This Could Change Everything(67)

‘I already saw it. You can’t use that – it’s dirty.’ Scarlett slid her arms out of her purple gilet. ‘Here, wrap him up in this.’

But as they closed in on the cat, it panicked and skittered between them, launching itself across the pavement and disappearing beneath a gap in the fence into dense undergrowth on the other side.

Conor swore under his breath.

‘You were too slow.’ As Scarlett spoke, they both heard the cat give another mew of pain.

‘We can’t leave it there.’ Conor shook his head.

Scarlett gave him an are-you-mad? look. ‘I know we can’t leave it.’ She scrambled to her feet, abandoning the gilet on the pavement behind her.

‘You can’t crawl under that fence,’ said Conor. ‘There’s no room.’

‘Don’t be such a defeatist. Maybe not enough room for you. I can do it, though.’ There were snowflakes in her hair and on the shoulders of her thin blue long-sleeved top. Ignoring his half-outstretched hand, she threw herself down, flattened herself out and crawled like a ninja through the narrow gap between the fence and the stony ground.

It was a long, high fence but Conor followed it until he reached the entrance to the overgrown area of woodland. By the time Scarlett eventually emerged from the tangle of dense undergrowth, he was waiting for her, holding the gilet.

‘I can still hear him,’ she panted as he reached out to help her up. She was covered in mud, twigs and dead leaves. ‘He’s over there to the left.’

‘Let me try—’ began Conor, but it was too late, she’d already plunged back into the undergrowth while the snow continued to fall steadily around them. Say what you like about the girl – and he frequently had – when she set her mind to something, Scarlett was unstoppable.

‘Hello baby,’ came her voice from somewhere in the bushes. ‘It’s OK, I’m not going to hurt you, just stay there . . . Oh!’

There was a sudden loud rustling of vegetation followed by a high-pitched yowl and a small splash.

The next moment, Conor heard Scarlett mutter, ‘Oh shit,’ followed by a gasp of frustration and a bigger splash.

OK, he had to find out what was going on. Following the sounds, he forced his way through the dense mesh of interwoven twigs and branches. Seconds later, he reached the pond, which must have been undetectable beneath a thick layer of leaves. The cat, he realised, had fallen into the water and Scarlett had launched herself in after it. Now, having scooped it up into her arms, she was struggling to climb out.

The sodden animal glared at Conor as he attempted to take it from her. It writhed and hissed when he wrapped it in her gilet. Having hauled herself onto dry land, Scarlett held out her hands. ‘Let me have him. I don’t think he likes you very much.’

Back in the van, Conor helped Scarlett into the passenger seat, then took off her sodden trainers and socks and dried her ice-cold feet with the not-very-clean towel he kept in the footwell. Then he took the spare pair of wellington boots out of the back of the van. ‘You’ll have to wear these.’

‘What size are they?’

‘Twelve.’

‘And I’m a size five.’ Scarlett’s teeth were chattering like castanets and flakes of snow were sliding down her face.

He held out the first boot. ‘Can’t afford to be fussy, Cinderella. Now the other one, that’s it. OK, let’s go.’

They reached the nearest vet’s surgery ten minutes later, by which time blood from the injured cat’s stomach wound was starting to seep through the gilet and over Scarlett’s pink jeans.

Forty minutes later, they were done. The vet had scanned the cat and found the contact details of its owners via the implanted microchip. Within twenty minutes of him calling them, they’d arrived in a flurry of panic while the vet finished cleaning and suturing the wounds. The elderly couple, utterly devoted to their six-year-old tabby, whose name was Barnum, had thanked Scarlett and Conor over and over again.

‘You saved his life.’ The little old lady clutched at Conor’s sleeve. ‘Thank you so much.’

‘It was Scarlett who managed to catch him,’ said Conor. ‘She’s the one who did all the hard work.’

‘Well, you’re angels, both of you. We’re so grateful.’ She turned to Scarlett. ‘And to think, if I’d seen you in the street, I’d have been terrified out of my wits by the sight of you!’

Scarlett was taken aback. ‘Oh . . .’

‘You punk-rock types, that’s what I mean. With your strange hair and those scary eyes and . . . you know, the outfits you wear.’ The old lady gestured at her apologetically. ‘We’ve always been frightened of you punk rockers, haven’t we, Melvin? But now we know we were wrong. Underneath it all, you’re just the same as normal people . . . Here, please let me give you something to thank you.’ Her quavering fingers delved into her purse and she drew out a crumpled five-pound note.

‘Oh no, please don’t,’ Scarlett protested. ‘You don’t have to do that!’

‘But we want to, dear,’ the little old lady insisted, ‘because you rescued Barnum for us, and we love him so much. Please take it.’ She pressed the note into Scarlett’s hand. ‘Just promise me you won’t spend it all on drugs.’