CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

Early one Friday morning in December 1991, I received a telephone call from Malcolm Whittaker, the consultant surgeon at the Friarage Hospital, Northallerton. He had some bleak news to convey.

The previous month, Alf had suffered a severe rectal bleed while walking in the field behind his house and, following some tests, had eventually been admitted to hospital for an operation. During the pre-operative examination, Mr Whittaker had noticed a small lump in Alf’s groin.

‘What is that?’ he had asked.

I think it is just a benign lipoma, Malcolm,’ Alf had replied.

The consultant had not been so sure. ‘How long has it been there?’

‘Oh, for several months.’

Having felt again around the nameless growth, Malcolm Whittaker had suggested a little further investigation. His suspicions had been well-founded. Upon analysis, the ‘harmless lipoma’ had proved a far different proposition. It was, in fact, an adenocarcinoma – a secondary cancerous spread from some primary source within the body which, after tissue-typing, was thought to be the prostate gland.

All this was transmitted to me over the telephone that day and it hit me like an express train. Having been informed that my mother and sister had already been told, I asked the consultant the obvious question.

‘How long has he got to live?’

‘It’s difficult to say,’ replied the surgeon, whose voice then acquired a lighter note as if trying to lift my feelings, ‘but he could have as much as three years.’

Having thanked Malcolm for his call, I sat down at the table and buried my head in my hands. Tears ran down my face as I tried to grasp the reality of the situation. Three years! I kept thinking of the time span, hoping fervently that it would be longer.

In retrospect, we should have suspected something like this, as Alf had shown symptoms of prostatic problems for some time. He had begun to have difficulty passing urine some five years previously and, around 1988, had started passing blood. His prostate gland had been investigated, found to be enlarged and attempts made to remove it. Biopsies taken at the time, however, showed no sign of malignancy, and we had assumed it was just a benign enlargement. Our optimism, however, was now dashed.

I visited him at his home, Mirebeck, shortly after I had received the dread news. He seemed to have taken it very calmly and was hopeful that the treatment he was about to undergo could stave off the cancer for a considerable period of time.

‘It’s wonderful what can be done nowadays,’ he said. ‘I’m just going to carry on enjoying myself and looking forward.’ We were delighted with his optimistic approach but Rosie, being a doctor, knew the harsh facts. Three years was the mostthat we could hope for.

Before leaving Mirebeck that day, I glanced back into the sitting-room. As I looked at him, seated in front of his word processor whilst putting the final touches to Every Living Thing, I wondered whether I would have had the courage to launch straight back into work should I have just received such fearful news. He had begun his long battle against cancer in the only way he knew; he was going to keep busy and continue being active for as long as he possibly could.

He was put onto a series of monthly Zoladex injections, and both chemotherapy and radiotherapy started. Throughout 1992, he did not appear to deteriorate much, although the radiotherapy and the Zoladex made him feel sick for a while. This stoical acceptance of his condition, together with the apparent stabilisation of the symptoms, gave us hope that, perhaps, the cancer could indeed be beaten.

He gave Joan a terrible fright early in 1993 when, having suffered a sudden cardiac arrythmia followed by a cerebral anoxia, he lost consciousness and collapsed on the floor of the kitchen. Having immediately rung Rosie, she was then at a loss as to how to help him. She cradled his head in her arms which, in fact, could have resulted in his death by further restricting the blood flow to his head. The prompt arrival of Rosie, who laid him out flat on the floor, saved the day, after which, following a short stay in hospital, he made a complete recovery.

In fact, 1993 was quite a good year for Alf, with the satisfaction of seeing Every Living Thingcontinuing to prove just as successful as his previous books. Later that year, however, having begun to experience symptoms of the carcinoma spreading, he found himself in hospital again where he underwent yet another operation. This was the beginning of grimmer times ahead – a time when we realised that the cancer, having kept a misleadingly low profile for almost two years, was beginning to show its true colours.

The brave veneer that he put on his condition cracked only once, in the autumn of 1993, when my mother rang me to say, ‘Please come up to see your father. I am at a loss to know what to do with him.’

This was an unusual call. My mother had, very admirably, borne the burden of watching her husband slowly deteriorate, rarely asking for any assistance, but he had become so severely depressed that she now felt powerless to help him. As I sat with him that day, I was reminded of the bad times over thirty years before, when he had suffered his great depression. He now looked at me, once again, with eyes that were a million miles away.

The position was very difficult for Rosie and me. We tried to cheer him up by talking about his hugely successful life, and the joy that he had given so many people, but we were looking into the eyes of a sensitive and private man, a sincere and deeply caring person with a complex personality which, despite our close relationship with him for so many years, we had never managed to fully comprehend. There had always been a part of my father that I had never really reached and, as I looked at him that day, I knew that I had little chance of unlocking the secret emotions that were troubling him. He had kept his innermost feelings to himself for so many years; why should he release them now?

He assured us that the cause of his despondency was not the fact that his days were coming to an end. I could well believe this. Although without any strong religious faith to help him through those difficult times, he had not only always been a selfless man whose concern for the welfare of others transcended any thoughts of his own well-being, but he, himself, had no fear of death. During his short speech on the occasion of his Golden Wedding anniversary in 1991, he had spoken of his good fortune in having enjoyed such a fascinating and fruitful life, dominated by good health and a supportive wife and family, and that, whatever the future held for him, life had already dealt him a more-than-generous hand. Realising that he still held that philosophy – and that he faced his future with a calm inevitability – I knew that the cause of his present depression was far deeper than just the bleak prospect of his worsening health. Those same mysterious emotions that had always simmered beneath the surface were, once again, exerting their influence.

‘What isthe matter, Dad?’ I asked. Well out of my depth, such a banal and basic question was delivered more in hope than expectation.

He continued staring out of the window and I remember his answer well. ‘I have this feeling of profound and overwhelming melancholy.’ He would say no more.

As an illustration of his deeply sensitive nature, I remember his giving an interview to Lynda Lee-Potter of the Daily MailHaving had a few drinks beforehand, he gave her an unusually frank interview in which he poured out his feelings, expressing especially his intense and lasting love for Rosie and Emma. On reading this in the paper, he was deeply upset. He said that he could not remember releasing his feelings so effusively; it was certainly not in his nature to do so.