Animal Instincts

by Alan Titchmarsh

  “Why not?”

  “Jealousy, amongst other things. Your dad thought she was a bit flighty. Doubt if the Land Girls ever talked to her much, but they don’t approve of huntin’ and Jinty hunts, so . . .”

  “What made her come along there, then, now that Dad’s gone?”

  “Can’t imagine.” Titus flashed him a wicked grin.

  “Go on . . . you don’t think . . . ?”

  “Sizin’ you up, I suppose. You’re not a bad catch.”

  “Get away! She wouldn’t be interested in me. She’s far too good-looking.” He saw her in his mind’s eye, sitting on the grey, and felt the heat rising in his cheeks.

  “Well, you’re no oil paintin’ but you’re not exactly ugly as sin either.”

  “Well, she did say I could go and look at her horses.”

  “There you are, then. Too good to waste. Get off round there and ogle her ’orseflesh.”

  “You know,” said Kit, draining his mug and leaning on his elbow, “you’ve not changed a bit in ten years.”

  “Glad to ’ear it,” retorted Titus. “I should bloody well ’ope not.”

  The prospect of supper with Titus in the Cockle and Curlew rather than vegetarian fare and uneasy company in the kitchen of West Yarmouth Farmhouse left Kit feeling more buoyant than he had since his arrival.

  He was about to bath and change when Elizabeth called him to take another phone call. She anticipated his question. “It’s not from Australia.”

  “Oh.”

  “No. It’s Dr Hastings.” She gave him the handset, retreated to the kitchen and closed the door. Once more Kit seated himself at the bottom of the stairs in the draughty hall.

  “Hello?”

  “Mr Lavery?”

  “Yes.”

  “Hastings. Your father’s doctor. Look, I’m sorry to bother you, but I wonder if you could pop in and see me sometime in the next day or two? Nothing too serious. It’s just about your father’s body.”

  “Oh, yes. He wanted to leave it to science. I think he told you, didn’t he? That’s what he said in the letter he left for me.”

  “Yes. Exactly. It’s just that there are slight complications. I’d rather not discuss it on the phone, but if you could pop in we should be able to clear things up fairly easily. Tomorrow morning, perhaps? Or this evening, if you prefer. I’ll have finished surgery in about an hour. Come in then, if you like. We’re in Farthing Lane.”

  “Yes. I remember.”

  An hour later, he was sitting opposite the large, untidy Dr Hastings in the large, untidy consulting room of the West Yarmouth practice.

  Dr Hastings came straight to the point. “I’m afraid that we’re not going to be able to comply with your father’s wishes to leave his body to science.”

  “Oh?”

  “No. The Department of Anatomy, er . . . no, Human Morphology, they call it now, at the local medical school won’t take a body that has been the subject of a post-mortem. This means that your father will have to be either buried or cremated.”

  “I see.”

  The doctor hesitated, then looked down at the papers in front of him. “There’s also another, more important reason why the body can’t be used by the medical school.”

  Kit sat perfectly still, aware of a note of concern in Dr Hastings’s voice.

  “This isn’t something that anyone except your father and I were aware of but as his doctor I had to share the facts with the coroner and, consequently, the medical school.”

  Kit looked questioningly at him.

  “When did you last speak to your father?”

  “At Christmas, I think.”

  “A long conversation?”

  “No. Not really. He had to go – I forget why. I said I’d ring him again in the New Year and then . . .”

  “When had you last spoken to him before that?”

  Kit thought back, wondering why this was so important. “September or October.”

  “I see.”

  “Why does this matter?”

  The doctor folded the file in front of him and looked up again. “Mr Lavery, under normal circumstances I would be careful about sharing such information with my patient, but in your father’s case . . . well, he was a man who felt quite determined to face life and all its eventualities.” He paused, then went on, clearly with a degree of reluctance, “Your father was suffering from Alzheimer’s disease. The medical school can’t accept a body when any form of dementia has been present – fears of CJD, the human form of mad cow disease.” Dr Hastings saw the horror on Kit’s face. “That most certainly was not what your father was suffering from. It’s just that teaching hospitals prefer not to take any risks when dissecting cadavers so your father’s body . . .”

  Kit nodded. “The phone calls?”

  “I wanted to know if you had detected any absentmindedness in recent conversations with your father. The disease had only lately begun to manifest itself.”

  “I didn’t notice anything unusual.”

  “I’m sorry to have to tell you all this, but I felt you should know.”

  “Yes, of course.”

  “It can strike quite out of the blue,” said the doctor, endeavouring to offer some consolation, “and it’s no respecter of intellect. Your father was a fine man and a good friend. I’m so sorry.”

  “Thank you.” Kit tried to appear grateful for the doctor’s concern. “Did my father know that . . .”

  “He knew he had the disease. He did not know that under such circumstances his body would not be useful to science. To be honest, neither did I until I made enquiries after his death.”

  “I see.”

  “I’ll explain to the mortuary that you will be making arrangements. Is that all right?”

  “Of course.” Kit rose from the chair, juggling with his confused thoughts and the prospect of a funeral, which his father had tried so hard to circumvent. Rupert, who had thought of everything else, had failed to consider that the mind that had led him through life might let him down in death.

  If only he had been here, perhaps he would have been able to help. The idea of his father ending his days in lonely isolation distressed him more than he could bear. If only.

  He dined with Titus at the pub, and shrugged off his friend’s concern that something might be wrong. The two men said goodbye at the door of the pub, each departing for his own bed. Titus knew better than to probe too deeply, but he understood that something had happened between the mug of tea at Quither Cottage and the steak and kidney pudding in the Cockle and Curlew.

  Kit lay awake for hours, watching dove-grey clouds glide past the moon, sometimes hiding it altogether. The cold white glow came and went as he tried to come to terms with the fact that his father – the brightest, sharpest man he had ever known – had fallen victim to the cruellest of diseases.

  The hands of the clock at his bedside were illuminated in the darkness as the clouds cleared once more. Ten past one – lunchtime in Australia. He slid out of bed, slipped on his father’s dressing gown, walked to the telephone and dialled the number.

  Heather answered quite quickly. “Balnunga Valley Stud, hello?”

  “It’s me.”

  “Hello, me, how are you?”

  “I’m OK.”

  “No, you’re not. What’s the matter?”

  “Oh, just a bit down.”

  “What is it?”

  “Just been to see Dad’s doctor. Apparently he was suffering from Alzheimer’s. Had been for a few months.”

  “Oh. Gosh, I’m sorry.”

  “I hadn’t rung him for so long. I might have noticed if I had.”

  “You can’t blame yourself. There’s nothing you could have done.”

  “But there might have been.”

  “Don’t be silly. How could you tell?”

  She sounded impatient and he wanted reassurance, which she was giving in her brisk, no-nonsense fashion, but not in the way he needed it.

  “I just wanted to tell
you, that’s all.”

  “Well, you musn’t worry about it. Really, you mustn’t. Anyway it’s too late now.”

  “Yes.” He was perched on the edge of the desk, looking at the pattern on the rug beneath his feet. “Too late.”

  “Promise me you won’t worry.”

  “Yes. OK. Look, I’d better go. It’s the middle of the night. I need some sleep.” And then, as an afterthought, “What are you doing?”

  “Just going out to a barbie at the Johnsons’. Nothing special.”

  “OK. Well, you take care.”

  “And you. Speak soon. ’Bye.”

  “ ’Bye. Love you . . .” But she had already hung up, and all he could hear was a continuous ringing tone in his ear.

  Chapter 10: Deadmen’s Thimbles

  (Digitalis purpurea)

  There was no way Kit could keep it from Elizabeth and Jess. For a start there was a body to deal with. But he did not feel obliged to acquaint them with the main reason for the medical school’s refusal to participate; the post mortem rejection would be enough. He brought up the matter over morning coffee. It came as a shock to both women.

  “It’s not right,” protested Elizabeth. “Those were his wishes.”

  “Yes, but I can’t make them take him.”

  Jess said nothing. Kit had become used to her moody silences now. He tried to be practical. “We have two choices – burial or cremation.”

  “Your father didn’t want either,” snapped Elizabeth.

  Kit asked calmly, “You have an alternative?”

  Elizabeth looked away and shook her head, though Kit had half expected her to suggest burial at sea.

  Jess spoke for the first time. “I think we should bury him on the reserve. Quietly. He didn’t want a funeral, or a fuss. We could – you know – lay him to rest on the edge of the Spinney. If we’re allowed to.”

  Kit nodded. “Yes, I think I’d rather have him at home.” The moment he had spoken he realised the implications of what he had said, and could have bitten off his tongue. Selling the reserve was difficult enough; selling it with his father’s body interred within it was unthinkable. “But maybe it would be better . . .”

  Elizabeth spotted her chance. “No, I think you’re right. This is the best place for him, not some impersonal crematorium where he’d be just a name in a book.”

  “What about the churchyard?” asked Kit, in a last attempt to stave off what now looked inevitable.

  “Full. They haven’t buried anyone there for six years. It would have to be Lynchampton Cemetery.”

  Kit saw that any further discussion would be futile, and felt an uneasy mixture of emotions: relief that his father would be laid to rest on home ground, and despair at the added complications this would now present.

  He could have sworn he caught Elizabeth smiling, but chastised himself for being heartless. His father would be buried in the ground he had tended, and that would be an end to it. He hoped.

  They buried Rupert Lavery on a clear blue morning in the first week of March. The Spinney dripped with sulphur yellow catkins, and the first primroses, defying the chilly onshore breeze, pushed up through the tussocks of needle-like turf. The coffin was of oak, there were just three people at the graveside, and the two local gravediggers went about their task with quiet efficiency.

  Kit watched silently as the coffin was lowered into the grave. He had thought he was coming to terms with his father’s death, but the ceremony revived the feelings he had struggled with over the last week, and he gritted his teeth to keep control.

  Jess suffered from no such restraint. As Rupert’s body was lowered into the earth she sobbed into a handful of soggy tissue. Elizabeth stood in a long black coat with her eyes closed, her expression giving little away, but her knuckles white as she dug her nails into her palms.

  As the coffin came to rest in the bottom of the grave, Elizabeth opened her eyes and took from her coat pocket a small notebook. She opened it and began to read:

  “He leaves no mark, the man on earth,

  To cause rejoicing at his birth,

  Unless that mark be growing still

  When he is laid ’neath yonder hill.

  If at his death they cannot see

  The branches of a sky-bound tree,

  Whose roots he laid in leafy soil

  When but a sapling, then his toil

  Will count for nought in hill and dale

  And vivid memory fade to pale.

  But were that life to nature giv’n

  Then man on earth createth heav’n

  And heaven liveth evermore

  Upon the tide-washed leafy shore.”

  Kit looked up as the final words fell upon the chilly air, and saw Jess’s face screwed up in pain. He put his arm around her shoulder and she leaned into him and wept.

  Elizabeth, her own eyes brimming, slipped the book back into her pocket and impatiently blew her nose. As the gravediggers shovelled the stony cliff-top loam into the hole, the three mourners walked back to the farmhouse in silence, with the sound of stones falling on oak ringing in their ears. The sun slipped behind a grey cloud, and an hour later it was raining hard.

  Kit watched the rivulets of water shimmying down the pane of his father’s study window. Tomorrow he would plant a tree at the head of the grave, and see about a memorial stone. Just a small one. His father would not have wanted anything ostentatious, and neither did he, but he had to make sure that anyone who came after would know just where Rupert Lavery was buried.

  What do you do after a funeral? Sit quietly for the rest of the afternoon reflecting on a life well lived? Partake of a ‘lovely ham tea’ and gossip about the dear departed in northern tradition, or try to get on with your life? Kit opted for the latter. He took Titus’s advice, and went to call on Jinty O’Hare, hoping that neither Jess nor Elizabeth would get wind of it.

  When he arrived at the stables at Baddesley Court she was not to be found. The rain had stopped now, and weak sunshine caught the cobbles outside the stables, making them glisten as though they had been lacquered.

  “Can I help you?” The voice was female, but robust.

  “I’m looking for Jinty. Is she out?”

  “Due back any time. Out with Allardyce. Hang around if you want.” Sally’s face broke into a smile. Kit looked at her – a stout dumpling of a girl with leg-of-mutton thighs encased in grubby fawn jodhpurs, and topped by a black and white Fair Isle sweater. Her plump cheeks were the colour of Victoria plums, her hair short and dark brown. She carried a bucket and a shovel. “I’m just clearing up. Have a look round. She won’t be long.”

  “Thanks.” Kit felt uneasy, but walked along the row of neat boxes looking at the inmates. He recognised the grey leaning out of his stable, and the horse recognised him. Seltzer whickered as he came close, and threw up his head in greeting. “Hello, boy.” He patted the horse’s neck and rubbed his nose. A handsome gelding, perhaps six years old. Some Arab blood in him, about a quarter, he guessed. Spirited, but not too much of a lunatic.

  His thoughts were interrupted by the sound of hooves clip-clopping into the yard. He looked round to see Jinty on a statuesque chestnut gelding, her cheeks flushed, her hair neatly netted beneath the black velvet hard hat.

  She dismounted at the corner of the stable block, brought the reins over the horse’s head and led it towards him. She stretched out a gloved hand in greeting and smiled a smile that took his breath away.

  “Hi! Glad you could make it. Phew! Bit out of breath. He’s a handful, this one.”

  “I can see that. Irish?”

  “Me or the horse?”

  Kit laughed.

  “Yes to both. Boherhue Boy’s Irish, too,” she pointed to the stable at the far end where he could see the head of a bay, “but not Seltzer.”

  “Bit of Arab in him?”

  “Yes. Very good!” She looked impressed, and curious.

  “About a quarter?”

  “Exactly a quarter.”

>   “Age?” enquired Kit.

  “You tell me.”

  “Six?”

  “Seven. Not bad.”

  “I do my best.”

  Jinty looked to right and left. “Have you seen Sally?”

  “End stable.”

  Sally stuck her head out. “You looking for me?” She was trying to suppress a grin – not very successfully.

  “Can you unsaddle him and sort him out? I’ll show Kit round.”

  “Yes, ma’am!” Sally tugged at an imaginary forelock, and Jinty shot her a mock frown.

  “Just three?” asked Kit, pointing to the horses.

  “Hunters, yes, but there’s an old cob – Patsy – at the end there by the barn and Norman’s a Connemara pony. I rode him when I was little.”

  “The Irish are out in force here, then?”

  “Got to stick together, especially this side of the water.” She took off her hat, tugged at the hairnet, and her fair curls bobbed free. She shook her head to let the fresh air reach her scalp, and when she looked up at him Kit felt again the scrutiny of the pale sea-green eyes.

  “So, how are you doing? Getting used to the ladies?”

  “Slowly. So do you . . . er . . . spend all your time looking after this lot?”

  “They’re a demanding bunch.”

  He noticed the gentle lilt in her voice, the white teeth and the clear complexion, made rosy by her afternoon’s exertions. She was quite tall, her long legs encased in jodhpurs, but the white Aran sweater she was wearing, as she had been the first time he saw her, hid her upper contours. She was, quite simply, the most devastatingly good-looking woman he had ever met.

  “Tea?”

  “Mmm?” He was lost in his thoughts.

  “Cup of tea? I’m gasping. Come along to the tack room.”

  Its walls were hung with framed photographs of horses and hounds, its roof timbers decorated with rosettes. Gleaming bridles and harness hung from hooks, shining saddles sat on stands as regimented as in an army barracks, and all around was the general clutter of everyday stable life – boot jacks, New Zealand rugs and numnahs – and the air was rich with a mixed aroma of saddle soap, horse liniment and pony nuts.

  Jinty walked to the sink in the corner, filled the electric kettle and set about making tea. Kit asked how long she had lived at Baddesley Court, and she told him what had happened to her parents, about her adopted uncle and aunt, and the horses she looked after. They sat beside each other on the slatted bench that ran down one side of the tack room, and he listened as she told him the story of her life.