Polly. She lay like a foundered whale in a shallow sea of linseed, gorged with the oily stuff, her belly blown out to twice its normal size so that the giraffe neck seemed unnaturally thin. Her ears drooped, making the bony boss of her poll stand up like a little bowler hat. Pathos and comedy were joined, as though Stan Laurel's head was stuck on Oliver Hardy's body.
God knows how much of the linseed she had eaten. All one could say with certainty was that it couldn't have happened to a greedier cow. I ran to phone the vet.
For three days and nights she lay there, covered in sacking to keep her warm, turned from one side to the other with ropes and enormous effort, emitting rivers of dung rich enough to grow Jack's beanstalk. A lesser beast would have died, but not Polly. The vet and Gladwyn and I may have contributed something to her recovery,but what got her to her feet again was undoubtedly the thought of the next square meal.
Finally, for sheer meanness, you could rely on Midnight.
Of all the many purchases I made, Midnight's was the most impulsive. A local farmer was selling up, it was a lovely day, there was nothing that absolutely had to be done for an hour or so.
“Come on,” I said to Gladwyn. “We'll just pop over and have a look.”
I hadn't thought seriously of buying anything, hadn't been round the cattle before, hadn't even set eyes on the magnificent wild animal that suddenly ran into the ring. In a flash the scene changed for me, from Gloucestershire to Granada. There was sand in the ring, not straw, and round it not bales but the
barrera.
Behind that sat the aficionados, farmers and dealers no longer, who stared down with eyes narrowed against the blazing Spanish sun.
The cow (it was almost a shock to see the evidence of its sex) stood there, the blackest cow you ever did see, coal black, raven black, black as midnight, and I suddenly said to Gladwyn, “What d'you think of that one?”
“Not a lot.”
“Nice tackle,” I said. “There's some milk there.” And indeed she had a well-hung udder, deep, square, flat-soled, the good-sized teats well placed.
“Got a funny look in her eye, boyo,” said Gladwyn.
The cow shook her small sharp horns at the drover, who was moving her round the ring.
“And I wouldn't like one of those antlers up my arse.”
“I shan't go above fifty,” I said. They were making a good bit more than that. She'd be a snip at fifty, I thought.
Funnily enough, nobody seemed much to want her.
“I bought a cow up at Goose Green,” I said to Myrle when we got home.
“What sort of a cow?”
“Well, no particular sort. She's black. Second calver. Rather a beautiful beast.”
“How much?”
“Forty pounds.”
“Three-quartered is she, or three-legged, or what?” “No. Just a bargain.”
But I got more than I'd bargained for.
The hauler brought Midnight in time for the afternoon milking, and what a milking that was. At the first touch of the first cup on the first teat, she put on a performance that relegated Kicker to the fourth division. It wasn't just the kicking, explosively violent, a burst of heavy machine-gun fire instead of Kicker's little pistol shots, a fusillade that stripped the machinery into its component parts and left Gladwyn and me battered andbruised and breathless. It was the sheer ferocity that accompanied the act as she leaped and pranced and bucketed, blaring and bawling at us with wide-open mouth, not in pain or fear but in red-hot anger. Her fierce eyes blazed, and only the neck chain restrained her from her obvious wish to disembowel the pair of us with those twin daggers.
So it was at every milking. Even with her hind legs tied and a vicelike instrument called “the bulldogs” in her nostrils, she still could contrive enough galvanic heaves to shake off the units, still bellow her hatred and fury.
Any theory I might have had that Midnight's black satanic anger was directed solely against the milking machine was dispelled a week
God knows how much of the linseed she had eaten. All one could say with certainty was that it couldn't have happened to a greedier cow. I ran to phone the vet.
For three days and nights she lay there, covered in sacking to keep her warm, turned from one side to the other with ropes and enormous effort, emitting rivers of dung rich enough to grow Jack's beanstalk. A lesser beast would have died, but not Polly. The vet and Gladwyn and I may have contributed something to her recovery,but what got her to her feet again was undoubtedly the thought of the next square meal.
Finally, for sheer meanness, you could rely on Midnight.
Of all the many purchases I made, Midnight's was the most impulsive. A local farmer was selling up, it was a lovely day, there was nothing that absolutely had to be done for an hour or so.
“Come on,” I said to Gladwyn. “We'll just pop over and have a look.”
I hadn't thought seriously of buying anything, hadn't been round the cattle before, hadn't even set eyes on the magnificent wild animal that suddenly ran into the ring. In a flash the scene changed for me, from Gloucestershire to Granada. There was sand in the ring, not straw, and round it not bales but the
barrera.
Behind that sat the aficionados, farmers and dealers no longer, who stared down with eyes narrowed against the blazing Spanish sun.
The cow (it was almost a shock to see the evidence of its sex) stood there, the blackest cow you ever did see, coal black, raven black, black as midnight, and I suddenly said to Gladwyn, “What d'you think of that one?”
“Not a lot.”
“Nice tackle,” I said. “There's some milk there.” And indeed she had a well-hung udder, deep, square, flat-soled, the good-sized teats well placed.
“Got a funny look in her eye, boyo,” said Gladwyn.
The cow shook her small sharp horns at the drover, who was moving her round the ring.
“And I wouldn't like one of those antlers up my arse.”
“I shan't go above fifty,” I said. They were making a good bit more than that. She'd be a snip at fifty, I thought.
Funnily enough, nobody seemed much to want her.
“I bought a cow up at Goose Green,” I said to Myrle when we got home.
“What sort of a cow?”
“Well, no particular sort. She's black. Second calver. Rather a beautiful beast.”
“How much?”
“Forty pounds.”
“Three-quartered is she, or three-legged, or what?” “No. Just a bargain.”
But I got more than I'd bargained for.
The hauler brought Midnight in time for the afternoon milking, and what a milking that was. At the first touch of the first cup on the first teat, she put on a performance that relegated Kicker to the fourth division. It wasn't just the kicking, explosively violent, a burst of heavy machine-gun fire instead of Kicker's little pistol shots, a fusillade that stripped the machinery into its component parts and left Gladwyn and me battered andbruised and breathless. It was the sheer ferocity that accompanied the act as she leaped and pranced and bucketed, blaring and bawling at us with wide-open mouth, not in pain or fear but in red-hot anger. Her fierce eyes blazed, and only the neck chain restrained her from her obvious wish to disembowel the pair of us with those twin daggers.
So it was at every milking. Even with her hind legs tied and a vicelike instrument called “the bulldogs” in her nostrils, she still could contrive enough galvanic heaves to shake off the units, still bellow her hatred and fury.
Any theory I might have had that Midnight's black satanic anger was directed solely against the milking machine was dispelled a week
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