remarks because I am convinced I “carried” my son.
I base this conclusion on a variety of symptoms. It would be an exaggeration to say I suffered from morning sickness, but my suspicions were certainly aroused when I began to feel a little queasy in the early part of the day. This was followed by a growing uneasiness as Helen’s tim
e drew near and a sensation, despite my physical condition, of being drained and miserable. With the onset in the later stages of unmistakable labour pains in my lower abdomen all doubts were resolved and I knew I had to do something about it
I had to see Helen. After all, she was just over that hill which I could see from the top windows of the Grand. Maybe that wasn’t strictly true, but at least I was in Yorkshire and a bus would take me to her in three hours. The snag was that there was no leave from ITW. They left us in no doubt about that. They said the discipline was as tough as a Guards regiment and the restrictions just as rigid. I would get compassionate leave when the baby was born, but I couldn’t wait till then. The grim knowledge that any attempt to dodge off unofficially would be like a minor desertion and would be followed by serious consequences, even prison, didn’t weigh with me.
As one of my comrades put it: “One bloke tried it and finished up in the Glasshouse. It isn’t worth it mate.”
But it was no good. I am normally a law-abiding citizen but I had not a single scruple. I had to see Helen. A surreptitious study of the timetables revealed that there was a bus at 2 p.m. which got to Darrowby at five o’clock, and another leaving Darrowby at six which arrived in Scarborough at nine. Six hours travelling to have one hour with Helen. It was worth it.
At first I couldn’t see a way of getting to the bus station at two o’clock in the afternoon because we were never free at that time, but my chance came quite unexpectedly. One Friday lunchtime we learned that there were no more classes that day but we were confined to the Grand till evening. Most of my friends collapsed thankfully on to their beds, but I slunk down the long flights of stone stairs and took up a position in the foyer where I could watch the front door.
There was a glass-fronted office on one side of the entrance where the SPs sat and kept an eye on all departures. There was only one on duty today and I waited till he turned and moved to the back of the room then I walked quietly past him and out into the square.
That part had been almost too easy, but I felt naked and exposed as I crossed the deserted space between the Grand and the hotels on the opposite side. It was better once I had rounded the corner and I set off at a brisk pace for the west. All I needed was a little bit of luck and as I pressed, dry-mouthed, along the empty street it seemed I had found it. The shock when I saw the two burly SPs strolling towards me was like a blow but was immediately followed by a strange calm.
They would ask me for the pass I didn’t have, then they would want to know what I was doing there. It wouldn’t be much good telling them I had just popped out for a breath of air—this street led to both the bus and railway stations and it wouldn’t need a genius to rumble my little game. Anyway, there was no cover here, no escape, and I wondered idly if there had ever been a veterinary surgeon in the Glasshouse. Maybe I was about to set up some kind of a record.
Then behind me I heard the rhythmic tramp of marching feet and the shrill “ ’eft-’ight, ’eft-’ight” that usually went with it. I turned and saw a long blue column approaching with a corporal in charge. As they swung past me I looked again at the SPs and my heart gave a thud. They were laughing into each other’s faces at some private joke; they hadn’t seen me. Without thinking I tagged on to the end of the marching men and within a few seconds was past the SPs unnoticed.
With my mind working with the speed of desperation, it seemed I would be safest where I was till I could break away in the direction of the bus station. For a while I had a glorious feeling of anonymity then the corporal, still shouting, glanced back. He faced to the front again then turned back more slowly for another look. He appeared to find something interesting because he shortened his stride till he was marching opposite me.
As he looked me up and down I examined him in turn from the corner of my eye. He was a shrivelled, runtish creature with fierce little eyes glinting from a pallid, skull-like face. It was some time before he spoke.
“Who the—hell are you?” he enquired conversationally. It was the number one awkward question but I discerned the faintest gleam of hope; he had spoken in the unmistakable harsh, glottal accent of my home town.
“Herriot, corpora! Two flight, four squadron,” I replied in my broadest Glasgow.
‘Two flight, four …! This is one flight, three squadron. What the—hell are ye daein’ here?”
Arms swinging high, staring rigidly ahead, I took a deep breath. Concealment was futile now.
“Tryin’ to get tae see ma wife, corp. She’s havin’ a baby soon.”
I glanced quickly at him. His was not the kind of face to reveal weakness by showing surprise but his eyes widened fractionally. “Get tae see yer wife? Are ye—daft or whit?”
“It’s no’ far, corp. She lives in Darrowby. Three hours in the bus. Ah wid be back tonight.”
“Back tonight! Ye want yer—heid examinin’!”
“I’ve got tae go!”
“Eyes front!” he screamed suddenly at the men before us. “ ’eft-’ight, ’eft-’ight!” Then he turned and studied me as though I were an unbelievable phenomenon. He was interesting to me, too, as a typical product of the bad times in Glasgow between the wars. Stunted, undernourished, but as tough and belligerent as a ferret.
“D’ye no’ ken,” he said at length, “that ye get—leave when yer wife has the wean?”
“Aye, but a canna’ wait that long. Gimme a break, corp.”
“Give ye a—break! D’ye want tae get me—shot?”
“No, corp, just want tae get to the bus station.”
“Jesus! Is that a’?” He gave me a final incredulous look before quickening his steps to the head of the column. When he returned he surveyed me again.
“Whit part o’ Glesca are ye frae?”
“Scotstounhill,” I replied. “How about you?”
“Govan.”
I turned my head slightly towards him. “Ranger supporter, eh?”
He did not change expression, but an eyebrow flickered and I knew I had him.
“Whit a team!” I murmured reverently. “Many’s the time I’ve stood on the terraces at Ibrox.”
He said nothing and I began to recite the names of the great Rangers team of the thirties. “Dawson, Gray, McDonald, Meiklejohn, Simpson, Brown.” His eyes took on a dreamy expression and by the time I had intoned “Archibald, Marshall, English, McPhail and Morton,” there was something near to a wistful smile on his lips.
Then he appeared to shake himself back to normality.
“ ’Eft-’ight, ’eft-’ight!” he bawled. “C’mon, cmon, pick it up!” Then he muttered to me from the corner of his mouth. “There’s the—bus station. When we march past it run like—!”
He took off again, shouting to the head of the flight, I saw the buses and the windows of the waiting room on my left and dived across the road and through the door. I snatched off my cap and sat trembling among a group of elderly farmers and their wives. Through the glass I could see the long lines of blue moving away down the street and I could still hear the shouts of the corporal.
But he didn’t turn round and I saw only his receding back, the narrow shoulders squared, the bent legs stepping it out in time with his men. I never saw him again but to this day I wish I could take him to Ibrox and watch the Rangers with him and maybe buy him a half and half pint at one of the Govan pubs. It wouldn’t have mattered if he had turned out to be a Celtic supporter at that decisive moment because I had the Celtic team on my tongue all ready to trot out, starting with Kennaway, Cook, McGonigle. It is not the only time my profound knowledge of football has stood me in good stead.
Sitting on the bus, still with my cap on my lap to avoid attracting attention, it struck me that the whole world changed within a mile or two as we left the town. Back there the war was everywhere, filling people’s minds and eyes and thoughts; the teeming thousands of uniformed men, the RAF and army vehicles, the almost palpable atmosphere of anticipation and suspense. And suddenly it all just stopped.
I
t vanished as the wide sweep of grey-blue sea fell beneath the rising ground behind the town, and as the bus trundled westward I looked out on a landscape of untroubled peace. The long moist furrows of the new-turned soil glittered under the pale February sun, contrasting with the gold stubble fields and the grassy pastures where sheep clustered around their feeding troughs. There was no wind and the smoke rose straight from the farm chimneys and the bare branches of the roadside trees were still as they stretched across the cold sky.
There were many things that pulled at me. A man in breeches and leggings carrying on his shoulder a bale of hay to some outlying cattle; a group of farm men burning hedge clippings and the fragrance of the wood smoke finding its way into the bus. The pull was stronger as the hours passed and the beginnings of my own familiar countryside began to appear beyond the windows. Maybe it was a good thing I didn’t see Darrowby; Helen’s home was near the bus route and I dropped off well short of the town.
She was alone in the house and she turned her head as I walked into the kitchen. The delight on her face was mixed with astonishment; in fact I know we were both astonished, she because I was so skinny and I because she was so fat. Helen, with the baby only two weeks away, was very large indeed, but not too large for me to get my arms around her, and we stood there in the middle of the flagged floor clasped together for a long time with neither of us saying much.
When I released her she looked at me, wide-eyed. “I hardly knew you when you walked in then.”
“I felt the same way about you.”
“I’m not surprised.” She laughed and rested her hand on her bulging abdomen. “He’s kicking like mad now. I’m sure it’s going to be a boy.” A fleeting concern showed in her eyes and she reached out a hand and touched my fleshless cheeks. “Don’t they feed you properly?”
“Oh, the food’s very good,” I replied. “But unfortunately they run it all off again.”
“Anyway, I’ll get you a good meal now.” She gazed at me thoughtfully. “Pity we’ve finished our meat ration, but how about some egg and chips?”
James Herriot Page 10