The Cat's Table - Michael Ondaatje [22]
Sometime after the episode with the passing venerable, Sir Hector was coming down the stairs of his great house. (The Assistant Purser used the phrase “climbing down the staircase.”) His pet terrier was at the foot of the steps waiting to greet him. A usual occurrence. This was an animal loved by all members of the family. As Sir Hector bent down, the affectionate animal leapt for his neck. Sir Hector pulled the dog off, at which point the animal bit his hand.
Two servants eventually got hold of the creature and put it in a kennel. While the animal was being caged, an in-law treated the bite. Apparently the terrier had already behaved strangely that morning, racing around the kitchen under the feet of the servants, and had been chased out of the house with a broom, before slipping back calm and muted at the last minute so it could await its master at the foot of the stairs. The dog had bitten no one during the earlier fracas.
Later that day Sir Hector passed the kennel and wagged his bandaged finger at the animal. Twenty-four hours later the dog died, having shown symptoms of rabies. But by then the “urinating dog” had already delivered his message.
One by one they came. Every respected doctor who serviced Colombo 7 was brought in for consultation for a cure. Sir Hector was (save for a few illegal gunrunners or gem merchants whose worth would always be unknown) the richest man in the city. The doctors spoke in whispers all the way down the long corridors of his house, arguing and finessing the defence against rabies, which was already beginning to affect the wealthy body upstairs. The virus was travelling at five to ten millimetres per hour to other cells, and there were already symptoms, such as burning, itching, and numbness at the site of the bite, but the terrible signs of hydrophobia were not yet apparent. As the patient was being given supportive care, the duration of the illness might last as long as twenty-five days before it was fatal. The terrier was dug up and checked once more to be certain of rabies. Telegrams were sent to Brussels, Paris, and London. And three staterooms were booked on the Oronsay, which was the next ship leaving for Europe, just in case. The liner would stop at Aden, Port Said, and Gibraltar, and it was hoped a specialist would be able to meet with the vessel in at least one of these locations.
But it was also being said that Sir Hector should remain at home, as it was likely that his condition would worsen during a possibly rough voyage where medical facilities might be minimal; plus the fact that there was usually a second-rate doctor on board, usually some twenty-eight-year-old intern whose parents had pull at the Orient Line headquarters. Besides, ayurvedic practitioners were now also arriving at the house from the Moratuwa district, where the de Silva family walauwa had existed for more than a century, and these men claimed to have successfully treated victims of rabies. They argued that Sir Hector, by remaining on the island, would be close to the country’s most powerful herbal remedies. They spoke vociferously in the old dialects he was familiar with from his youth, saying that the journey would leave him far from these potent sources. As the cause of the illness was local, the antidote would always be found somewhere in the same place.
In the end, Sir Hector decided to take the