For Sarah,

  Nick and Helena.

  H. P.

  For Dibbs x

  E. S.

  Jasmine groaned as her mum turned off the motorway into a service station. It was early evening on the first Saturday of the October half term, and they were returning from visiting Jasmine’s sister, Ella, at university.

  “Do we have to stop?” Jasmine said. “Can’t we just go home?”

  “I need to buy a few things for the morning,” said Nadia.

  “But the animals will be hungry. And they’ll be missing me.”

  Nadia smiled at her as she stopped the car. “Don’t worry, they’ll be fine. Dad promised to feed them.”

  Jasmine had a sheepdog, a donkey, a pig, a deer, a sheep and a duck of her own, as well as her two cats. She planned to run a rescue centre when she grew up, and she had already rescued many animals. Luckily, her dad was a farmer and her mum was a vet, and there was plenty of room at Oak Tree Farm.

  To Jasmine’s relief, it didn’t take long to do the shopping. When they got back to the car, she stood leaning against the passenger door while her mum rearranged the boot to make room for the grocery bags. Nadia was a farm vet, so the boot was always full of medicines and equipment.

  A few metres away, a woman got out of her car. She was speaking on her phone while scanning the car park as though searching for somebody. She waved at a man a few cars down and he smiled and walked towards her.

  “You must be Diana,” he said.

  “That’s right,” said the woman, shaking his hand.

  “I’m Chris. Pleased to meet you.”

  Diana opened the boot of her car and Jasmine glimpsed a dog crate.

  “Here she is.” She opened the crate and, to Jasmine’s delight, took out a tiny, honey-coloured golden retriever puppy.

  “Oh!” breathed Jasmine, her face breaking into a smile.

  The puppy was gorgeous. She had the sweetest, gentlest face, with dark eyes, floppy ears and big fluffy paws. Jasmine wished she could hold her. She sneaked up closer to get a better look.

  Diana handed the puppy to the man. He walked to the front of the car so that he was standing under a lamppost, and looked at the puppy’s face. Jasmine frowned. The puppy didn’t look quite well. Her head was tilted to one side at an odd angle and there were strings of white and grey discharge on the surface of her eyes. As Jasmine watched, the puppy shook her head uncomfortably, as though trying to dislodge something.

  “What’s this gunk in her eyes?” asked Chris. “It doesn’t look good.”

  “Oh, that’s nothing to worry about,” said the woman. “A lot of puppies have it. She’ll grow out of it in a week or two.”

  The puppy shook her head again. Something’s not right, thought Jasmine. Mum always said discharge from a puppy’s eyes was a serious condition that needed prompt treatment. It wasn’t something they would grow out of.

  “So I just need the payment and she’s yours,” said Diana.

  The puppy shook her head again. Jasmine wondered if she had an ear infection. She hoped the man would ask about it, but instead he reached into his coat pocket and started to pull out a thick wad of notes. Jasmine stared at the money, amazed. She hadn’t realised puppies were so expensive.

  He paused with the money halfway out of his pocket.

  “You said she’s fully vaccinated. You’ve brought the vaccination certificate?”

  “Of course,” said Diana.

  She took a piece of paper from a folder in the boot and handed it to Chris.

  “Jasmine!” called Nadia.

  Jasmine walked over to her mum. “Can you come and look at that puppy?” she whispered. “I think there’s something wrong, but the lady who’s selling her says she’s fine.”

  Nadia glanced at the scene under the lamppost. “She’s selling the puppy? Here?”

  Jasmine explained what she’d seen and heard. Nadia’s face tightened. She strode across to Diana’s car. Jasmine followed her.

  “Excuse me,” Nadia said, smiling at Chris and Diana. “Sorry to interrupt you, but I’m a vet, and I happened to notice that your puppy doesn’t look well. I’m sure she’s being treated for her eye and ear infections, but I wondered if I could be of any help.”

  The man looked at her in bewilderment. A flash of fear passed across the woman’s face. She put on a smile that was obviously fake.

  “I don’t think this puppy is any of your business, is it?” she said.

  “Is she your puppy?” asked Nadia.

  “I’m buying her,” said Chris.

  “I see,” said Nadia. “I assume the mother is here too?”

  Chris looked in confusion at Diana.

  “The mother is at home with her other puppies,” said Diana. “Obviously I couldn’t take her away from the rest of the litter.”

  Nadia turned to Chris. “You know it’s illegal to buy a puppy if it’s not with its mother?”

  He looked startled. “Er…”

  “Have you seen this puppy with its mother?”

  “Er … Well … no.”

  “Had you seen the puppy at all before today?”

  “Er, no, but—”

  “This is ridiculous,” said the woman. “You can’t just walk up to people in a car park and start interfering in their business. You’re clearly mad.”

  Jasmine had a sudden thought. She crept to the front of the car and stared at the registration number.

  Nadia looked at the piece of paper in the man’s hand. “That vaccination certificate doesn’t look genuine to me,” she said. “I think you’ve been duped into buying a puppy from an illegal puppy farm. This puppy isn’t well and I very much doubt whether she’s been vaccinated.”

  “How dare you!” snapped the woman. “You should be locked up, barging in and accusing me like this.” She turned and glared at Jasmine. “What are you doing?”

  “Nothing,” said Jasmine, gazing at Diana with her most innocent expression. She repeated the registration number silently in her head.

  “I would strongly advise you,” Nadia said to Chris, “not to take the puppy tonight, and at the very least to phone the vet’s number on this certificate and check whether it’s genuine.”

  “Will you go away and stop interfering!” spat Diana. “You should be ashamed of yourself, making accusations and causing trouble in a public place.”

  Nadia didn’t move. Jasmine held her breath, her heart beating fast, as the two women stared at each other. The man stood holding the puppy, looking very uncomfortable.

  Out of the corner of her eye, Jasmine noticed two police officers, a man and a woman, walking out of the service station. She waved her arms above her head and called, “Excuse me! Hello!”

  The police officers looked across. Diana turned and saw them. She froze for a second, and then made a grab for the puppy. The man tightened his hold on her. Nadia stepped between them.

  “Come quickly!” Jasmine called to the police. They broke into a run. Diana glanced at them and jumped into her car. She slammed the door, revved the engine, and with a screech of tyres reversed out of her parking space and drove away.

  “OY59 7PN,” Jasmine said to the policewoman as she approached. “That’s her registration number.”

  The police asked Chris lots of questions about Diana and his communications with her. When they turned their attention to Nadia, Jasmine plucked up the courage to ask Chris if she could hold the puppy.

  “Sure,” he said, barely glancing at her. He seemed stunned by the extraordinary turn of events.

  The puppy was warm and soft, and settled quietly in Jasmine’s arms. “You’re beautiful, aren’t you?” murmured Jasmine as she stroked her gently.

  The puppy shook her head again. “Poor thing,” said Jasmine. “Your ears are hurting, aren’t they? Don’t worry. Your new owner will take you to the vet tomorrow.”

  Nadia was giving the police a description of the woman’s appearance. “Presumably you can look at the CCTV footage too,” she said.

  “Unfortunately there aren’t any cameras in this car park,” said the policewoman. “That’s probably why she suggested handing over the puppy here. It’s lucky your daughter memorised her registration number.”

  Nadia smiled proudly at Jasmine. “Well done, Jas. That was excellent thinking.”

  When the police had taken all the details they needed, they checked with Chris that he was prepared to take responsibility for the puppy, and then they left. Chris turned to Nadia.

  “So you think it’s got an ear infection as well as dodgy eyes?” he said.

  “I can check if you like.”

  “Will you charge me for it?”

  Nadia gave him a scathing look. “Not just to look in her ears, no.”

  “All right then, if it’s not going to take too long. I need to get home.”

  Nadia fetched her pen torch from the car. Jasmine held the puppy close and stroked her while Nadia shone the torch inside her ear and gently felt around with her fingers. The puppy gave a little yelp and jerked her head away.

  “Yes, it’s quite red and swollen,” said Nadia. “She’s definitely got an ear infection. And the head tilt indicates that it might be spreading deeper down, into the middle ear. It will need treating quickly before it gets worse. It must be very painful for her, poor little thing.”

  “So what’s the treatment?” asked Chris.

  “I expect the vet will prescribe her some medicated eardrops and an ear cleaning solution,” said Nadia.
< br />   Chris frowned. “Is that expensive?”

  “It can be, I’m afraid. Ear infections can be tricky to manage. Sometimes they need several weeks of treatment. They can be caused by an underlying condition, like an allergy, so the vet might look into that too.”

  “That doesn’t sound cheap,” he said. “And what about her eyes?”

  “I can’t tell you for certain, but it looks like what we call ‘dry eye’. Its official name is KCS – keratoconjunctivitis sicca.”

  “Is it serious?”

  “Well, it’s uncomfortable, and if it’s not treated promptly it can cause ulcers and other problems.”

  “Oh, good grief,” said Chris. “I don’t believe this.”

  “It might take a few different medications before the vet finds the one that works for her, but I’m sure they’ll be able to get her back to full health. In the worst cases, dogs need surgery, but that’s only if other medications don’t work.”

  “So it’s going to cost a fortune. And then there’s the vaccinations. You say you think this is fake?”

  He passed the paper to Nadia. She frowned as she scanned the details.

  “Yes, this doesn’t look like a genuine vaccination record. For a start, it’s a photocopy, not an original. The stickers from the vaccine vials should be on the record card, and this just has photocopies of stickers.”

  “So Diana lied to me? Does that mean she hasn’t been microchipped either? Diana told me she had been.”

  “I can check now,” said Nadia.

  She fetched her scanner and ran it over the puppy. There was no sound. She tried again, but the scanner stayed silent. She raised her eyebrows as she looked at Chris.

  “So, no microchip?” he said.

  “I’m afraid not.”

  “I don’t believe this! That woman sounded so nice on the phone, and now she’s landed me with a sick, unvaccinated dog who needs a fortune spent on her.”

  “Did she ask you to pay a deposit before you saw her?”

  “Yes. She said other people were interested, but if I paid a deposit straightaway I could have her.”

  Nadia sighed. “It looks very much as though she’s running a puppy farm.”

  “A what?”

  Jasmine was glad he’d asked because she wanted to know too.

  “They’re illegal places where puppies are bred in terrible conditions,” said Nadia. “Puppy farmers only want to make money, so the mothers are forced to have litter after litter of puppies and the dogs are kept as cheaply as possible. They’re often sold with fake vaccination certificates, and the buyers don’t find out until it’s too late that their puppy has serious health problems.”

  The man pressed his hand to his forehead. “This is a nightmare. I just wanted a cute puppy for my girlfriend’s birthday.”

  Nadia didn’t look impressed. “You should report the seller to the RSPCA, and to their local council. The council will check to see if they’re actually licensed to sell puppies, and the RSPCA will inspect them to see how the dogs are being looked after. If it is an illegal puppy farm, hopefully they’ll shut it down and the owners will be prosecuted.”

  The man held up his hands. “I can’t do this. I don’t want to be mixed up in anything dodgy. I can’t deal with the stress.”

  “Well, in that case, I’ll report them,” said Nadia.

  “It’s not just that. It’s the whole thing. I can’t deal with a sick, illegal animal.”

  “So what do you plan to do?”

  He looked at the puppy lying in Jasmine’s arms. “You’re a vet. You take her. Do what you like with her. I don’t want any more to do with it.”

  Jasmine sat in the car, stroking the tiny puppy on her lap and talking to her softly. Despite her obvious discomfort, the puppy wagged her tail when Jasmine spoke to her.

  “I can’t believe we went to a service station for bread and milk and came home with a puppy!” she said. “Tom won’t believe it.”

  Tom was Jasmine’s best friend, and they had rescued many animals together.

  “You know we’re not keeping the puppy, don’t you?” said Nadia. “I’ll ask in the surgery tomorrow; I’m sure one of the other vets or nurses will take her.”

  Jasmine hoped they wouldn’t, but she kept her thoughts to herself.

  “I need to name her anyway,” she said. “Even if I only have her for a day, I can’t just call her ‘the puppy’.”

  “What will you call her?” asked Nadia.

  Jasmine studied the puppy’s sweet face and tried out names in her head. They had left the motorway and were driving along a high street. Nadia stopped at a red light and Jasmine looked at a poster in a shop window. “Buy Your Fireworks Here,” it said. There was a picture of people beside a bonfire, waving sparklers.

  “Sparkle!” said Jasmine. “She’s called Sparkle.”

  “Sparkle?” said Nadia. “She looks the opposite of sparkling to me, poor thing.”

  “She will be sparkling though. Once you’ve treated her and I’ve cared for her, she’ll be the sparkliest little puppy you’ve ever seen.”

  Jasmine set her alarm for six o’clock the next morning, but just after half past five she was woken by whining and scrabbling noises. She threw off her covers and knelt down beside Sparkle’s crate. The little puppy was jumping up at the bars.

  “It’s all right, Sparkle, I’m here. Let’s go to the garden.”

  When they had got home the previous evening, Nadia had looked at Sparkle’s teeth to find out her age. She estimated that the puppy was between seven and eight weeks old.

  “She might go straight to sleep in her crate,” she had said, “but if she cries in the night, don’t touch her, just talk to her reassuringly and she should soon settle.”

  They agreed to share the night-time toilet trips, so Jasmine took Sparkle to the garden before she went to bed, and then Nadia took her at midnight and Jasmine at three in the morning.

  “Come here, Sparkle,” said Jasmine now, as she opened the crate door and scooped the warm, soft, wriggly puppy into her arms. She clipped Sparkle’s lead on, hurried downstairs and put on her wellies.

  She led the puppy to the place at the edge of the garden that she’d chosen as her toilet spot the previous evening. As soon as Sparkle had finished, Jasmine bent down to make a fuss of her.

  “Well done, Sparkle! Good girl.” She looked closely at the puppy’s lovely face.“Your eyes look better today, and I’m sure you’re holding your head a bit straighter. The medicines must be working. Let’s get your breakfast.”

  Jasmine fed Sparkle in her crate and then took her out to the garden again. Sparkle was in a playful mood, scampering about and barking for Jasmine’s attention, but Jasmine refused to be drawn in. She couldn’t wait to start playing, but she had read all about toilet training a puppy last night, and she was determined to follow the advice.

  “We’ll play afterwards,” she said. “If we start playing now, you’ll forget what we’re here for, and then you’ll have an accident in the house.”

  When Sparkle had finished, Jasmine praised her lavishly. They went indoors and found Michael, Jasmine’s dad, sitting at the kitchen table drinking tea.

  “Hello there,” he said, smiling at the puppy. “Did she keep you awake all night?”

  “No, she was really good. Can you keep an eye on her while I fetch her crate down?”

  “With pleasure.”

  When Jasmine brought the crate into the kitchen, she was thrilled to see Sparkle sitting on Dad’s lap. He was stroking her as he drank his tea and read Farmers Weekly. If Dad loved Sparkle, that would surely make it easier to persuade him to keep her forever.

  Jasmine set up the crate at the far end of the kitchen, where it would be quieter. Then she picked up the puppy.

  “I’m going to see if she can play fetch,” she told Dad.

  “Well, she’s a retriever, so it should come naturally.” He took his coat from its peg and went out to the farmyard to start his day’s work.

  Jasmine knelt on the hall rug and positioned the puppy opposite her. She stroked her head softly.

  “This is the ball we’re going to use,” she said, taking a tennis ball from her pocket. Sparkle fastened her eyes on it. Jasmine rolled the ball slowly backwards and forwards on the floor between her hands. Sparkle’s eyes followed it constantly. After Jasmine had rolled the ball a few times, Sparkle pounced on it and picked it up in her mouth.

 

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