Pets in Prospect - Malcolm D. Welshman [5]
I remembered the blonde-haired girl who’d been mopping down the reception floor and the shy smile she’d given me.
‘Lucy’s just joined us as a trainee nurse,’ explained Eric. ‘Pleasant enough girl … just a bit reserved. But with Mandy’s help, she’ll no doubt find her feet.’
Back in the office, I had just taken a mouthful of lukewarm tea when I heard the swish of tyres in the drive; the deep growl of an engine cut out, a door slammed; a voice vibrated through reception, the tone pitched to shatter a decanter at 40 paces. ‘Have I missed him?’
There was a murmured response from Beryl.
‘Sounds like Crystal’s back,’ said Eric.
The mug in my hand jumped as the office door swung open and in swept Dr Crystal Sharpe BVetMed, BSc, PhD, MRCVS.
Although I had never met her, I had, of course, already formed a mental picture of this formidable lady. Her impressive qualifications alone made her worthy of the title of ‘Doctor’. But not a Dr Dolittle … definitely not. I was thinking more in terms of an Agatha Christie sleuth. A tweed-clad, brogue-shod, veterinary Miss Marple, black bag in one hand, stethoscope swinging in the other, ready to track down and treat illness in any cat or dog that dared to cross her beastly path.
How wrong I was.
The woman who swirled to a halt in front of me in a cloud of delicate perfume was far removed from that crusty old image. I was drawn to Crystal Sharpe immediately. In fact, if this Julie Andrews lookalike could have taken me by the hand, whisked me out of the office and up on to the Downs with a burst of ‘Climb Ev’ry Mountain’, I’d have been a very happy goatherd. But why the Julie Andrews comparison for heaven’s sake? After all I was 25. Surely I’d be more into the likes of Britney Spears or Mariah Carey, they being of my time. It was all to do with my mum and her dabbling in light musicals when I was a teenager. Well, at least I think so.
‘You must be Paul Mitchell,’ Crystal Sharpe was saying in a clipped, mid-shires accent.
I found my hand clasped by hers – slim fingers, short, well-manicured nails, devoid of varnish. Her face, too, was unblemished by make-up. Laughter lines sprang from the corners of intense, steel-blue eyes, eyes which at that moment were boring uncomfortably into mine. Dainty pearl studs adorned petite ear lobes below fringed, short tresses of copper curls. A perfect English rose? Maybe. But would there be a thorny side to this lady?
The hand unclasped itself and an apology made. ‘Sorry I wasn’t here to meet you. But I’m sure Eric was able to give you some idea how we operate.’
I felt myself blush, remembering my giggling fit in the theatre.
Her husband’s face lit up with another cheery smile. ‘We covered most things,’ he said, putting a finger to his lips and giving me a conspiratorial wink.
‘And, of course, we’ve studied your CV very thoroughly,’ added Dr Sharpe. ‘So …?’ She was again scrutinising my face. ‘Are you prepared to take the post?’
My mind was still leaping goat-like over alpine meadows. I should have been asking more questions. What happened to the last assistant? Why did he leave so quickly? Why were they so desperate for a replacement? But my head was up in the clouds. And mesmerised by Crystal’s piercing blue eyes, I said, ‘Yes,’ without thinking.
Minutes later, I found myself skipping down the drive of Prospect House whistling ‘The Lonely Goatherd’ having promised to start the following week.
Seven days later, I’d plummeted down from those alpine slopes on to the more earthly terrain of the second consulting room in Prospect House where I was peering into a cage stuffed with bars, swings, wheels and tunnels.
‘Fred’s a bit of an escape artist,’ explained the woman as her son unlocked the three padlocks on the cage door; he then stood back, reconnected himself to his iPod and started rocking on the spot again.
There was what looked like a nest box up in the far right-hand corner of the cage.
‘He