Free A Song of Sixpence by A. J. Cronin Page B

reached our house.
    This cough of Father’s, appearing intermittently, particularly in damp weather, and dismissed in his off-hand style as ‘a touch of bronchitis’ or even, with a sort of possessive pride as though it were an attribute peculiar to him, as ‘my bronchial tendency’ and alleviated by herbal remedies of his own, had come to be accepted in the family, despite occasional protests by Mother, as a natural phenomenon. I thought nothing of it, and its relation to that absurdly small spot of crimson which Father had himself made light of seemed so improbable or at least so unimportant that immediately we got home I went off whistling to the farm with Darkie to fetch the milk, an evening task that had now devolved on me.
    In the byre the milking was still in progress and for perhaps twenty minutes, while the hot milk squirted and frothed into the pail, I waited, amused by the antics of the cat as it caught and lapped the driblets that splashed to the stone flags. Sauntering up the road with my jug of milk I was totally unprepared for the sight of Dr Duthie’s gig standing outside our house, a shock heightened by the fact that the gig lamps were already lit and, magnified by the misty dusk, seeming to typify the personality of the village doctor, were glaring at me like two enormous eyes.
    This Dr Duthie was a formidable figure, and not to me alone. A fierce old red-faced man, past seventy, dressed invariably in corduroy breeches, shiny brown leggings and a baggy velveteen jacket, he stamped in and out of sick-rooms like a Highland bull, discharging his diagnosis in a voice comparable to the Erskine foghorn, so forcibly indeed that when he had attended me I was often hit by a spray of saliva upon my cheek. By all the canons of romantic fiction this rough exterior should have harboured a heart of gold. It did not. The doctor was coarse and often brutal with his patients. Caring nothing for public opinion, he was generally admitted to be ‘a hard nut to crack’. He had a farm in the back country where he reared saddle-back pigs and was often heard to declare that he preferred them to his patients. If he had a weakness, beyond the bottle of whisky he drank daily and which served him as an elixir vitae —for he seemed to grow more potent with every dram—it was for a pretty woman. He squeezed the dairy maids at all the farms he visited while they giggled and pretended to protest, bumping them against the steading wall with his knee. While his manner towards her was less amorous, since he had the wit to know where to stop, I always felt that he had a soft spot for my mother.
    Of course, I dared not enter my home while this ogre was in possession. I had suffered enough at his hands. Creeping into the shadow of the wall I peered cautiously into the lighted parlour. Father lay on the sofa, stripped to the waist, while Dr Duthie, with his ear on a short wooden tube, bent over him. Never had I seen my audacious parent at such disadvantage, so subdued, dominated, almost possessed. The sight was unbearable and, turning away, I slid down and sat with my back to the wall, supporting the warm jug of milk between my knees.
    A longish interval elapsed before the front door opened and Dr Duthie and my mother appeared on the threshold, both figures clearly visible against the lighted lobby. I crouched lower as the doctor’s voice boomed out:
    â€˜Send to the surgery for the medicine. I’ll let ye have the cod liver oil and malt as weel. But mind, woman,’ he pressed Mother’s arm, giving point to his words by a series of reproving yet caressing shakes as though trying to turn her towards him, ‘the main thing is to get him out of here. Didn’t I tell you at Rosebank to keep away from the shore? It does nobody good to spend their lives on damp mud and silt. Forbye, river fogs are fair poison for a man with his chest.’
    I did not properly interpret this pronouncement, I