CHAPTER TEN #2
It took about half an hour to get to the small farm, and I spent the time filling Xel in on the various laws surrounding animal care and ownership on Rendol 4.
Cases of animal neglect usually came with heavy penalties, but Doot had said that the owner of the donkey had dementia.
It was a pretty rare illness these days, with medical advances in the last fifty years having greatly decreased the incidence of it, but there were a few subtypes of the disease that unfortunately still persisted.
“So on the basis that he’s probably not going to be considered legally capable,” I explained, as we pulled onto a winding lane that led to the man’s house, “he’s probably not going to be charged for any of the neglect.
But at the same time, he’ll be banned from ever owning an animal again.
The authorities will track down his family and make sure he has suitable accommodation. ”
I didn’t say it to Xel, but I was privately relieved that the owner was mentally not all there – as awful as that might have sounded.
I’d had to put up with far too many disgruntled owners deciding they could try to bully me based on the scars on my face.
A fair few of them had honestly expected me to back down just because they called me ugly – as if the idea had never occurred to me before.
This man was far more likely to simply be confused, and as much as I wanted to know that he would be receiving appropriate care, my job here was to see to the welfare of the animals.
I parked beside a familiar yellow vehicle and got out, looking around for Doot.
I spotted him a little way off, with a small cluster of people around him.
One of them was holding a crate with two chickens inside, while another had a goat on a lead, and I guessed they were the neighbours who had agreed to take on the man’s other animals.
I led Xel in their direction, keeping an eye out for the owner or the police officers who would inevitably have been called, but I couldn’t see them.
Nor could I see any sign of the donkey. I stopped a way back from the group, not wanting to engage with the neighbours if I could avoid it, and thankfully, Doot saw us coming.
He nodded in our direction, then finished up whatever he was explaining to the neighbours, before he dismissed them with a cheery wave and wandered in our direction.
“Thank you for coming,” he said, offering his hand, and I was once again grateful that it had been Doot to call me, rather than one of the other animal welfare officers the city employed.
We’d met two years ago, in the midst of a warehouse explosion that had involved eight injured kittens, and the emergency had meant we’d both spent a solid three hours helping to treat the kittens’ wounds at a nearby veterinary clinic.
By the time either of us had had time to stop and take a breath, Doot had gotten accustomed to my scars.
He’d handed me a damp cloth to wipe the soot off my face, and a shot of whisky, and then complimented my skills at inserting a venous catheter into a vein so small it was little bigger than a piece of string.
I’d responded with a wry, “Ugly but useful, right?” and he’d laughed so hard he’d shot whisky out of his nose.
“This is Xel,” I introduced him, before Doot could ask who my new companion was. “He’s coming to work for me after my uncle passed away. So where’s this donkey at?” I rushed on, without giving Doot the chance to start asking questions about Xel. “And how’s the owner dealing with all of this?”
“Welcome aboard, Xel,” Doot said, then he shook his head.
“I’m amazed the owner has managed to keep the house going for as long as he has.
There’s hardly any food, most of the animals were roaming free and the electricity company’s been threatening to shut off the power for months.
That’s what finally got us out here. They sent a man to turn off the power, he saw the state of the place and called in the authorities.
Sad story, but at least now, he’ll be getting the help he needs. The animals, on the other hand…”
What little optimism there had been on Doot’s face vanished as he led us into a ramshackle stable with a door that was almost falling off its hinges.
“This is Huckleberry,” he said, turning the corner and coming to a stop in front of a low stall door.
I stepped closer, trying hard to make out the donkey in the dim light.
Giving up after a few moments, I turned on the light on my comm instead…
and gasped as I finally got a look at the sorrowful creature.
“Oh god, Doot…”
“He’s in rough shape,” Doot confirmed, though I could clearly see that for myself.
The donkey was emaciated, his coat falling out in clumps, his mane matted and his hooves…
Oh god, his hooves were overgrown to the point that he could barely stand up.
And now I understood what Doot hadn’t said during our call.
Getting him into the trailer was going to be a nightmare, not because Huckleberry didn’t want to go, but because the simple act of walking was damn near impossible.
“Would you be able to bring the trailer over here?” Xel suggested immediately. “So he doesn’t have to walk so far?”
“Yeah, absolutely,” I agreed. “Is he injured?” I asked Doot. “Aside from the obvious, I mean? Can he walk?”
“Slowly, but yes. He was in a yard around the back, in the full sun. We brought him in here to give him some shade. He had a barrel full of green water and some mouldy hay. I’ve given him some fresh water, but I wasn’t sure about food.
I didn’t want to accidentally make him sick by giving him the wrong thing. ”
I nodded. “Good quality hay with a protein supplement is ideally what we’re looking for. Assuming his teeth aren’t in too bad shape. Is there any hay around here?” Perhaps I should have thought to bring some.
Doot looked dubious. “Not really. I’ll show you what there is.” He led the way around the back of the stable, to a hay shed that was filled with…
“Oh, heck, no,” I blurted out, backing swiftly out of the shed.
The smell of rotting vegetation was strong in the air, and a quick glance at the bales revealed that they were covered in a pale, fuzzy mould.
“No way in hell he should be eating that. Well, we’re going to have to try and get him into the trailer using old fashioned coaxing and pushing.
Give me a minute, I’ll go and bring the car around.
” I hurried off, doing my best to avoid the two police officers who were now hanging around out the front of the owner’s house.
From inside, I could hear vague shouts – a man declaring that he wasn’t going anywhere, thank you very much – and I did my best to ignore it.
Towing the trailer across the uneven grass was a slow and painstaking exercise, but when I got close to the stable, Doot did his best to guide me around the worst of the potholes, until I finally had the rear of the trailer just a metre or two from the stable door.
I got out of the car and headed back inside, expecting to find Xel in there, keeping Huckleberry calm. He’d already proven to have something of an affinity for animals, and they seemed to like him in return.
But the stable was empty, aside from Huckleberry himself, and I stepped back outside, looking around. “Where did Xel get to?” I asked Doot… just as Xel himself came dashing around the corner, an armful of long grass in his grasp.
“Will this help?” he asked, with a hopeful look on his face. “There’s a patch of long grass just over the back fence. Everything inside the fence has been eaten down to bare dirt.”
“Perfect,” I said, relieved all over again. Okay, so maybe if Xel kept being this helpful, I would have to learn to overlook the lack of in-depth conversation. He clearly wasn’t stupid, for all his reticent ways, so maybe this was just more of a ‘speak when you’re spoken to’ sort of thing.
And if that was the case, then it was probably up to me to be a bit more forthcoming with conversation. Lectures about animal care were all well and good, but they couldn’t take the place of sharing real thoughts and feelings.
Deal with the donkey first, I mentally scolded myself. I could navigate my own self pity later.
We headed back inside the stable, and Doot helped by holding the various doors open while I led Huckleberry out of his stall, with Xel bribing him the whole way with tempting mouthfuls of fresh grass.
It was a long, slow process, particularly when we got to the ramp of the trailer.
Huckleberry stopped, and for a few long minutes, it seemed he wasn’t willing to go any further.
The ramp shifted a little under his weight, and for a creature used to being so unsteady on his feet, that was enough to frighten him.
But Xel was endlessly patient – far more so than anyone I’d ever know, outside of the other staff at the sanctuary – and he stood on the ramp, holding out the grass, backing slowly, slowly into the trailer, until hunger finally won out against caution.
Huckleberry plodded anxiously up the ramp, lifting his feet high to try and avoid tripping, and was rewarded with the rest of the armful of grass once he was finally standing inside the trailer.
“Nice work,” I said to Xel, a wealth of appreciation in my voice – not just for his help, but for the completely unruffled way he’d delivered it. He seemed like the sort of man who’d be handy in a crisis, able to keep himself and everyone around him calm.
“Thank you, sir,” Xel replied, and his tone caught me off guard for a moment.
It was warm and slightly husky, like honey poured over hot toast, and the little smile on his face was full of satisfaction.
And god, he was gorgeous when he smiled.
I had the insane thought that I was going to have to give him a reason to do that more often…
and then I quickly squashed the idea. Not that I wanted him to be miserable.
But swooning over him like a lovesick teenager was entirely inappropriate.
Job done, we eased around Huckleberry and out of the trailer.
“I’ll call the vet out to give him a thorough check over,” I told Doot, as I secured the rear door. “We’ll let you know how he goes. He’s got a long, slow recovery ahead of him, but I can’t see any reason why he shouldn’t do well, in the long run.”
Doot nodded and shook my hand again. “Good to see you again, Cole. Don’t be a stranger. We should get a beer sometime. And you too, Xel. Thanks for your help.”
“Yeah, we should do that,” I said, knowing that both he and I knew I didn’t mean it. There was no way in hell I was going to go and sit in a pub and let a bunch of half-drunk busybodies gape at me for the whole evening. “Take care of yourself. I’ll see you next time.”
I eased the car back onto the driveway, listening to the faint thumps as Huckleberry learned to balance himself, and then we were off, heading back towards the sanctuary, where we’d have a whole new pile of work to do.
After five minutes or so on the road, Xel said, “Doot seems like a nice man.”
“Yeah, he is,” I agreed. “Cares a lot about the animals. I guess that makes his job a pretty stressful one. It’s not all animal neglect and inhumane conditions, but there’s enough of that that it can get draining.”
“We should invite him over. For a beer.”
I looked sharply at Xel, before fixing my eyes back on the road. “What? Why?”
“He said we should have a beer. And forgive me if I’m being presumptuous, but I got the impression that you wouldn’t enjoy going out to a pub or a restaurant. But there’s no reason why we – you – couldn’t invite him to your house for a social evening.”
The fact that Xel was being rather insistent about it made me once again re-evaluate my impression of him as being on the laconic side.
I’d displayed no particular enthusiasm for the idea, and yet he was pressing it – which was fairly un-dimari-like behaviour.
So could it be that he was pushing the idea because he wanted another opportunity to socialise?
“No, I don’t think so,” I said, feeling a wave of regret even as I said it. “It’s just one of those things people say, but they don’t really mean it.”
There was silence for a moment. Then Xel said, “Then perhaps we could simply invite him over to check on Huckleberry in a week or two? I’m sure he would be interested to know how he’s recovering.”
I knew exactly what he was suggesting. And yet I didn’t have the heart to say no. “Yeah, sure,” I said, already knowing I was going to regret this. “Maybe in a couple of weeks.”