The Girl Who Cried Wolf(42)

Michael looks at my animated face with amusement. ‘You really have this all figured out, don’t you, darling?’ He sounds cross but a smile plays at his lips. ‘And what if my folks don’t want another dog about the place?’

I shrug and tell him we would have to find another home for him, but anything would be preferable to leaving him there to freeze or starve to death.

That concludes the discussion, and we focus on hatching a plan to save him. Izzy goes through it a final time before we take the turn onto my old street.

‘OK, Michael leave the car in the alley behind his house, then go round front and knock on the door to tell him you’re lost and need directions. Keep him talking as long as you can. Anna will get the dog through the backyard gate and I’ll keep the engine running while she unties him and fetches him to the car. By that time Michael will have run back around and we’re home free!’

She sounds about as convinced as I feel, but not at least attempting to do this just was not an option. We watch poor Michael head round the front and I look behind to see his worried face, clearly not delighted at his task to distract a thug.

Izzy waits anxiously, keeping the engine running as I sigh with relief that the gate is not bolted and opens quietly. I call softly, ‘Here, boy,’ and the poor soul just looks at me with wary eyes. I wonder what I have gotten myself into, and fear he may bite me as I gently reach behind his collar and begin to untie the tattered rope. I can hear raised voices from inside the house and my hands start to shake uncontrollably, but I have come this far and pull at his now untied collar. Initially refusing to budge, the dog eventually makes a decision to come with me and reluctantly allows me to lead him through the gate, before making it onto the back seat of the car. Izzy burst into to tears when she sees him and I have to hiss to get into the passenger seat.

Michael flies round the corner into view at full sprint and he protests about what a crazy idea that was, and how the man had threatened to punch him, He comes to an abrupt halt when he looks over onto the back seat and at our new companion sat trembling next to me.

By the time we pull into Elm Tree, he’s shaking a little less, although he still looks rather bewildered. I can see beneath the grime that he had once been a rather handsome golden Labrador.

To my absolute horror, as we all tumble out of Michael’s car, my mother swings open the front door and rests her mortified eyes on our fourth passenger. She is wearing a white Donna Karen suit but as we let the dog out, none of us can quite believe it as she drops to her knees, allowing him to lick her pretty face, oblivious to the muddy paws ruining her designer clothes.

‘You poor darling,’ she whispers to him, stroking behind his soft ears in a manner that makes his head turn happily upwards. ‘Where did you find him?’

‘A stray!’ I blurt out before she can look at our guilty faces. She might have an unexpected fondness for this dog, but I am certain she would draw the line at theft.

‘A stray in this weather, you poor, poor thing.’ And with that the raggedy dog follows her obediently into the house while we are left outside stunned.

‘But she doesn’t like dogs.’ Izzy sounds bemused and it was true, we went through the inevitable stage of asking for a puppy throughout our childhood and she had always hidden behind the reasoning that Father would never allow it.

We follow her inside and she is rubbing him gently with an expensive cream bath towel, fresh and warm from the tumble dryer. He seems quite taken with her also, and obediently lifts his paws as she talks to him in a cooing voice.

‘His lovely face reminds me of Oscar, your Grandma Beth’s little dog.’ I shake my head, never remembering her owning a dog.

‘We didn’t think you liked dogs, Mother.’

She looks up at me sharply, ‘It was your father who never wanted animals in the house. He worried they would make too much of a mess,’ she adds, but I just manage to hear, ‘Take the attention away from him, more like.’

When she is satisfied that the caked mud is mostly gone, three Egyptian cotton bath towels now lie filthy on the kitchen floor. She beckons him to follow her to the fridge and he happily does so as she dices some leftover turkey. ‘I know you’re hungry, but just a little at a time. We don’t want you being sick.’

He nibbles the turkey gently from her fingers and looks so hungry, but my mother is careful and does not feed him too much. She fetches him some water, which he laps at with gusto.

‘What about Father?’ I say.

‘He called earlier and won’t be back for two days. These golf gatherings can pan out into other activities.’

With that, we retire into the living room with steaming mugs of hot chocolate while Mother tenderly bathes the cut above the Labrador’s eye.

‘Do you think we can keep him, Anna?’

‘She’s very much taken with him but it’s inevitable that Father will say no.’ I am still in shock at my mother’s reaction to the new arrival, and I cuddle into Michael for comfort.

‘You did a good thing saving him, Anna. It’s unbelievable to me that someone could treat an animal in such a way.’

‘We are all children of the same stars.’ I tell him, then pause and shake my head having no clue what I meant.

‘What?’ Izzy asks me, laughing. ‘I think we should call him Freedom, because of his great escape.’