Part 17 (2/2)
”Aye, it were right excitin', and you know, I was sitting there on the front row when Denis Compton walked up to me. 'Well, Arnie, how nice to find you,' he said. 'I was hoping I'd see you. One of the lads said you would be here today and I've come to take you to lunch. I've been looking everywhere for you.' ?
”Oh, great,” I said. ”So you had lunch with the teams?”
”Oh, aye, it was smas.h.i.+n'. There was Bill Edrich and Cyril Washbrook, and all them great Australians. Keith Miller, Neil Harvey, Ray Lindwall and all the rest. They were right glad to see me again-I'd met them all before, of course.”
”Of course.”
Just then, Kenny Ditchburn, a beefy, red-faced young man, plumped himself down on the other side of my friend.
”Now then, Arnie,” he said, grinning, ”talkin' cricket, eh? Have you been lendin' Len Hutton your boots lately?”
Arnie turned an unsmiling face towards him and his eyes narrowed. ”Now then, Kenny,” he replied gruffly, then turned back to me.
His reminiscences had given him a reputation in the town and the younger element were at all times trying to take the mickey out of him, but he had become hypersensitive to the blunt approach and clammed up immediately he recognised it. Throughout my many meetings with him I had never ever initiated a conversation about his sporting experiences, never showed any particular interest in them, and it was then, when he was relaxed, with his guard down, that the fascinating tales came pouring out.
The poor man was a victim not only of teasing, but of a whole series of apocryphal anecdotes that were falsely attributed to him and bandied around among the locals. According to some, Arnie had described how, when serving in France in the First World War, he had gained such a reputation as a football goal-keeper that finally a lot of famous dead-shot players were lined up to take penalty kicks against him. For ages they booted that ball at him but they couldn't score. Arnie was impregnable. At last, in desperation, they loaded a football into a cannon and fired it at him. Apparently, Arnie's laconic ending to the tale was ”Well, I saved it all right, but I broke a couple of ribs.”
It was also put about that he had told a story that, while on winter manoeuvres in Russia, the soldiers had organised a kicking contest. Arnie had won, and in fact he had sent the ball so high that it had snow on it when it descended. These and many other far-out yarns were put in Arnie's mouth by the local lads, but I personally had never heard them from him and discounted them, as I did Arnie's reputed description of how, during a crisis in the Egyptian campaign, he had carried General Allenby across the Nile.
However, they all pa.s.sed into local folklore, and I think they will always be talked about. I remember one occasion at a charity concert in the Darrowby town hall when a comic violinist got up on the stage and declaimed, to loud laughter, ”I shall now play the second movement from a fantasy by Arnie Braithwaite.”
Never mind, I liked the old boy. I, too, was a sports buff and Arnie, when he wasn't reminiscing, talked with great knowledge of all aspects of the sporting scene. I always enjoyed his conversation. Also, he was an animal lover and devoted to his dog and that made another bond.
One sunny afternoon, a few weeks after the nail-clipping, I was walking my little beagle in the riverside fields when I saw Arnie with Bouncer. As usual, he was playing one of his games and the big dog was leaping around, chasing a ball under the great willows that overhung the water.
”He's lost a bit of weight, Arnie,” I said, looking at the hollows in Bouncer's flanks and his prominent ribs. ”Is he all right?”
”Oh, aye, full of beans and eatin' like a horse. He's fit, that's all. In full training for the football season. Come on, lad, do your Stanley Matthews.”
Bouncer capered around with the ball, pus.h.i.+ng it this way and that in a mazy dribble that did indeed make me think of the great man.
”Haven't seen Stan for a bit,” Arnie said ruminatively. ”He must be wondering where I'm hidin' myself.”
A month pa.s.sed before I heard from the old man again. His voice on the telephone was strained. ”Wish you'd come and see my dog, Jim, he's right poorly.”
”What's he doing, Arnie?”
”Nowt, really. Got no life in 'im.”
The inseparable pair were in the garden when I called. I was shocked at Bouncer's appearance. He was emaciated, sitting motionless on the lawn, and he made no attempt to give me his usual greeting.
”My G.o.d, Arnie,” I said, ”why have you let him get to this state? He looks awful!”
”Well, I could see he was gettin' thinner, but he was eating so well, eatin' like a horse. I thought maybe he was just runnin' around too much. He's got suddenly worse over the last few days. I'm not one to neglect me dog, am I?”
”No, no, of course you're not. And he's still eating well, you say?”
”Aye, never better, that's what puzzles me.”
”And is he drinking a lot?”
”He is-allus at it.”
I began to examine Bouncer, but even before I started there wasn't much doubt in my mind. Loss of weight, voracious appet.i.te, abnormal thirst, extreme lethargy. It could mean only one thing.
”Arnie,” I said, ”I think he has diabetes.”
”Oh, 'ell, is that bad?”
”Yes, I'm afraid it is when it has got as far as this. It can be fatal.”
The big man stared at me, totally shocked. ”Oh, don't tell me that! Is he goin' to die?”
”I hope not. There's a lot we can do.”
”Can you start right away, Jim?” He ruffled his hair distractedly. ”I mustn't lose 'im.”
”I will, Arnie, but first I've got to make sure. I must eliminate one or two other things like kidney trouble. First thing tomorrow morning I want you to get a urine sample from him. Stick a nice clean soup-plate under him when he c.o.c.ks his leg and put it in this bottle, and bring it straight round with Bouncer to the surgery.”
He nodded. ”Right...I will...but maybe he's not as bad as all that.” He lifted a football and rolled it up to the dog. ”Now, lad,” he cried eagerly, ”let's see you do your Tom Finney.”
Bouncer did not move. He touched the ball listlessly with his nose, then looked up at us with lack-l.u.s.tre eyes. His master went over to him and stroked his head. ”Oh, Bouncer, Bouncer,” he whispered.
Next morning I tested the sample. Positive for glucose.
”Now we know for sure, Arnie. It is diabetes, so this is what we do. I'm now giving him this injection of a small amount of insulin and you must come in every morning bringing Bouncer with a fresh sample which I will test. If still positive I will slightly increase the dose of insulin until he is stabilised, that is, when the urine is negative for glucose.”
”Aye, ah'll come in every day, for as long as it takes...that is, if he...if he stays alive.” The old man's face was a doleful mask.
I nodded. ”If he stays alive, Arnie.”
Sometimes in diabetes the first shot of insulin brings a spectacular improvement, but it wasn't so with Bouncer. He was too far gone for that. For several mornings Arnie brought him round and I looked in vain for even a hint of better things. The big dog was a woebegone, lifeless creature so different from the all-round athlete of former days. Arnie, grim and resolute, was there on the dot of nine o'clock, and after ten days I commiserated with him.
”Arnie, it's tough on you having to do this day after day.”
He stuck out his chin. ”I'll come round here on me hands and knees till kingdom come if it'll save me dog.”
It was just around then that I sensed a difference in Bouncer. He was still as skinny as ever, still as apathetic, but there was the suggestion of a gleam in his eyes-they were losing something of their dead look. From then on my hopes grew, as the big dog slowly began to show signs of his old vitality, and after three weeks of the treatment the daily sample was negative and I had a happy, tail-wagging animal looking at me as though he was quite ready for a game.
”Arnie,” I said, ”he's stabilised at last. He's going to be all right. But it's over to you, now. You'll have to give your dog a shot of insulin every morning for the rest of his life.”
”Eh? Me inject 'im?” He didn't look very happy about it.
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