Джеймс Хэрриот - All Creatures Great and Small

It is difficult to describe the glorious relief which flooded through me when at last I felt the thing between my fingers; I pulled it out, filthy and dripping and stared down stupidly at the graduations on the tube.

Mr. Sidlow cleared his throat. “Well, wot does it say? Has she got a temperature?”

I whipped round and gave him a piercing look. Was it possible that this man could be making a joke? But the dark, tight-shut face was expressionless.

“No,” I mumbled in reply. “No temperature.”

The rest of that visit has always been mercifully blurred in my mind. I know I got myself cleaned up and dressed and told Mr. Sidlow that I thought his cow had Johne’s disease which was incurable but I would take away a faeces sample to try to make sure. The details are cloudy but I do know that at no point was there the slightest gleam of light or hope.

I left the farm, bowed down by an ever greater sense of disgrace than usual and drove with my foot oh the boards all the way to Brawton. I roared into the special car park at the race-course, galloped through the owners’ and trainers’ entrance and seized the arm of the gatekeeper.

“Has the first race been run?” I gasped.

“Aye, just finished,” he replied cheerfully. “Kemal won it—ten to one.”

I turned and walked slowly towards the paddock. Fifty pounds! A fortune snatched from my grasp by cruel fate. And hanging over the whole tragedy was the grim spectre of Mr. Sidlow. I could forgive Mr. Sidlow, I thought, for dragging me out at all sorts of ungodly hours; I could forgive him for presenting me with a long succession of hopeless cases which had lowered my self-esteem to rock bottom; I could forgive him for thinking I was the biggest idiot in Yorkshire and for proclaiming his opinion far and wide. But I’d never forgive him for losing me that fifty pounds.

FORTY-EIGHT

“THE RENISTON, EH?” I fidgeted uneasily. “Bit grand, isn’t it?”

Tristan lay rather than sat in his favourite chair and peered up through a cloud of cigarette smoke. “Of course it’s grand. It’s the most luxurious hotel in the country outside of London, but for your purpose it’s the only possible place. Look, tonight is your big chance isn’t it? You want to impress this girl, don’t you? Well, ring her up and tell her you’re taking her to the Reniston. The food is wonderful and there’s a dinner dance every Saturday night. And today is Saturday.” He sat up suddenly and his eyes widened. “Can’t you see it, Jim? The music oozing out of Benny Thornton’s trombone and you, full of lobster thermidor, floating round the floor with Helen snuggling up to you. The only snag is that it will cost you a packet, but if you are prepared to spend about a fortnight’s wages you can have a really good night.”

I hardly heard the last part, I was concentrating on the blinding vision of Helen snuggling up to me. It was an image which blotted out things like money and I stood with my mouth half open listening to the trombone. I could hear it quite clearly.

Tristan broke in. “There’s one thing—have you got a dinner-jacket? You’ll need one.”

“Well, I’m not very well off for evening-dress. In fact, when I went to Mrs. Pumphrey’s party I hired a suit from Brawton, but I wouldn’t have time for that now.” I paused and thought for a moment. “I do have my first and only dinner-suit but I got it when I was about seventeen and I don’t know whether I’d be able to get into it.”

Tristan waved this aside. He dragged the Woodbine smoke into the far depths of his lungs and released it reluctantly in little wisps and trickles as he spoke. “Doesn’t matter in the least, Jim. As long as you’re wearing the proper gear they’ll let you in, and with a big, good-looking chap like you the fit of the suit is unimportant.”

We went upstairs and extracted the garment from the bottom of my trunk. I had cut quite a dash in this suit at the college dances and though it had got very tight towards the end of the course it had still been a genuine evening-dress outfit and as such had commanded a certain amount of respect.

But now it had a pathetic, lost look. The fashion had changed and the trend was towards comfortable jackets and soft, unstarched shirts. This one was rigidly of the old school and included an absurd little waistcoat with lapels and a stiff, shiny-fronted shirt with a tall, winged collar.

My problems really started when I got the suit on. Hard work, Pennine air and Mrs. Hall’s good food had filled me out and the jacket failed to meet across my stomach by six inches. I seemed to have got taller, too, because there was a generous space between the bottom of the waistcoat and the top of the trousers. The trousers themselves were skin tight over the buttocks, yet seemed foolishly baggy lower down.

Tristan’s confidence evaporated as I paraded before him and he decided to call on Mrs. Hall for advice. She was an unemotional woman and endured the irregular life at Skeldale House without noticeable reaction, but when she came into the bedroom and looked at me her facial muscles went into a long, twitching spasm. She finally overcame the weakness, however, and became very businesslike.

“A little gusset at the back of your trousers will work wonders, Mr. Herriot, and I think if I put a bit of silk cord across the front of your jacket it’ll hold it nicely. Mind you, there’ll be a bit of a space, like, but I shouldn’t think that’ll worry you. And I’ll give the whole suit a good press—makes all the difference in the world.”

I had never gone in much for intensive grooming, but that night I really went to work on myself, scrubbing and anointing and trying a whole series of different partings in my hair before I was satisfied. Tristan seemed to have appointed himself master of the wardrobe and carried the suit tenderly upstairs, still warm from Mrs. Hall’s ironing board. Then, like a professional valet, he assisted in every step of the robing. The high collar gave most trouble and he drew strangled oaths from me as he trapped the flesh of my neck under the stud.

When I was finally arrayed he walked around me several times, pulling and patting the material and making delicate adjustments here and there.

Eventually he stopped his circling and surveyed me from the front. I had never seen him look so serious. “Fine, Jim, fine—you look great. Distinguished, you know. It’s not everybody who can wear a dinner-jacket—so many people look like conjurers, but not you. Hang on a minute and I’ll get your overcoat.”

I had arranged to pick up Helen at seven o’clock and as I climbed from the car in the darkness outside her house a strange unease crept over me. This was different. When I had come here before it had been as a veterinary surgeon—the man who knew, who was wanted, who came to render assistance in time of need. It had never occurred to me how much this affected my outlook every time I walked on to a farm. This wasn’t the same thing at all. I had come to take this man’s daughter out. He might not like it, might positively resent it

Standing outside the farmhouse door I took a deep breath. The night was very dark and still. No sound came from the great trees near by and only the distant roar of the Darrow disturbed the silence. The recent heavy rains had transformed the leisurely, wandering river into a rushing torrent which in places overflowed its banks and flooded the surrounding pastures.

I was shown into the large kitchen by Helen’s young brother. The boy had a hand over his mouth in an attempt to hide a wide grin. He seemed to find the situation funny. His little sister sitting at a table doing her homework was pretending to concentrate on her writing but she, too, wore a fixed smirk as she looked down at her book.