“Daisy! Daisy! We need a pet basket now! Help us Daisy! Hurry!”
My doorbell rang again and again. Loud knocking, accompanied by the shouts had made me jump. My paintbrush fell onto my paper, landing with a splosh onto my sunflower painting. I jumped to my feet and raced downstairs from my study. As fast as my elderly legs could go! I’d been living in my converted stable cottage for some weeks. The Priory House, dominated a central courtyard, having stable wings either side of the courtyard in the shape of a U. One side of the stables had been converted into cottages, in one of which I lived. The opposite side was still in disrepair. My study, a small upstairs bedroom, had fantastic views over Bodmin Moor. Since my move to the Priory, I’d resumed my botanical painting.
“What is it? What’s all the noise?” I asked as I flung open my front door.
“Daisy! Help us! We need a pet basket for these. They need a vet at once!” Sheila, an octogenarian who lived in one of the two refurbished apartments in Priory House, stood on my doorstep, with her grandchildren, eight year old Rosie, and ten year old Ben.
“We found them on our walk and they are going to die,” wailed Rosie.
“I bet they’re from that puppy farm,” said ten-year-old Ben. He clutched a tiny scrap of fluff, his anxious freckled face peering down at it.
“She’s escaped with her babies,” said Rosie, cuddling another tiny pup.
“Hurry Daisy, we must get them to the vet,” insisted Sheila. Her white helmet of curly hair bent over the small King Charles Cavalier dog in her arms. Brown liquid eyes stared up me through dirty matted fur. Anxious and sad, the eyes were pleading. I felt such a rise of fury at the cruelty of the puppy farmer that it overwhelmed me.
“Come in, I’ll get the basket.” Listless, without any flicker of emotion, the dog and her pups were placed on a soft, clean fleece, in the basket. The dog sniffed at it, as if unused to such cleanliness or luxury. The dog basket was used for Flora, on outings and puppy training classes. Another cottage resident, Inspector Tenby, our local police Inspector had taken over his daughter’s puppy when she went to Dubai. A boisterous fluffy little mongrel who was adorable. Flora and my cat Cleo had bonded and become best friends. They decided between them that Flora would come to live with me!
“I’ll come with you,” began Sheila, rising awkwardly from her chair. Sheila was disabled with arthritis. I realised that her morning walk had been her day’s limit.
“No, Sheila. I’ll take the dogs to the vet. Can you look after Cleo and Flora, and take them into the garden? And text the others,” I added. Ben helped me carry the cage. “Take Ben with you, he can help,” called Sheila from my
doorway.
“Okay Ben, you’re coming with me to the
vets.” I smiled at him and waved to Sheila and Rosie.
“Daisy, I love your van, and the words ‘BURT’S BEEFY BANGERS’ on the side of it. That huge smiling face of Burt holding a large sausage on a fork is great! Everyone at my school knows your van. I tell everyone you’re my friend.” Ben helped put the cage in the back of my van. He patted Burt’s large smiling face, and the large sausage on its fork on the side of my van, as he walked round.
“Wow!” was all he said.
As a lifelong sufferer from EDS, I cope with my restricted mobility by dictating all my novels.
Changing primary schools, meant that I was unable to read until given special lessons.
This gave me a deep love of reading and I devoured books.
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