The Village Vet (18 page)

I was hoping the photo of Buster would make someone fall in love with him, but I’m doubtful now. He looks like a grumpy old man.

‘So, how is it all going?’ Fifi asks when we’re finally alone together, having dropped Libby off at the Co-op, where she’s been called in to do an extra shift, and brought me to the garden centre for a cream tea. It is one of her many missions in life to get some weight back on my bones, to turn me from what she describes as a skinny chicken into a fat bird.

‘I thought you might have come up to find out,’ I respond, wishing to let her know that I’ve missed her help without sounding as though I’m criticising her lack of input. We are sitting at one of the tables in the coffee shop, surrounded by fronds of greenery and beside a stand of special offers – impulse buys of handy items you never thought you needed, like grippers to attach to your shoes so you can walk safely on ice, and fleecy sacks you can wear while chilling out on the sofa in the winter, shopping trolleys and support stockings.

‘Oh, I’ve been rushed off my feet as usual. I’ll drop by to do some more office work one day next week.’ She pauses, gazing at me, her eyelashes long and thick with mascara and her lips an unnatural matt pink. ‘Have Diane and Wendy been along to volunteer recently?’

‘They turn up occasionally. They seemed keen to
start
with, but their enthusiasm appears to be waning. Libby’s often about though.’ I smile to myself. I reckon she’ll be staying on at the Sanctuary for a long time yet, and not just because of her interest in the pony.

‘And Jack? Is it working out between you?’

‘I couldn’t do it without him,’ I say generously.

‘I see. So you are managing to work with him, after all?’ A smile plays on my aunt’s lips. ‘I knew you two would get along.’

‘We get along for the welfare of the animals. We’re very … professional.’ I find myself blundering on in my eagerness to prove that there is not and never will be anything between me and Jack, in spite of my aunt’s apparent determination that there will be hearts and flowers.

‘Jack’s a lovely boy,’ she continues. ‘He’s always thinking of others before himself. He was called out to the Old Forge up at Talyford the other night. There was a fire, and Penny – you know Penny, with the assistance dog – was trapped in her studio. According to the gossip in the butcher’s, Jack forced the window at the back and carried her out over his shoulder, would you believe it?’

Do I believe it? I know from experience that you have to take some of Talyton’s spicier pieces of gossip with a pinch of salt, but this one seems genuine.

‘When did this happen?’ I ask.

‘On Monday night.’

‘Jack didn’t say anything.’

‘Well, he wouldn’t, would he? As a retained firefighter, he would say that it’s what he’s paid to do for the members of our rural community.’ My aunt smiles again and adds with more than a trace of irony, ‘Why should he mention it to you anyway, Tessa? I wouldn’t
expect
Jack to make small talk to me when our relationship was on an entirely professional footing.’ She changes the subject. ‘How’s DJ getting on?’

‘When I managed to get hold of him, he mentioned that he hasn’t been paid,’ I say as tactfully as I can manage.

‘That’s Diane’s fault,’ Fifi flashes back. ‘She’s treasurer. She’s withholding the funds.’

‘Can she do that?’

‘She thinks she can.’

‘But DJ’s doing the work, so he’s fulfilling his side of the contract. You can’t not pay him.’

‘I’m doing my best in the face of adversity.’ Fifi taps her spoon against the side of her teacup. ‘Diane has always been a subversive influence on the committee and she’s always had her eye on taking over the role of chair, not because she’ll be any good at it, but out of envy.’

‘Let’s forget Diane for a moment. I’m worried that DJ will push off without finishing everything. The stables look great, but he hasn’t hung the doors in the kitchen in the bungalow, or completed the last five kennels (there should be a row of ten), or lined the shed so it’s useable. I’d like it all to be done before the Fun Day. It isn’t long now and we’re nowhere near ready to show it off to the public. I don’t have time for DIY when I’m tied up with the animals.’ I am beginning to panic. ‘Is Diane being a pain about the money to get at you for taking me on here? Because that’s the rumour, according to Jack.’

‘I’m still chair of Talyton Animal Rescue. No one can do anything without my say-so.’

‘Fifi, do you think I should leave? My leaving would solve the problem.’

‘Don’t even think of it. We’d never find anyone else of your calibre, and besides, we need someone there now. There are animals at the Sanctuary that need full-time care. I can’t let you abandon them.’

‘I could stay until the committee finds a replacement.’ It would break my heart, but I would do anything to save the Sanctuary, and with the committee members falling out with my aunt, I can feel it beginning to fall apart.

‘You are not going anywhere, dear niece. There’s bound to be some unrest among the volunteers – people don’t like change. One day, they’ll see sense, and in the meantime, we must go ahead with the fund-raising events for this summer, otherwise the summer ball will end up as a winter one, and that will clash with the highlight of the hunt’s social calendar, the Hunt Ball. I thought we’d go for September.’

‘How can we go ahead with arranging a ball if the rest of the committee isn’t onside?’ I spread a dollop of clotted cream onto my scone before scooping jam from the dish on the tray in front of me. I was going to choose carrot cake because it sounds vaguely healthy, but as Fifi noted while I was deliberating at the counter, the garden centre’s carrot cake should carry a warning: may contain traces of carrot.

‘We’ll worry about that later,’ Fifi says. ‘If we wait, everywhere will be booked up.’

‘We need a half-decent venue that isn’t too expensive,’ I explain. ‘You know everyone so I thought you might be able to strike me a good deal. I thought maybe I could look at the Talymill Inn, the Dog and Duck or the Cricket Club, or we could keep it simple with a hog roast at the church hall.’

‘Oh no, you can’t possibly expect everyone to make
a
splash unless you book somewhere far more exclusive,’ Fifi says disapprovingly. ‘And a hog roast? That will not do. That will not do at all. You’ll be telling me you want to hold a disco in a barn, like the Young Farmers. Tessa, I am not wading through mud in my best shoes and sitting on a straw bale with a paper plate of greasy pig and slimy coleslaw. Ugh!’

‘What about here, at the garden centre? You could donate the fee to Talyton Animal Rescue.’ I warm to my idea. ‘You know what you’re doing. You’ve held dances here before.’

‘Yes, tea dances for the over-eighties.’ Fifi shakes her head slowly. ‘Your uncle couldn’t cope with the idea of partygoers’ undertaking drunken antics among the gnomes, and I couldn’t stand the strain of watching him getting more and more stressed out.’

‘What kind of balls do you go to, Fifi?’ I ask, pretending to be appalled. ‘They sound completely wild.’

‘Someone always ends up dancing on the table,’ she begins, tilting her head to one side. ‘You’re so staid, Tessa. Don’t you ever have any fun?’ She hesitates. ‘I’m sorry, you’ve been through so much recently. That was tactless of me’ – she laughs at herself – ‘as ever.’

The ‘having fun’ gene must have skipped a generation, I muse, thinking of my parents’ antics, the pyjama parties, murder mysteries and post-panto celebrations.

‘I’ll make sure you let your hair down. We’ll find you a dress and some decent heels, and a handsome man to accompany you. Cinderella, you will go to the ball.’

‘Thank you, but—’

‘No buts. I’ll pay towards the dress and lend you a pair of shoes.’ Fifi strokes her top lip as if checking for
stray
whiskers. ‘I might have to leave the handsome man down to you. I’m sure Jack would be more than willing …’

‘Jack,’ I echo. ‘I’ll be too tied up with organising the event to take part,’ I say, but I feel a frisson of excitement at the thought of being among all those people, dressed in black tie and glamorous dresses, drinking champagne and dancing. I picture myself holding on to Jack’s arm as I greet the guests on behalf of Talyton Animal Rescue before he leads me onto the dance floor, spins me round to face him and slips his arm behind my back … Okay, I can’t imagine the next part because I can’t dance to save my life, but it involves some bodily contact – chaste bodily contact, you understand, but contact all the same.

‘Tessa?’ Fifi brings me back down to earth. ‘You haven’t been listening to a word I’ve said. You appear to be terribly distracted.’

‘I’m sorry,’ I say quickly. ‘I’m back …’

Fifi gazes at me, bemused, as if to say, But you haven’t gone anywhere.

‘Where does the hunt hold their ball?’ I ask. ‘Couldn’t we try there?’

‘Alex Fox-Gifford hosts that at the Manor and, to be honest, it’s a little run-down; all very well for the horsey set, but not what I had in mind.’ My aunt leans towards me. ‘I think you should call the hotel in Talymouth, the one on the seafront that has a ballroom.’

‘Won’t that be too expensive?’

‘That’s what I’m trying to say,’ Fifi says, exasperation etched across her face. ‘You should ring them to find out how much it is per head and check availability in September. It would be such a coup if we got that venue. Go on, Tessa. Call them now.’

I have to deal with it when I return to the Sanctuary, however, because Jack phones me to let me know he’s on his way there, having picked up Tia the dog, and I have all the keys. My aunt drops me off, giving me time to give the baby birds their afternoon tea before Jack arrives about twenty minutes later.

‘Tessa, I’ve brought you a new resident, but judging by the look of her, I don’t think she’s going to last very long. She’s pretty ancient,’ Jack says brightly, looking out of the open window of the van and slapping the outside of the door with the palm of his hand in rhythm to the music playing on the radio.

‘So this is Tia,’ I say as Jack hands me the paperwork. I scan down the form that Tia’s owner’s daughter has completed on her behalf.

‘The old lady has lost her marbles so the daughter has power of attorney. It’s all above board …’ Jack pauses. ‘I don’t hold out any hope of you finding a home for this poor old thing. I almost stopped at Otter House on the way to have a chat with Maz or Emma, but I thought you’d better have a look first.’

It’s one of the reasons Fifi took me on. Because I’m a vet nurse, I can make the initial assessments on every animal we take in, thereby, in some cases, saving the charity money on vet’s bills. Not in Tia’s case though.

Jack opens the door and swings his long legs out of the van before walking around the back in a navy polo-shirt and combat trousers that fit snugly across his muscular buttocks. I try, but fail, not to look. He opens the rear doors, slips a rope lead over the dog’s head and lifts her down.

‘Meet the lovely Tia,’ he says.

I approach the hugely overweight roan cocker spaniel that’s bulging with fatty lumps and bumps that
shouldn
’t be there, and hold out my hand to her. She sniffs it vaguely then stands with her head down and tail tucked between her legs, much like Buster did when he first arrived at the Sanctuary.

‘You poor old thing,’ I say gently. ‘Jack, let’s get her into kennels so I can give her the once-over.’

‘I wish you’d do that for me,’ Jack says, touching the small of his back. ‘I could do with a once-over. She weighs a ton.’

‘Be careful what you wish for,’ I tell him with mock sternness. ‘I might find I have to be cruel to be kind.’

‘Yes, I’d prefer you to miss out the bit with the thermometer to be honest,’ he jokes.

Tia waddles along behind us, puffing and panting, her tongue hanging out and her overgrown nails clacking on the floor on the way to the kitchen in the kennel block. Suppressing the urge to invite Jack onto the table for a full examination and maybe a back massage, I ask him to lift the dog up for me, where she stands like a statue.

‘Go on then, nurse,’ Jack says, smiling. ‘Do you want me to restrain her for you?’

‘I don’t think she’s going anywhere fast.’ I check Tia over, examining her mouth, nose, eyes and ears. She reeks of halitosis, greasy skin and infected ears, so much that she makes me retch. ‘I’m going to have to book her in to see one of the vets. She’s in a terrible state.’

‘Do you think anyone will take her on, a dog of her age and in this condition?’ Jack asks tentatively. ‘She might not last much longer.’

‘She’s a sweet dog.’ Mild, by which I mean she has an almost non-existent persona. ‘There must be someone out there who will love her.’

‘That’s one of the things I like about you, Tess. You’re always so bloody optimistic,’ Jack grins.

‘Not always,’ I say. ‘Put her into the kennel next to the spaniels. I’ll contact Otter House to book an appointment for tomorrow. Can I have the van?’

‘I can take her.’

‘No, it’s all right. I’m happy to do it.’ To be honest, I could do with having a break from the Sanctuary. It’s more a lifestyle than a job. I stroke Tia’s floppy ear through the dense mats of hair. She can’t have been brushed for years.

‘I’ll drive you there,’ Jack says.