‘Emergency. Which service?’
‘Ambulance.’ My throat was so dry I could scarcely speak.
Mum grabbed her coat and ran out the door, pulling it on over her cook’s apron. Sam followed her, so there was no chance for me to ask him any more details, but as far as my emergency call was concerned it hardly mattered. I knew the stretch of lane along which the cows were driven for milking; the routine was always the same, and had been for as long as I could remember. As for Dad’s condition, that was something I was going to have to find out for myself.
When I’d finished speaking to the ambulance control room I grabbed my walking boots and struggled into them, my hands shaking so much it was all I could do to tie the laces. My Berghaus was hanging on a hook in the hall; I flung it on. As I swung into the farmyard as fast I was able, I saw Scrumpy standing shivering beside her kennel, tail down, head hung low. She took a couple of steps towards me, then retreated, the picture of a dog in disgrace. Scrumpy always went with Dad when he was out and about on the farm; when the herd stampeded she must have fled, and now was feeling as guilty as if the catastrophe was somehow her fault.
I was halfway across the farmyard when I remembered – Mum had been in the middle of cooking when Sam came bursting in. Had she left something on the ring of the Aga? The onions I’d smelled frying, perhaps? If so, the pan could catch fire and the whole kitchen go up in flames. I struggled back inside, sick with fear. With the present pervading aura of nightmare, no disaster seemed beyond the realms of possibility.
The cast-iron casserole was still on the ring, but safe enough – Mum had reached the stage of adding stock, which was now bubbling furiously. I lifted it off and set it down on the nearest worktop, not caring whether or not it would damage the wood work surface. The dish was so heavy I couldn’t manage to limp any further with it, and a scorched work top was the least of my worries just now.
One of my crutches had fallen on to the floor; I rescued it, and hopped outside.
It was still raining, a horrible thick drizzle. By the time I reached the track my hood had come down and my hair was clinging damply round my face. I ignored it. I didn’t have a free hand, and I didn’t want to stop to pull my hood up again. I could see the cows milling about outside the milking shed; they’d obviously made their way to their usual destination, and seemed quiet enough now, apart from some jostling and the occasional plaintive ‘moo!’ Up ahead, about a hundred yards away, I could see Mum on her knees on the lane, Sam beside her. And though they were blocking my view, an outstretched leg told me it was Dad they were kneeling beside.
The sick feeling pulsed now in my throat as I swung on along the track, stumbling sometimes as my crutch hit a muddy rut, but somehow managing to recover myself. Then I slowed, my breath coming in shaky gasps.
Dad was lying across the verge, his head cradled in Mum’s lap. There was blood everywhere, streaking his paper-white face, clotting in his hair and pooling in the mud. His arm was at an impossibly crazy angle, his eyes were closed. For a heart-stopping moment I thought he was dead.
‘Dad?’ I sobbed.
‘He’s breathing,’ Mum said. She sounded unbelievably calm now, as if from somewhere she had found reserves of strength.
I bent low, wishing that, like Mum, I could get down on my knees, but since I wasn’t able to bend my leg, I couldn’t do that. I could see now that the blood was coming from a huge gash on the side of Dad’s head, but it looked to me as if he’d taken a blow from a flying hoof rather than been trodden on. I wished desperately that I’d thought to bring towels or even a sheet or pillow case, anything with which to stem the bleeding, and a blanket to cover Dad with, but I hadn’t. Just getting to him had been all that had mattered.
‘I’ve called the ambulance,’ I said. ‘They’ll be here soon.’
I wasn’t too confident of that actually; way out in the country we were too far from the ambulance station to be favoured with the fastest of response times. But to my surprise and relief it could only have been a matter of minutes before I heard the sound of a siren, distant, admittedly, but getting louder. Once or twice it faded, as the ambulance negotiated the winding road, I supposed, but then grew louder again, and then it appeared at the end of the lane, blue lights flashing, the most welcome sight I’d ever seen in my life.
It came to a halt just a few feet from us, and two paramedics in green overalls jumped out and ran towards us.
‘OK, my love, just stand back and leave this to us,’ one of them, a slight, balding man, said, and his partner, a comfortably large woman, knelt beside Dad.