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Authors: Sarah Waters
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any harm, to be seen taking the initiative with a trial of this nature.’
That was perfectly true; though had I been really honest with her, I would have added that I also had hopes of impressing the local gentry—who, hearing perhaps of my success in treating Roderick Ayres’s ailments, might for the first time in twenty years consider sending for me to take a look at their own. We talked the matter over for a minute or two, with the car engine idling; and since she grew more excited about it the more she heard, she at last said, ‘Look, why not come up to the farm with me right now, and put this to Roddie yourself?’
I glanced at my watch. ‘Well, there’s the patient I promised to look in on.’
‘Oh, but can’t they wait a little? Patients must be good at waiting. That’s why they’re called patients, surely … Just five minutes, to explain it to him? Just to tell him what you’ve told me?’
She spoke, now, like a jolly sort of schoolgirl, and her manner was hard to resist. I said, ‘All right,’ and turned the car into the lane, and after a short jolting ride we found ourselves in the cobbled yard of the farm. Ahead of us was the Hundreds farmhouse, a gaunt Victorian building. To our left were the cow-pen and milking-shed. We’d clearly arrived near the end of milking-time, for only a small group of cows still waited, fretful and complaining, to be taken in from their pen. The rest—about fifty of them, I guessed—could just be seen in an enclosure on the other side of the yard.
We got out and, with Gyp, began to pick our way over the cobbles. It was hard work: all farm-yards are filthy, but this one was filthier than most, and the mud and slurry had been churned by hooves and then baked solid, in ruts and peaks, by the long dry summer. The shed, when we reached it, turned out to be an old wooden structure in a rather obvious state of dilapidation, reeking of manure and ammonia and giving off heat like a glass hot-house. There were no milking machines, only stools and pails, and in the first two stalls we found the farmer, Makins, and his grown-up son, each at work on a cow. Makins had come in from outside the county a few years before, but I knew him by sight, a harassed-looking lean-faced man in his early fifties, the very image of a struggling dairyman. Caroline called to him, and he gave us a nod, glancing at me in mild curiosity; we walked further and, to my surprise, found Roderick. I’d guessed he was in the farmhouse or busy in some other part of the farm, but here he was, milking along with the others, his face scarlet with heat and exertion, his long lean legs folded up, and his forehead pressed into the cow’s dusty brown flank.
He looked up and blinked when he saw me—not entirely pleased, I thought, to be caught at work like this, but doing a good job of hiding his feelings, for he called lightly, though without smiling: ‘I hope you’ll excuse me if I don’t get up to shake your hand!’ He looked at his sister. ‘Everything all right?’
‘Everything’s fine,’ she answered. ‘Dr Faraday wants to talk to you about something, that’s all.’
‘Well, I shan’t be long.—Settle down, you great daft thing.’
His cow had started moving fretfully about at the sound of our voices. Caroline drew me back.
‘They get skittish around strangers. They know me, though. Do you mind if I help?’
‘Of course not,’ I said.
She let herself into the cow-pen, slipping on a pair of wellingtons and a filthy canvas apron, moving easily among the waiting animals, then driving one back into the shed and putting it to stand in the stall beside her brother’s. Her arms were bare already, so she had no sleeves to roll up, but she washed her hands at a stand-pipe and gave them a swill with disinfectant; she brought over a stool and a zinc pail, put them down beside the cow—giving the cow a shove with her elbow as she did it, to bring it round to the right position—and set to work.
That was perfectly true; though had I been really honest with her, I would have added that I also had hopes of impressing the local gentry—who, hearing perhaps of my success in treating Roderick Ayres’s ailments, might for the first time in twenty years consider sending for me to take a look at their own. We talked the matter over for a minute or two, with the car engine idling; and since she grew more excited about it the more she heard, she at last said, ‘Look, why not come up to the farm with me right now, and put this to Roddie yourself?’
I glanced at my watch. ‘Well, there’s the patient I promised to look in on.’
‘Oh, but can’t they wait a little? Patients must be good at waiting. That’s why they’re called patients, surely … Just five minutes, to explain it to him? Just to tell him what you’ve told me?’
She spoke, now, like a jolly sort of schoolgirl, and her manner was hard to resist. I said, ‘All right,’ and turned the car into the lane, and after a short jolting ride we found ourselves in the cobbled yard of the farm. Ahead of us was the Hundreds farmhouse, a gaunt Victorian building. To our left were the cow-pen and milking-shed. We’d clearly arrived near the end of milking-time, for only a small group of cows still waited, fretful and complaining, to be taken in from their pen. The rest—about fifty of them, I guessed—could just be seen in an enclosure on the other side of the yard.
We got out and, with Gyp, began to pick our way over the cobbles. It was hard work: all farm-yards are filthy, but this one was filthier than most, and the mud and slurry had been churned by hooves and then baked solid, in ruts and peaks, by the long dry summer. The shed, when we reached it, turned out to be an old wooden structure in a rather obvious state of dilapidation, reeking of manure and ammonia and giving off heat like a glass hot-house. There were no milking machines, only stools and pails, and in the first two stalls we found the farmer, Makins, and his grown-up son, each at work on a cow. Makins had come in from outside the county a few years before, but I knew him by sight, a harassed-looking lean-faced man in his early fifties, the very image of a struggling dairyman. Caroline called to him, and he gave us a nod, glancing at me in mild curiosity; we walked further and, to my surprise, found Roderick. I’d guessed he was in the farmhouse or busy in some other part of the farm, but here he was, milking along with the others, his face scarlet with heat and exertion, his long lean legs folded up, and his forehead pressed into the cow’s dusty brown flank.
He looked up and blinked when he saw me—not entirely pleased, I thought, to be caught at work like this, but doing a good job of hiding his feelings, for he called lightly, though without smiling: ‘I hope you’ll excuse me if I don’t get up to shake your hand!’ He looked at his sister. ‘Everything all right?’
‘Everything’s fine,’ she answered. ‘Dr Faraday wants to talk to you about something, that’s all.’
‘Well, I shan’t be long.—Settle down, you great daft thing.’
His cow had started moving fretfully about at the sound of our voices. Caroline drew me back.
‘They get skittish around strangers. They know me, though. Do you mind if I help?’
‘Of course not,’ I said.
She let herself into the cow-pen, slipping on a pair of wellingtons and a filthy canvas apron, moving easily among the waiting animals, then driving one back into the shed and putting it to stand in the stall beside her brother’s. Her arms were bare already, so she had no sleeves to roll up, but she washed her hands at a stand-pipe and gave them a swill with disinfectant; she brought over a stool and a zinc pail, put them down beside the cow—giving the cow a shove with her elbow as she did it, to bring it round to the right position—and set to work.
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