Pets in Prospect - Malcolm D. Welshman [56]
A wave of sadness swept through me. Despite the little chap’s habit of going for my ankles, he’d been a good companion for Mrs Paget. She was going to miss him terribly.
‘Do you want me to tell her?’ volunteered Mandy.
‘No,’ I replied, ‘I think I should.’
I found Mrs Paget sitting in reception, Beryl’s arm round her. She looked up, eyes red and swollen, her face streaked with tears, a handkerchief balled in her fist.
‘He’s gone, hasn’t he?’ she whispered.
I nodded. ‘I’m so sorry,’ I said, putting a hand on her shoulder. ‘There was nothing we could do to save him.’
Mrs Paget let out another heart-wrenching sob. ‘Can I see him, please?’
It was Beryl who intervened. ‘Yes, of course, Cynthia. You just wait here a minute.’ She got up, her eyes also glistening with tears. ‘I’ll see to it, Paul. You’ve got that actress woman still to deal with.’
‘Sure?’
‘Yes, sure. Go on,’ she insisted, giving me a slight push in the direction of the consulting room.
Francesca Cavendish rose to her feet as I entered. ‘Darling, how dreadful,’ was her response when I told her of Chico’s demise. Did I detect some sympathy there? But that soon evaporated when I instructed her to put Oscar on the table. Take one … scene one … Action!
‘You sure it’s clean, darling? I don’t want Oscar catching a nasty bug.’ Cut.
‘It’s disinfected between each consultation. Please put him on the table.’ Take two, and … Action!
‘The disinfectant could harm his paws. He’s got very sensitive feet you know.’ Cut.
I pointed. ‘On the table. Please.’ Take three, and … Action!
‘He might slip and slide about.’ Cut.
I clicked my fingers. ‘On the table.’ Take four.
Yes. This time it was in the can. Oscar was unpeeled from the pashmina and lowered on to the table. He was not a pretty sight. No film or TV role would ever be offered to this undersized specimen of a Maltese terrier with his lumpy, matted coat and pink skin, confetti-scattered with scurf. He immediately started bucking about the table like a pantomime horse on speed. Miss Cavendish swept him up into her pashmina again and said, ‘You’ll have to manage with me holding him.’
‘Let’s start again then, shall we? What seems to be the problem?’
This time a straight answer was given. ‘He can’t walk properly.’
‘He’s lame?’
‘That’s my idea of someone who can’t walk, sweetie.’
Oh dear. We were off again. Must be the artistic temperament. Or just plain rudeness. Whatever, I chose to ignore it. ‘So which leg’s he lame on?’
There was a theatrical shrug of the shoulders. ‘I’m no vet.’
Keep calm, Paul, keep calm. I walked round the side of the table and held out my hand. ‘May I?’ I said indicating the pashmina with the yellow teeth sticking out of it.
‘If you insist.’
‘I do.’
‘Very well then.’
There was a snarl – one that emanated from Oscar rather than Francesca Cavendish – as I slid my hand into the folds of the shawl and eased out Oscar’s front paws. ‘I’m not going to hurt you,’ I murmured.
‘My dear, he doesn’t know that,’ she said as I gingerly began palpating each of Oscar’s toes. He fidgeted and squirmed but didn’t cry out. I eased myself round the actress and levered out his hind legs from behind her elbow. The dog whimpered as I felt his right back paw.
‘Oh, my sweetheart. Is he hurting you?’ exclaimed Miss Cavendish with a toss of her turbaned head.
But at least I had located the problem. A dew claw, grossly overgrown, had curled round on itself to dig into the pad. No wonder Oscar was lame; it must have been like walking on a needle. There followed a tussle between nail clippers, Maltese terrier, fingers, folds of pashmina and loose incisors as I delved into the folds of the shawl to extract paws and, one by one, cut nails and prise out the worst of fur balls between toes. It was a masterful performance, itself worthy of an Oscar nomination if not the statuette itself.
Nail clippings shot in all directions.