Читать книгу Pets on Parade - Malcolm Welshman - Страница 10

Did Lucy get a St Valentine’s Day card from me? No, I’m afraid she didn’t.

I felt a bit mean for not getting her one. I’m normally a bit of a romantic at heart, so a box of chocolates or a bunch of flowers wouldn’t have gone amiss. Or at least a card as a token of my affection. But that was the trouble – the affection, or rather the lack of it, which now seemed to be the case most of the time. Lucy was so terribly moody; and each day I woke up wondering whether it was going to be another of ‘those days’, one of monosyllabic replies to my questions, accompanied by a long face which seemed to get longer as the day wore on until I felt her jaw would end up scraping along the ground. Her mood affected me and I began to feel a little resentful at having to put up with it all. So, no Valentine’s card. Tough titties.

‘Don’t think that was a good idea,’ said Beryl, having just returned from her morning puff at the back door and now spooning three sugars into her black coffee. She’d shown me the card she’d received from Mr Entwhistle – a very romantic, red-edged affair, with red bows and red roses encased in a red, velvet heart. I didn’t have the heart to tell her I thought it rather over the top, especially as, inside, he’d glued a snapshot of himself centred on another velvet heart, like he was some sort of heart-throb. Yuck!

I could imagine the reaction I’d have had from Lucy if I had done the same. But then I didn’t consider myself a heart-throb. OK, I liked to think I wasn’t too bad looking. I did have rather a sharp nose – ‘aquiline’, my Mum would say, while she caressed her own prominent snout (thanks, Mum) – and I did have one slightly protruding front tooth. And yes, I suppose my ears were rather on the large size – ‘You take after Prince Charles,’ my Dad always said (thanks, Dad) – so I always made sure my hair overlapped them. But at least I had hair, a good head of it, which I usually kept cropped short, although I sported a fringe as I had an unusually high forehead – a sign of intelligence, Mum was always quick to say (thanks again, Mum). Currently, my brown hair had blond highlights to match the gold stud in each earlobe. I thought this gave me a touch of the David Beckhams. Lucy had been less than sympathetic when I returned from the hairdresser’s with my new style. ‘David Beckham?’ she’d snorted. ‘The nearest you get to him is dribbling in bed.’ (Thanks, Lucy, love you too.) I think she was referring to my habit of snoring on my side, with my mouth wide open and saliva seeping out onto the pillow. Not the nicest of habits when trying to score.

‘I guess things between you and Lucy are still a bit …’ Beryl was saying, trailing off, unable to find the right words. I could have supplied plenty: ‘iffy’ … ‘difficult’ … ‘off and on’? Definitely more off than on.

Even Eric had noticed. He’d come bouncing into the office earlier on, ruddy cheeked, bald head glowing, muffled in a winter jacket and bright orange scarf, complaining how cold it was outside while Beryl shuffled past, her hands pulling the sleeves of her black cardigan across her chest, saying it wasn’t much better indoors.

‘Full of the joys of spring, I see,’ he said to her receding back as she climbed the steps to reception. ‘Mind you, you’re not much better,’ he went on, looking at me. ‘Talk about winter blues. You seem really down in the dumps these days. So does Lucy.’ He held up his hands. ‘Not that I want to interfere, but for the sake of the practice … you know, we do need to get on with each other. Control our emotions, even if we feel like throttling someone.’

‘Eric.’ Beryl’s voice rang out. ‘I hope you’re not going to be too long.’

He raised his eyebrows and pointed a finger towards reception. ‘Good example up there,’ he continued in a whisper. ‘It can be quite difficult at times, but you learn to cope.’ He gave a nervous grin.

‘Eric! I’ve booked you several visits this morning.’

‘So if there are any issues you’d like to talk over …’

‘Eric!’

‘We could have a jar over at the Woolpack one lunchtime.’

‘ERIC!’

‘Coming, Beryl.’ With a final grimace at me, Eric sprang away.

It was kind of Eric to lend a sympathetic ear. But that was him all over. He might have given the impression of being a bumbling, rather inept sort of chap, and, indeed, he did nothing to play down that image, always flapping round the place in a white coat that was several sizes too big for him. He was also usually tieless, and the brown cords he invariably wore were creased and slightly shiny at the knees. It was as if he was making a statement – take me or leave me. A lot of clients left him, preferring the clipped, professional image of his wife, always smartly turned out, even when it was an emergency in the middle of the night.

‘Crystal keeps a set of clothes specifically for those times,’ he once confided in me, his tongue a little loosened from the couple of pints consumed over at the Woolpack that lunchtime.

Those liquid lunches, although not excessive, were strongly disapproved of by Beryl. It wasn’t the drinking as such – she wasn’t averse to the occasional port and lemon; and, in fact, the bottle I’d bought for last year’s ‘What Were You Wearing When the Ship Went Down?’ party went down very well with Beryl. At the end of the evening, she was seen weaving round Willow Wren, with a glass containing at least eight slices of lemon from constant replenishments, proclaiming herself free for a Jolly Roger. No – it was more the beery fumes exhaled by Eric on his return, coupled with an even more ruddy complexion than normal, so that cheeks, nose and bald head glowed a bright amber, like one of those roadside beacons warning you of impending danger.

The danger in this case was the watching eye and waspish tongue of Beryl, who would pounce as soon as Eric breezed into reception. There’d be an exaggerated sniff, a fan of the scarlet talons in front of the face, and a direct reference to Eric’s slightly inebriated state in the form of a withering comment, usually a standard one, along the lines of, ‘God, Eric, you could anaesthetise a Great Dane in one breath.’ Although the breed and size of dog could vary according to the intensity of Beryl’s outrage at the time.

Eric took to stuffing a couple of peppermints in his mouth before confronting Beryl should he have been over at the pub. Of course, it didn’t fool her. The trouble was, whenever I thought I might have a touch of halitosis – possibly through having had one of Bert’s garlic bread baguettes – and had been sucking a mint myself, I, too, became the target of one of Beryl’s eye-drilling scans. Most unnerving.

I could hear the dialogue up in reception between Eric and Beryl getting louder and more heated by the minute; intrigued, I tiptoed up the stairs to lean in at the door behind Beryl. Eric was facing her, the other side of the counter, looking at the visits book while Beryl was tapping the computer screen with one of her scarlet nails. If Eric had been red on arrival, he was now slowly turning puce.

‘I can’t see how I can fit all of these in,’ he exclaimed, his hand slamming down on the page that listed the visits Beryl had set up for him that morning.

‘Well, if you’d got cracking sooner,’ replied Beryl, ‘I’m sure it wouldn’t have been a problem.’

Eric was peering at the list. ‘You’ve got me down to visit Miss Millichip’s sows.’

‘9.30 … yes.’

‘To do what? It doesn’t say here.’

‘The usual.’

‘Which is?’ Eric’s voice was getting more exasperated by the second.

‘They need their trotters trimming. You do it routinely every six months.’

‘But you’ve got me booked over at the Stockwells at the same time. I can’t possibly be in two places at once, can I?’ Beads of sweat had broken out on Eric’s forehead as he visibly tried to control himself. ‘Can I?’ he repeated, in a controlled snarl.

‘Don’t you use that tone of voice with me,’ snapped Beryl. I could see the wings of her coal-black hair springing up, all of a quiver.

‘Well, you shouldn’t have double-booked.’ Spittle had appeared at the corners of Eric’s mouth.

‘I can’t help it if the Stockwells called in requesting a visit as soon as possible. You’ll just have to do the Millichip trimming later on.’

‘Beryl,’ seethed Eric, ‘it’s not for you to tell me what to do.’ His hands were gripping the edges of the counter, his knuckles white, and he was swaying backwards and forwards, his eyes wild, glaring at her.

Now what had he just been telling me about how important it was for everyone to get on? Hee-hee … count to ten, Eric. Self-control.

‘So how are we all this morning?’ The words were clipped, clearly enunciated in a mid-shires accent, and were uttered by Crystal Sharpe as she swept into reception from the car park and swirled to a halt next to her husband. ‘Sorting out the visits, are we?’ she said, smiling sweetly round at everyone, her Cupid’s lips parting to show an even row of glossy, white teeth. ‘No problems, I hope.’ She gave Eric the full-on, penetrating stare of her steel-blue eyes before switching her attention to the visits book. She ran a well-manicured, unvarnished nail along the top of the page and, within seconds, had sorted out the morning’s workload, without a murmur of protest from anyone.

Eric was to trim the trotters, she would see the few clients booked in for me and I would visit the Stockwells and see to the calving. I would? I gulped. Of course I would. I would do anything for Crystal. Besides, as she said, I’d been to the Stockwells before when they had that cow stuck in the quarry and they’d been impressed by how helpful I’d been then. So I was to hurry along and see what I could do to help them this time. ‘I take it you’ve no problem with that, Paul?’ she had said.

Bewitched, bewildered and rather bedazzled, I shook my head and obediently trotted out to my car, checking I had all the necessary calving ropes, gown and instruments ready to get to grips with a potentially difficult calving. And, more importantly, as I drove out of the car park, I realised I needed to get in the right frame of mind to tackle the Stockwells.

Madge and Rosie Stockwell were twin sisters, originating from Yorkshire, who had moved down to Sussex over 30 years earlier to take on Hawkshill Farm, secreted away in the side of the Downs between Ashton and Chawcombe; and here they’d remained ever since, in what could only be described as a time capsule. Little had been done to keep pace with modern advances in farming, and they had ticked along with a motley collection of sheep, the flock now reduced in size, as was the herd of Jerseys which now numbered only 12. I had been called out last summer to attend to Myrtle, one of their Jerseys, who had gone down with milk fever. Boy, that had been an experience; their slow, unperturbed way of going about things had driven me nuts, especially as we’d had an emergency on our hands, but as they’d said on my arrival, ‘Doesn’t pay to be in a hurry. Now’t gained if vet breaks leg …’ while they watched me rush across their yard and almost do precisely that when I slipped in a cow pat.

Once on the dual carriageway, I headed north over the Downs and dropped down into Ashton where the practice house, Willow Wren, was situated. Taking the road west towards Chawcombe, it was a mile or so before the narrow lane on the left wound back up the northern slopes of the Downs and took me to Hawkshill Farm. Although it had been many months since my last visit, I still remembered the Stockwells’ instructions regarding the gate: ‘Second one on the right and make sure to close it after you.’ The gate was still there in much the same condition as before. Bleached oak, five bars reduced to four, and that fourth one just as loose, although an attempt had been made to prevent it from dropping out of its bracket by some strands of orange bailer twine tied round it and secured to the upright. It was all rather rickety and, as I prised open the latch, the gate dropped on its hinges and I had to lift it and drag it back across the gravel track.

The farm, tucked down in a hollow, was obscured by a thick veil of mist this morning, so I wasn’t able to see the details that I’d found so attractive on my previous visit: the undulating pitch of the clay-tiled roof; the flint walls set in courses of red brick; the tiny lattice windows painted white; the oak-panelled front door, weathered grey. And all of this complemented by the landscape beyond – a patchwork of fields, hedgerows and the spire of Chawcombe church in the distance.

But not today. Today, the background was a blur of grey as banks of low cloud rolled down and obscured everything in droplets of icy mist. Last time, as I drove down the winding track and into the brick-paved yard at the side of the house, I’d been struck by the lack of TV aerial, satellite dish or white PVC conservatory to mar the sense of the farm being locked in a time capsule. So fanciful was the impression of rustic charm due to the oak tithe barn with its exposed beams, linking the knapped flint stables to the house, that I’d half expected a Hardyesque figure to emerge to greet me – Tess, Bathsheba, or Susan Henchard perhaps – certainly not the gnome-like creature that had shuffled into view – Madge Stockwell.

Today was no exception, save that two, rather than one, gnome-like figures emerged through the mist in the yard like phantom goblins from The Lord of the Rings rather than Julie Christie lookalikes from Far from the Madding Crowd. Madge and Rosie Stockwell – identical twins, dressed identically in brown tweed trousers, stuffed into black wellies and, I suspected, identical green, army-style pullovers, although this time it had to be a guess as their upper halves were obscured by brown, rubber capes, buttoned tightly at the neck, stretching down to calf level, with side vents for their arms which were currently tucked inside. The overall impression was of two over-inflated buoys, an impression given more credence by the fact that they were standing in a yard ankle-deep in water.

As I got out of the car, the two sisters splashed towards me.

Never knowing who was Madge and who was Rosie, each having a tomato soup complexion, hooked nose and mousy, pudding basin-styled hair, I addressed them as one. ‘Morning, ladies. See you’ve had quite a bit of rain here.’ I pointed at the flooded yard.

Both sisters shook their heads simultaneously. ‘It’s not rain,’ said one caped figure.

‘Vet thinks it is,’ said the other.

‘But it’s not, Madge.’

‘I know it’s not. It’s the leak in that outside tap,’ replied Madge.

‘It’s an outside tap that’s leaking,’ explained the sister who I’d now worked out was Rosie.

‘It needs to be fixed,’ said Madge. ‘We’ll get round to it in time.’

‘We will, Madge. In time,’ said Rosie, nodding her head slowly.

I felt a nervous tic start to throb in my temple at the mention of time. I was being reminded of how time meant nothing to the Stockwells. As Beryl had warned me before my first meeting, it was no use hurrying them as they lived in a world of their own. Everything had to be done at their pace.

But, like the time I’d rushed out to treat their Jersey with milk fever, time was still precious; and this time there was a calving cow requiring attention. I assumed she was going to be in the tithe barn and said as much to the sisters as I opened the boot of my car and started to collect up my calving equipment.

‘Vet thinks Deidre’s in barn,’ said Madge, turning to Rosie.

‘But she’s not,’ said Rosie, shaking her head, dislodging a drop of water from the end of her nose.

‘I know she’s not. She’s out in Fox Meadow.’

‘That’s right, Madge. Fox Meadow. Deidre’s out in Fox Meadow,’ went on Rosie, looking at me.

‘That’s where you’ll find her,’ explained Madge, also staring at me.

‘Fox Meadow,’ said Rosie in case I required extra confirmation.

The tic in my temple was now throbbing at full throttle. ‘Look, ladies,’ I said quickly and a little too curtly, ‘we haven’t got all day. Your Deidre needs looking at as soon as possible. Just take me to Fox Meadow, OK?’

‘Rush. Rush. Always in a rush,’ murmured the Stockwells in unison.

‘Shall I show him?’ said Rosie, turning to Madge. Or was it Madge turning to Rosie?

‘You can if you like. Or I’ll go.’

‘Don’t mind.’

‘Or we could both go.’

‘Probably best if we both went.’

‘OK.’

‘We’ll both go,’ they chorused, their ruddy cheeks glowing.

I started to grind my teeth. ‘Well let’s get going then,’ I seethed, hastily donning my boots and waterproofs as the mist turned to a steady drizzle, while handing calving ropes and the rest of the kit to the twins.

As we splashed across the first meadow, water seeped up my sleeves and crept down my collar and mud worked its way up and over the edge of each boot.

‘Is it much further?’ I gasped as the gate to a second meadow was opened.

‘Vet’s asking is it much further,’ said one twin, squelching to a halt.

‘Heard him,’ said the other with a squish, closing the gate behind us.

‘Well?’ I asked, squashed between them.

‘We’re here,’ they said as one. ‘This is Fox Meadow.’

The meadow consisted of a small field bounded by overgrown hawthorn hedges – the irregular tops an undulating line of brown spikes in need of cutting back; the grass was poached round the perimeter with patches of mud and puddles leading to a large, corrugated-roofed field shelter, inside of which huddled a group of about ten or so Jerseys, some of which were desultorily snatching mouthfuls of hay from a pile heaped in one corner.

‘Deidre’s over there,’ said one of the twins – Madge, I think. She pointed to the far side of the field where, through the drifting sheet of drizzle, I could just discern the outline of a cow, only her flanks visible, the rest of her below the level of the grass. ‘She’s gone down in the ditch,’ added Madge.

‘Dear old Deidre,’ said Rosie.

Between them, the twins explained that earlier they’d noticed Deidre had separated herself from the rest of the herd, showing signs of unease, standing alone, tail flicking, gazing into the distance, emitting the occasional soft moo.

‘Thought then she might be due to calve, didn’t I, Madge?’ said Rosie.

‘You did, Rosie.’

‘I did, Madge.’

‘And you were right.’

‘I was.’

So they went back to get a head collar and rope to bring her in but on their return had found she had gone down the side of the ditch that flanked the field, normally dry and grass-filled, but now soggy and water-filled – as I discovered when we got to Deidre and found her hindquarters partially submerged.

‘Couldn’t get her to budge,’ commented one twin.

‘No, we couldn’t,’ said the other.

‘But we did try,’ said the first.

I asked about contractions and was told some had been seen earlier but they had since eased off. There had been no sign of a water bag bursting, although in these wet conditions that could easily have been missed. I felt in a real dilemma here. Deidre certainly looked as if she was about to calve. An internal examination could establish whether the calf was engaged in the cervix and correctly positioned; but there was no way that was going to be achievable with Deidre’s back end half under water. As if reading my thoughts, the heifer gave a grunt, contracted her abdominal muscles and thrust both hind-legs down through the lank grass of the bank, an action which pushed her rump back level with the field so she was now splayed diagonally across the ditch.

‘OK, let’s go for it,’ I exclaimed, and, taking a deep breath, tore off my jacket and sodden shirt and gritted my teeth as I pulled on the red calving apron one twin held out to me, gasping as the freezing rubber slapped across my chest. Lubricating my arm with the oil the other twin gave me, I cautiously levered myself down onto the slippery bank and, while Madge – or was it Rosie? – held Deidre’s tail back, and the other twin, having secured a head collar, was kneeling down, gripping it tightly under Deidre’s chin, I slowly slipped my arm inside the cow, feeling the warmth of the animal’s birth canal instantly enfold me as clouds of steam eddied out.

With my arm buried up to the elbow, I eventually managed to touch the calf’s head and felt it tweak back as I pinched its nose. At least the calf was still alive.

But to judge the calf’s head in relation to the size of the heifer’s pelvis, I had a sinking feeling that we weren’t going to have a normal birth. I just felt that head was too big to pass through. Which meant only one option for a safe delivery. A Caesarean.

I stood up, rapidly re-dressed and told the twins. They sploshed round from either end of the prone cow, only stopping when their hooked noses were almost touching.

‘Did you hear what vet said, Madge?’

‘I did, Rosie. A Caesarean.’

‘That’s what he said, yes.’

‘I know. So what do you think?’

‘Best let vet do it.’

‘That’s what I think’s best,’ said Madge. Or was it Rosie?

The problem now was how to get Deidre back to the farm, since there was no way I could contemplate carrying out a Caesarean under such dire field conditions unless absolutely forced to. Even if we did manage to haul her back, there was still the problem of who was going to help me. I really didn’t feel it fair to put the onus on the Stockwell twins to assist.

The first problem resolved itself when Deidre gave an almighty bellow and heaved herself up into a sitting position, at which point Madge and Rosie suddenly sprang into action and bent down, pushing at Deidre’s rump, the slope of the bank helping them to roll Deidre sideways until her back legs folded in under her. She gave another loud snort and then shakily rose to stand on all four feet.

Problem two was resolved by a mobile call to Prospect House, where Beryl informed me she’d organise someone to come out and help straight away; that created a new problem of its own, though, when after waiting a few minutes while she went and conferred, I was told Lucy was on her way. ‘Hope you don’t mind …’ were Beryl’s parting words.

No, actually I didn’t mind. Although Lucy was only a trainee nurse, she’d already shown her aptitude for the work involved, with an understanding, patient manner when dealing with creatures of all shapes and sizes, a natural empathy not clouded by sentimentality and that niggling ‘love for animals’ so often expressed by people and which so often obscured and undermined the professionalism required by veterinary nurses to ensure that some of the less glamorous aspects of the work were carried out. That aptitude had been clearly demonstrated the time I had to deal with the Richardsons’ difficult foaling – their darling Clementine with her breech birth. Lucy’s support and reassurance as to my capability to deal with the crisis that night had been instrumental in us hitching up. Maybe Deidre’s problem would be the catalyst required to bring us back together again. We’d have to see.

The Stockwells and I had managed to push and cajole Deidre across Fox Meadow and the adjacent field, slipping and sliding into the yard just as Lucy drove down the gravel track.

‘You remembered to close gate,’ said one of the twins as Lucy climbed out of her somewhat battered old Fiesta, a present from her Mum when she reached her 18th a year back.

She nodded and then looked at me before saying, ‘I’ve brought out the sterilised emergency op pack and some additional artery forceps. Hope that will be sufficient.’ She dropped her gaze as she finished, and opened the rear car door to gather up the equipment, taking it across the yard to the tithe barn as instructed by the twins, quickly tiptoeing to avoid too much water getting into her shoes.

‘These young ’uns … always in a hurry, Rosie,’ said Madge.

‘Rush, rush, rush. Always in a rush,’ I heard her twin mutter as I, too, scooted ahead into the barn while Deidre was slowly coaxed in by the sisters. ‘There, there, take your time,’ they were saying as the heifer nervously shuffled onto the straw covering the cobbled barn floor. At least we were now all under cover and I did have somewhere to operate. Not ideal, though, I thought, gazing up at the cobweb-festooned timbers that arched above us; from the central span of one hung a dust-covered bulb which, although lit, scarcely penetrated the shadows of that cavernous interior.

I began to shiver, feeling the muscles in my arms and legs tremble. Was it my wet clothing or nerves at the thought of what I was about to do?

‘Here, put these on,’ murmured Lucy, handing me a pack containing a T-shirt and operating gown. ‘Wasn’t sure if you’d want them. But at least they’re dry.’

‘Thanks.’ I removed my jacket and stripped off my wet shirt. Having put on the ops clothes, I felt much better, although still apprehensive at what lay ahead. One of the twins had tied Deidre to a large iron ring embedded in the flint wall. The heifer was now standing there, next to an old wooden manger, its frame pitted with woodworm, with her head down, her dark eyes dull, partially obscured by her long, black lashes, and her hooves sifting backwards and forwards in the straw. She was clearly distressed. The sooner I operated the better.

‘Could we please have a couple of straw bales over here …’ I gesticulated at the stack at the far end of the barn. ‘As quick as you like.’

Madge and Rosie didn’t do ‘quick’. In the time it had taken them to amble down and bring back a bale each to make a makeshift operating table, I’d drawn up the dose of local anaesthetic required to give an epidural, had pumped Deidre’s tail to locate the right spot between the lumbar vertebrae and had given the injection. Some difference to that time last year when I’d given Clementine a similar spinal injection to stop her straining. Then I’d been all fingers and thumbs.

The operation site now had to be prepared.

‘I did bring the clippers,’ said Lucy, holding them up. ‘And they’re fully charged. I checked before leaving.’

Good girl. More brownie points.

‘You can do it,’ I said, outlining the area on Deidre’s right flank that required shaving. ‘And perhaps one of you would like to get me some hot water,’ I continued, turning to the Stockwells who had lined themselves up by the straw bales.

‘Vet wants some hot water, Madge.’

‘I heard him, Rosie.’

‘Shall I get it?’

‘You can if you like. Or I can go.’

‘Whatever.’

‘You go then.’

‘OK, Madge. I will. But it might not be that hot. Boiler’s not on.’

‘Vet will just have to make do.’

‘He will, Madge, he will.’

By the time Rosie had returned with a bucket of water, Lucy had finished shaving Deidre’s right flank and had scrubbed it with antiseptic and wiped it down with surgical spirit; and I had injected more local anaesthetic in the skin parallel to the spine to deaden the nerves that ran out to the area where I was going to make my incision.

I scrubbed my hands with antiseptic, rinsing them in the water provided by Rosie, which, as she had predicted, was tepid, and dried them on some sterilised paper towels from a pack Lucy had opened. I extracted a large green drape from a similar pack and spread it across the straw bales and then Lucy opened the third sterile pack, containing the instruments, and tipped them out. Scalpel, artery and rack-toothed forceps, needle holder, scissors, catgut and nylon, swabs and a gauze pad with a variety of different-sized needles threaded through it tumbled onto my makeshift operating table.

‘OK … ready?’ I said, poised with scalpel in hand like a conductor about to wave his baton.

‘I’m ready,’ said a twin. ‘Are you, Madge?’

‘Yes, Rosie, I am.’

‘We’re ready, vet,’ said Rosie.

A brief smile of reassurance flicked across Lucy’s face. ‘You’ll be fine, Paul,’ she whispered.

I dropped my wrist and the blade plunged deep into Deidre’s hide to slice down the flank and reveal the underlying bed of glistening white connective tissue criss-crossed with small, pulsating arteries and the dark red striations of the muscles, some of which twitched involuntarily.

As I sliced deeper, the first of several small arteries was cut. A fine jet of blood sprayed into the air and splattered down my gown, stopped only by a pair of artery forceps clamped to the spurting, severed vessel. I cautiously cut deeper until – with a quiet puff of the vacuum being broken – the abdominal cavity was entered. Enlarging the aperture, I revealed parts of the digestive tract – the grey, glistening, rounded end of the rumen, a sea of small bowel, the dark curve of a kidney – but my main focus was on the massive wall of womb directly in front of me.

It bulged and rippled as the calf inside twisted about.

I took a deep breath, realising it was going to be a mammoth task to get the gravid uterus in line with the incision I’d made and then, holding it still, cut through the uterine wall and extricate the calf. And so it proved. Even with both my arms immersed in Deidre’s abdomen and enfolded round the womb, I could barely lift it to the edge of the wound.

‘Lucy, I think you’d better scrub up and give me a hand here,’ I gasped.

She swiftly did as instructed while I grimly held on to the womb, pushing it out towards me as best I could.

‘Now see where those feet are poking up?’ I nodded at the tent of grey uterine wall I was supporting, level with the gap in the abdominal wall. ‘Put a scalpel through that.’

Lucy reached between my arms and cut where I had indicated. A tiny hind-leg immediately popped out.

‘Rope it quick.’

That done, I took the scalpel from Lucy and enlarged the uterine incision to winkle out the other hind-leg, which she roped as well. The two of us then hauled on the ropes and the steaming body of the calf slithered out of the womb, up and over the edge of the abdominal incision, to collapse in a pile of mucus and membranes in the straw.

‘Rosie, Madge, see to the calf,’ I urged and was pleasantly surprised to see them move with the speed of – not exactly lightning – but with sufficient alacrity to ensure they’d pulled the calf up by its hind-legs and had swung it to and fro to get its airways cleared, and had then been rewarded by a splutter and a cough.

‘It’s a boy,’ said one.

‘So I see, Rosie,’ said the other. ‘A boy.’

‘That’s what I said, Madge.’

‘I know.’

‘It’s a bull calf,’ they chorused at me.

I wasn’t really paying attention as there was a pressing need to get the uterine incision stitched and over-stitched as it was rapidly contracting down now the calf had been removed. Within minutes, it would be a tenth of its size. Lucy held up the cut edges while I sewed, and then assisted as I closed the abdominal wall, drawing the layers of muscle and connective tissue together and running sutures through them. Finally, the skin was pulled across and stitched in place, leaving a long, pink line down Deidre’s flank.

One of the two Stockwells had been rubbing the calf’s coat with a handful of straw while the other waited until I’d finished suturing and dusting the wound with antiseptic powder, and then released Deidre’s halter from the iron ring. The heifer immediately swung round and started to lick and nuzzle her new offspring.

Lucy, with quiet efficiency, packed up all the instruments, clothes and ropes, taking them across the yard to the back of her car.

‘Vet and his young ’un will be needing wash,’ declared a twin.

‘Indeed they will, Madge,’ said Rosie, getting to her feet and stepping back from the calf.

‘Over in kitchen, then,’ said Madge.

Lucy and I cleaned ourselves up with the soap and tepid water provided and, having declined the offer of a cup of coffee – for fear it would take hours to make – we made our way back into the yard accompanied by the Stockwells. Before leaving, we decided to check on the calf.

The sight of a newborn creature starting on its life’s journey never ceases to amaze me, whether a hatched chick flapping its bare wings for the first time, a little froglet swimming or a baby crying with unfocused eyes, waiting to latch on to its mother’s milk. Deidre’s calf was no exception. He seemed to be all legs, gangly, long-limbed, uncoordinated, as he attempted to stand, his rump up in the air, aquiver, only for him to topple forward onto his side. Undeterred, he tried again, heaving himself up, staggering like a boxer coming round from a knock-out blow. This time, despite lurching backwards and forwards and twisting to one side, he remained standing, all four limbs splayed out; and as if to proclaim his achievement, he emitted a gurgly ‘Naaarh’ while Deidre curled her tongue round his head with a reassuring ‘Naaarh’ of her own.

‘Dear old Deidre,’ murmured one twin, looking over the half-door of the barn.

‘She is a dear, yes,’ said the other, gazing in as well. ‘Best if we left her to it.’

‘I think it’s best, Madge,’ said the first, nodding.

‘That’s what I said, Rosie.’

‘I heard you.’

‘It’s fine by you then?’

‘I think it’s best, Madge.’

‘You’ve already said that.’

‘Just agreeing with you.’

‘You think the same then.’

‘I do, Madge.’

‘We think it’s best,’ they chorused, swinging round, as one, to look at me. ‘What do you think?’

Oh dear. Best to say our goodbyes, and we did so with the customary addition of ‘Contact us if you have any worries.’

Hopefully, the Stockwells wouldn’t have any worries. I couldn’t say the same about myself. I drove ahead up the gravel track from the farm and stopped at one side to open the gate and allow Lucy through in her Fiesta. Was I opening the gate to a new future together or, to judge from the lack of acknowledgement as she drove away, just closing the gate firmly on our relationship, in much the same way as I slammed the Stockwells’ gate shut, once I’d driven through it? Hmm … only time would tell.