Markham and the Fox
A short story by Jodi Taylor
AI-generated audio has been added for accessibility
To set the scene – and before everyone scoffs at the unlikeliness of the following tale – this is based on an actual event. There really was a fox. And an avenging cat. And a traumatised thigh. And no, it wasn’t my thigh. Just to be absolutely clear.
Anyway – this story is set at St Mary’s. Markham is in Sick Bay, receiving treatment from Nurse Hunter when Peterson turns up to see what all the noise is about.
‘Aaaaggghhhhh,’ moaned Markham.
‘What’s all the noise about?’ said Peterson, unexpectedly entering Treatment Room Three – or the Markham Suite as it was frequently known. ‘Good God – what the hell is that?’
‘That’s his leg,’ said Nurse Hunter helpfully. ‘More specifically – his left leg. Which I know because I’m a highly-trained medical professional and you’re not.’
Peterson drew himself up. ‘I am a fully qualified field medic, you know.’
‘And yet you failed to identify one of the major components of the human body. To whit – his left leg.’
‘Well, obviously, now you’ve pointed it out … What’s the matter with it anyway?’
‘Cat bite.’
Peterson peered. ‘That’s an astonishing amount of blood.’
‘Big cat bite.’
Peterson considered this carefully. ‘To be clear – was it the cat that was big? A lion? Or a panther? Or was it just the bite that was big?’
‘Don’t tell him anything,’ said Markham, attempting to roll over and inspect his own left leg
Nurse Hunter blinked. ‘Why ever not?’
‘Medical confidentiality and all that.’
‘I am the Deputy Director,’ said Peterson with great dignity. ‘There are no secrets to which I am not privy.’
‘Oh really,’ said Markham. ‘So you know all about Max and the bouncing bicycle?’
‘Eh? What?’
‘Or Lingoss and the mysterious stain in the third cubicle on the right in the ladies’ loo on the second floor. To say nothing of the embarrassing aftermath?’
‘No …?’
‘Or that Mrs. Mack’s commemorative Yorkshire Pudding has taken the oven door off and is even now advancing down St Mary’s back passage sweeping all before it?’
‘What …?’
‘Hold still,’ said Hunter. ‘This will barely be agonising.’
‘Aaaaaggghhhhh.’ moaned Markham. Again. ‘That stings.’
‘It’s supposed to,’ she said unsympathetically. ‘The greater the sting the less chance of you losing your leg. Medicine 101.’
Markham twisted his head to look up at her. ‘People say you did your training under the Spanish Inquisition.’
‘People are not wrong.’
‘What are all those funny little holes?’ demanded Peterson, peering closely. ‘There are hundreds of them.’
‘Claw marks.’
Peterson squinted. ‘Really – they’re so small,’
‘So was the kitten.’
Peterson stepped back in astonishment. ‘Your daughter’s little kitten did all this?’
‘She did,’ said Hunter, ripping open yet another pack of sterile dressings.
‘What? That teeny-tiny ball of fluff?’
‘Yep.’
‘Princess Kitty Glitter?’
‘That’s the one.’
‘I don’t believe it.’
‘Believe it,’ said Markham, through gritted teeth. ‘At one point I thought she was going to take my whole leg off.’
‘For heaven’s sake, you weren’t trying to worm her again, were you?’
‘God, no,’ said Markham, with feeling. ‘Never doing that again.’
Peterson indicated the results of Markham’s encounter with his daughter’s kitten. ‘But why?’
Markham scowled. ‘Because she’s a fiend incarnate wrapped in a fluffy bundle of tabby fur and she’s been trying to kill me ever since Flora – disobeying my strict instructions – brought her home to live with us and she does whoopsies in my boots. Every day.’
Peterson blinked. ‘Flora does whoopsies in your boots?’
Nurse Hunter, busy anointing her patient with copious amounts of what she had assured her patient was the latest thing in anti-kitten venom ointment, rolled her eyes at the male inability either to convey or assimilate simple information.
‘No, of course not,’ said Markham. ‘I’m talking about that bundle of yellow-eyed fluffy malevolence that tries to kill me three times a day.’
‘But she’s gorgeous and that thing she does with a ball of wool is so cute.’
‘And when she’s playing with the laser pointer,’ said Hunter.
There was a short silence.
‘That’s my laser pointer,’ said Peterson. ‘I wondered where that had gone.’
Markham shifted restlessly. ‘Are we going to be much longer?’
‘Yes,’ said Hunter, ‘and if you don’t like it then stop biting off more than you can chew.’
‘Just like Princess Kitty Glitter,’ said Peterson, falling about at his own wit.
Markham regarded him. ‘Why are you here?
‘Entertainment. Why are you?’
Markham folded his arms as best he could. given the position he was in, and scowled. The silence lengthened.
‘There was a fox,’ said Hunter, eventually
‘Don’t tell him,’ shouted Markham
‘But regulations require me to send a copy of my report to the Deputy Director so he’s going to find out, anyway. Plus, you’ll be going in the Accident Book. Again. Volume VII.’
Markham was indignant. ‘Volume VII? What do you mean Volume VII?’
Hunter paused in her task of applying various sterile dressings to various portions of Markham’s left thigh.
‘Volume I. A – Ba.
‘Volume II. Ba – Ba. That’s mostly Mr Bashford.’
Heads nodded sagely. That seemed likely.
‘Volume III. Be – J.
‘Volume IV. J – L.
‘Volume V. Ma – Ma.
‘Volume VI. Ma – Ma.
‘Volume VII. Ma – Ma.’
‘Ah – yes, of course,’ said Peterson. ‘Markham and Maxwell. Got it.’
‘You can’t put all that on me,’ said Markham, indignantly. ‘Most of those entries belong to Max.’
‘Never mind that,’ said Peterson, arranging himself comfortably on a vacant trolley. ‘Tell me about the fox.’
‘He was hoping you’d forgotten about the fox,’ said Hunter, grinning.
‘Well, I haven’t. Tell me about the fox.’
‘There was a fox,’ said Markham and would say no more.
‘And it wasn’t the fox that bit him?’
‘No,’ said Hunter, reaching for her second roll of adhesive tape.
‘So what happened?’
‘Medical confidentiality,’ said Markham again.
‘We’ve done all that,’ said Peterson, waving medical confidentiality aside as irrelevant. ‘Nurse Hunter – your report, please.’
‘Well,’ said Hunter, moving to yet another area of highly-traumatised thigh. ‘Our rooms are on the top landing. We left the window open and a fox must have come across the roof and got in somehow. It was only a youngster and definitely not looking for trouble, though. Unfortunately …’
‘Aaaaaggghhhh,’ moaned Markham. Again.
‘Sorry – did that hurt? Unfortunately, the first thing the fox encountered was little Princess Kitty Glitter, at that moment making her way towards the whoopsie box.’
‘Not in his boots this time?’ enquired Peterson, grinning.
‘He was wearing them. Anyway, furious at this unauthorised incursion by an unknown hostile, she instantly expanded to five times her normal size, unsheathed tooth and claw and attacked.’
Peterson peered at Markham’s wounds again. ‘Attacked whom?’
‘The fox, of course – the master of the household was in the bathroom and had yet to appear. There was an enormous amount of sound and fury. Fur flew in all directions. The fox just wanted to get away I think, but couldn’t get past the Gandalf of the kitten world. Anyway attracted by all the noise, the head of the household pulled the chain, raced to the rescue, tripped on a rug and crashed heavily to the ground. The fox, correctly divining that he had somehow strayed into a madhouse and not liking these new odds, broke free and legged it back out of the window.’
Peterson gestured at Markham’s wounds. ‘So how …?’
‘There’s no need to tell him about …’ began Markham.
Hunter was applying yet more adhesive tape. ‘Unfortunately, Princess Kitty Glitter, baulked of her prey but still surfing a wave of blind, berserker feline rage, fastened on the next available target.’
Silently, Peterson gestured at Markham and raised his eyebrows.
Silently, Hunter nodded and rolled her eyes.
‘She clamped herself to my left leg,’ said Markham, piteously. ‘Gnawing her way through to my tibula.’
‘You mean femur,’ said Hunter. ‘She was clinging on with every razor-sharp claw she possessed.’
‘All ten thousand of them,’ moaned Markham, still suffering under the tender ministrations of the medical profession..
‘But she’s tiny,’ objected Peterson.
‘Teeth like needles,’ said Markham, beginning to warm to his theme. ‘Trust me. It was agony. And the more I tried to pull her off the more she dug in. She’d be there still if Hunter hadn’t got her off with a sardine.’
‘Goodness,’ said Peterson, his voice only slightly unsteady. ‘How fortunate you had one handy.’
‘We keep a tin in our medicine chest,’ said Hunter.
‘Good to know,’ said Peterson. He became aware of Markham’s glare. ‘Should the need arise again in the future, I mean. And the fox – should I be initiating a rabies alert?’
Hunter began to gather together the bloody detritus of Markham’s morning madness. ‘For whom? The fox? Or …?’ She indicated Markham now on his feet and very carefully pulling up his trousers.
‘Whichever you think best,’ said Peterson, hastily. ‘On this occasion I shall bow to medical expertise. Is it safe to take him away now?’
‘Oh, yes. Just watch for frothing at the mouth or a fear of water.’
Peterson frowned. ‘Doesn’t he have all that anyway?’
‘Now you come to mention it – yes.’
‘Anything else?’
‘Pasteurella multocida, inflammation, infection, septicaemia, fever and death.’
‘He’s not infectious, is he? Or do I mean contagious?’
‘Nothing alcohol can’t cure,’ muttered Markham, pulling on his boots.
Peterson heaved himself off the trolley and regarded him. ‘Given the events of the morning, don’t you think kitten heels might be more appropriate?’
And was out of the door before Markham could get to him.
Read more about Markham in My Name is Markham by Jodi Taylor
