Chapter 2 Dangerously Healthy by Malcolm Birkenshaw

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Chapter 2.

`Give us thee glass,' Lofty groaned, landlording his
long-suffering arm towards me from his side of the bar. He also had
four arthritic fingers and a knuckled thumb clasping a burnished
brass pumps handle, an arms breadth away, impatient to serve bitter.

`Why not?' I chuckled, looking down at my legs. `After this
smell of beer on my breath Lena will never guess at the truth.'

Nicotine swirled, pipes puffed, cigarettes smouldered, and a
huddle of locals, demanding more ale, tap-tap-tapped against their
table with upturned dominoes. `Hurry thee sen up, Martin.'

There was neither chrome nor mirror to reflect upon their
demands, for the brewery was yet to inflict modernity identity upon
us. Time and Oliver Cromwell had passed us by, the Jolly Poacher
being a sepia memory of its permanent past with brown wooden doors
to match its yellowed anaglypta-papered walls, a home from home for
rural regulars.

All night long Lofty would serve them beer, swivelling on his
stool, dispensing beer to lounge and tap room without having to get
to his feet, provided nobody brought a wife. Never did like women's
drinks, what with them compelling him to uncoil his seven foot
length, with one hand on knee, back still bent, to furtle amongst
the shelves for a pineapple split or orange crush. Nor did he
welcome bourgeoisie orders that had him buckling his head against
the ceiling, just to serve from his optics, not unless they were
for trebles to make the effort worth while.

`Are you sure, tha won't want a lift?' Stan cut across Lofty's arm.

`Certain,' I nodded, looking down at his glass. `Another pint
for Stan, please, Lofty,' and lined up another as a thanks for his
offer. `I better be off.'

`Leaving already?'

`Up early in the morning, remember,' I grimaced.

Good thing it is dark, I thought, as soon as I left through the
door, a dense wall of black even blacker beyond in the lane,
otherwise folk would think the wrong reasons for my wobble. But,
funny, there now seems to be less lead in my legs? has mixing with
people lifted my spirits?

`I'm home,' I called, letting Lena know that it was me who was
in the kitchen. On the other hand, what if the alcohol is confusing
those things which are doing me harm with others which are doing
me good?

She smiled when I peeped round the door. A transparent smile
which masked what she thought? Perhaps she had expected me to
overreact to the specialist's news, throw myself into the Brick
Pond,.. or was she planning to open a secret savings account in
case I got worse?

Of course not, that was only the joke she had cracked with her
friends, like other people saving up their running away money.
Obviously she was relieved to see me, I could tell, though truly
frightened of me doing something stupid. My fault for being so
idiosyncratic, I supposed, but at least I was home and she chirped
away to make a nice cup of tea.

The condemned man's last supper, I mused, as clinks from the
kitchen heralded that she was also making something to eat. It was
going to be special, I could smell, closing my eyes and sinking even
deeper in thought.

Before she returned I was searching for a cure, having gone
back in time to when I was four. The memory of a tattoo and the
wooden castle front, with soldiers, and a long contraption of a gun,
the biggest on wheels they said, and the first salvo fired, which
overwhelmed me beneath a barrage of terror. I could still recall
the hysteria, being unable to walk, with father and mother pushing
me home, past the lake, past the people, past the gates, sick all
the way. `He's just suffering from shock,' the doctor told them.

Could this have been M.S.? No, I was too young. Besides, shock
has nothing to do with M.S., has it? - The books never said not, but
the books said very little.

`Where should I rest it?' Lena said. She was holding a tray
with mugs and plates steaming, wanted to know where to put them.

`Oh?' I opened my eyes, tried to get up. `Err, anywhere,
thanks,' my muscles finding it almost impossible to shift.

`How far did you walk?'

`Not far, just a bit further than the pub,' I yawned. `Don't
know why I'm so tired. Perhaps we better go to bed, straight after
supper, what with tomorrow?.....'

Her suspicions diverted she agreed, planing to make an early
start in the morning, intending to teach until lunch time and then
slip away from school for an hour. `I've made arrangements with Stan
to take you to hospital.'

`Have you, what time?' I knitted a fib whilst on the edge of
the bed, searching for a sleeve in my pyjamas.

`Ten o'clock. Wilf will look after their farm whilst Stan runs
you there.'

`Oh! What time did you say?' I cast off yet another lie,
having feigned a mental note. `Good night,' and turned out the
light, content about my arrangements with Stan. It's an ill pint
that brings nobody no good.

Next morning the sky again hung grey over Adderton. But the
birds didn't care. Funny things, birds, their chorus started on
time. `Wait until the migrants arrive,' I chuckled, stretching my
legs, thrilled that even my calves had almost recovered, except for
still being numb. Sod it, no miracle cure this time. `I'll do my
own packing,' I called from the bedroom. Lena was getting the
children ready for school.

Whilst sorting the clothes I began thinking again, remembering
school days when my progress lurched. Eventually it lurched so far
the headmaster sent for my parents. `Take your son away,' he waved
my report, red ink graffiti all over it. I was only eleven, but to
avoid the disgrace mother accepted a reprieve and sent me to the
boarding school. Here, away from home and its stresses, I learned
what life was like with lads from normal homes and immediately
revelled in outdoor activities. It was here that I discovered that
climbing hills and fells could throw off influenza. Yet last
night's climb had failed, but this time it's definitely M.S. and not
influenza.

But had it been influenza in those days? For example, when I
returned to the day school, with the same old home stresses, my
fitness deteriorated and my troubles became frequent. But mother's
doctor had diagnosed them as being fluid on the knee, that same
doctor who one day was to practice penicillin dart-board therapy upon
my fundamentum. Yet my legs felt just like they do now, although
today the specialist calls it M.S.! Let's hope he's wrong and it's
only fluid on the thighs, shins and ankles, as well as my knees.

`Have you finished packing?' Lena interrupted, having returned
for a last sortie round the bedroom before leaving for school. She
was dressed for hospital visiting, but for the moment with exercise
books piled under each arm.

`Mmm? Ah, yes, almost,' I mumbled, speeding things up.
`There, done now,' I clicked the case shut. `I'm coming. Just want
to drop in at work before Vanessa arrives.' Vanessa was my
secretary, she would be organising the business whilst I was away.

By ten o'clock Vanessa knew exactly what was to be done. But
that was typical of Vanessa, being capable, whatever the problem, so
it was not the business which seeped through my mind as I set off
for hospital. Best get it over and done with, I thought, especially
since the clouds were leaching a watery sun. Beware the Ides of
April - What kind of omen is that?

I drove slowly, eking out the countryside, making the most of
my last journey as a normal being before being diagnosed as
officially ill. Of course, I was not actually ill, it was just
that, not knowing what to expect, I intended to play their game,
bide my...... The drive was soon over, ahead the hospital car park.
Lined bays for consultants close to the door and a mayhem for
visitors at decorous arm's length. Where to put my car? What to do
with a four litre Rolls Princess?

I spotted an empty space. "Consultants Only". Ideal, no-one
unauthorised would dare to park there, and handy if I changed my
mind and needed an emergency escape. I weighed up the chances,
charged with adrenaline by the risk, especially since my ageing
limousine was second hand. Thank goodness it had been through the
car wash. Better not hang about, though, Lena might arrive, unaware
of me driving here on my own. What will she do when she finds out?

I locked its door, disguised my limp, and assumed the authority
of a visiting specialist. Good job I had crammed the clothes and
effects for my stay into a brief case. The car park attendant doffed
his cap, straightened his shoulders. All well so far, but inside the
main entrance a reception desk demanded attention. It was "manned"
by a woman in white, with hat and uniform larger than the most
senior qualified nurse in the world. `Yes?' she tapped her ball-point
to demand my attention.

`Doctor Petch told me to report to ward twenty one.'

`Did he?' she flicked through her papers. `He hasn't told me.'

`I'll go home then,' I seized the excuse to run away.

`Just a minute,' she lifted her voice, convinced she had
intercepted a usurper. `Wait there,' she jabbed a finger towards a
row of red chairs, her pen dialling for Doctor Petch. `I've got a man
here, called ...... What's your name?' her oyster framed spectacles
glared over the desk.

`Mytholmroyd'

`My,..Myt,..Ma.... You what?' she said, her high-heeled accent
having gone at the welts.

`My tholm royd,' I repeated, one syllable at a time.
`Pronounced My-them-royd.'

My hope of escape disappeared, I could tell by the way she was
nodding that the voice on the telephone was expecting me. `Go
straight along there. Turn right at the end. You can't miss it,'
she exuded resentment, someone else having tampered with her empire
of paperwork.

The corridor was bright and light, a modern wing grafted onto
the old. But its fresh paint could flake off so far as I was
concerned, hypodermics are hypodermics whatever the decor. `Ward
twenty one?' I double checked.

A sister nodded. The junior nurse understood her signal, took
charge of my suitcase, led me to an empty bed, the only one
unoccupied, and drew the curtains before I could glimpse around the
ward. `I'll be back for your case and clothes, in a while,' she
chirped, leaving me to undress whilst she busied herself elsewhere
upon more pressing needs.

Unsupervised, I seized this opportunity for an act of rebellion
and buried my suit within the bed's bedside cabinet. Perhaps it was
really a refusal to accept the gravity of having multiple sclerosis,
though I preferred to think of it as a challenge, cramming clothes
into an impossible space like packing a kit bag when in the army.

Soon I was bored, in freshly ironed pyjamas, lying on the bed
listening to noises, trying to guess what was happening beyond the
curtains inside the ward. Then my nurse peeped back, checking all
was well. `We do not lay on our beds, Mister Mytholmroyd, it makes
the ward untidy,' she chivvied me under the sheets, propping my back
upright against three regulation pillows, before she drew back the
curtains.

Funny that I should have thought about the army. I was fit in those
days. Trained for war in Korea they had sent me to Egypt to
spend eighteen months using killer skills to guard against sand and
flies. Not all the time, of course, for there were days for playing
games, as well as swimming in the Bitter Lakes beneath an
unsympathetic sun, apart from those patrols and military duties.
But, during my second summer, being a sergeant, I knew the short
cuts so there was less to do and a lethargy began to drag me down.
The less I did the more fuzzy my brain. Strange, I only overcame
this by forcing myself to move, play cricket, get my circulation
moving again, work off the heat, go swimming, regain my zest for
activity. `Right then, I want ten more volunteers for the rifle
range.' Must remember this when I get out of hospital - not the
rifles, of course, but the zest and circulation.

A rattling of crockery in the corridor broke into my thoughts
and I detected a stagnant whiff of hospital food. Impossible to
guess what was coming, the whiff was always the same - poached
dishcloth. `No,' a woman in a faded green uniform waddled her
trolley up to my bed, `Yer can't `ave yours in't day room.' One had
to be absorbed into the system, it seemed, to be receiving
treatment, and to have one's recovery assessed on the chart clipped
to the foot of the bed, visible to all and yet forbidden to the
patient, before perhaps qualifying for that privilege.

`Be like that,' I almost swore, a curse intended for the
specialist - though the longer he stayed away the better. Mind you,
at least he had told me it was M.S., so I now knew what I was fighting.

Read the following chapters that tell of how Martin "cured" his M.S. and climbed mountains by the following year.

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