Every Living Thing Read Free

without moving, fixed me with his good eye and drew his lips back from a row of formidable teeth.
    I withdrew my hand. “Yes…yes…I’ll have to give you some antibiotic ointment and you must squeeze a little into his eye three times a day. You’ll be able to do that, won’t you?”
    “Course I will. He’s as gentle as an awd sheep.” Expressionlessly she lit another cigarette from the old one and drew the smoke down deeply. “Ah can do anything with ’im.”
    “Good, good.” As I rummaged in my bag for the ointment I had the old feeling of defeat, but there was nothing else for it. It was always long-range treatment with Puppy. I had never tried anything silly like taking his temperature, in fact I’d never laid a finger on him in my life.
    I heard from Mrs. Bartram again two weeks later. Puppy’s eye was no better, in fact it was worse.
    I hurried round to the flat, inhaling the delicious vapours from the shop as I went down the alley. Puppy was in the same position as before, upright, facing his mistress, and there was no doubt there was an increased discharge from the eye. But this time I fancied I could see something else and I leaned forward, peering closely into the dog’s face as a faint but menacing growl warned me not to take any more liberties. And it was there, all right, the cause of the trouble. A tiny papilloma growing from the margin of the eyelid and rubbing on the cornea.
    I turned to Mrs. Bartram. “He’s got a little growth in there. It’s irritating his eye and causing the discharge.”
    “Growth?” The lady’s face seldom registered any emotion, but one eyebrow twitched upwards and the cigarette trembled briefly in her mouth. “Ah don’t like the sound o’ that.”
    “Oh, it’s quite benign,” I said. “Nothing to worry about. I’ll be able to remove it easily and he’ll be perfectly all right afterwards.”
    I spoke lightly because indeed these things were quite common and a little injection of local anaesthetic and a quick snip with a pair of curved scissors did the trick effortlessly, but as I looked at the big dog regarding me coldly with his one eye I felt a twinge of anxiety. Things might not be so easy with Puppy.
    My misgivings proved to be well founded when Mrs. Bartram brought him round to the surgery next morning and left him in the small consulting room. He would obviously have to be sedated before we could do anything, and among the rush of new drugs were excellent tranquillisers such as acetylpromazine. There was, however, the small matter of one of us grasping that leonine head while the other lifted a fold of skin and inserted the needle. Puppy made it very clear that such things were not on the agenda. Being on strange ground and feeling threatened he came roaring, open-mouthed, at Siegfried and me as soon as we tried to enter the room. We retreated hastily and locked the door.
    “Dog catcher?” suggested Siegfried without conviction.
    I shook my head. The dog catcher was a snare of soft flex on the end of a long pole and was a handy instrument to slip over a difficult dog’s head and steady it while the injection was made, but with Puppy it would be like trying to lasso a grizzly bear. If we ever managed to get the loop over his head it would be the prelude to a fearsome wrestling match.
    However, we’d had tough dogs before and we had a little trick in reserve.
    “Looks like one for the Nembutal,” Siegfried murmured and I nodded agreement. For unapproachable cases we kept a supply of succulent minced beef in the fridge. It was a delicacy no dog could resist and it was a simple matter to break a few capsules of Nembutal among the meat and wait while the animal drifted into a state of blissful somnolence. It always worked.
    But it was time-consuming. Removing the tiny growth should have been a few minutes’ job and we’d have to wait for twenty minutes or so until the stuff took effect. I tried not to think of the urgent cases all over the