The Vet from Snowy River by Stella Quinn

CHAPTER

38

Vera almost had a skip in her step as she let herself out of the kitchen and into the alley. She’d made a small move in the right direction with Josh today, and that had felt good. Offering Graeme a share in The Billy Button Café … that felt good, too.

Maybe Marigold was right. Maybe she could hope, just a little. Even if Josh had stopped popping into her café. Even if he just smiled politely at her now whenever they met in the street, and didn’t linger to chat. She was the one who’d let him down—

A deep, sinister yowl rose up from the shadows by the rubbish bin and she paused. Surely grey cat hadn’t found her way back to the alley from her apartment?

‘You hear that, Graeme?’

Her bunch of keys was jangling in the door lock, but still she heard a faint scuffle. ‘Daisy?’

Nothing. Of course … she’d taken so long to name the stray cat who’d befriended her, why would the cat respond? She flipped over the phone and used the screen to illuminate the rubbish bin. ‘Grey cat?’ Two round, yellow eyes gleamed back at her from a still, sprawled shape.

‘Oh no,’ she murmured. ‘No, no, no!’

‘What is it, Vera?’

‘I think—’

She couldn’t say it. The alley was cool now the sun had hidden itself behind the mountain range, and shreds of leaf litter skittered along the old brick gutter. Her handbag slipped from her fingers as she ran forward.

‘Oh god.’

Grey cat’s eyes were closed, but her sides heaved in distress. A low sound escaped her mouth, nothing like the tractor purr she used when she was content; this sound was terrible. It spoke of pain, and loss, and suffering. Vera recognised herself in it: her pain, her loss, her suffering.

‘She needs help,’ she whispered.

‘Vera?’ Graeme’s voice was worried behind her.

‘She needs help!’ She all but shrieked the words. ‘Get Josh. Please. And run.’

Her friend’s booted feet pounded down the street as Vera bent her head to the cat’s.

‘Hang on, girl. Hang on. Help’s coming.’

The cat’s breathing was rough. Vera pulled off her gloves and rested her fingers, as gently as she could, between the cat’s soft grey ears. There was no blood that she could see, but the cat’s back legs looked loose, somehow, as though her muscles had given way. She’d known grey cat was wandering—why had she done nothing about it?

She could do something now, but what? God, she’d never felt so useless. A box—yes. When Josh came, he’d need something flat and stable, strong enough to bear grey cat’s weight. The cat was fatter now she no longer had to scrounge for food, and heavy with the life she carried in her belly.

Vera lifted her head, wiped away the blur of tears. Milk crates towered by The Billy Button Café’s service door, and beside them stood a stack of waxed boxes that her vegetables were delivered in. They’d do. They’d more than do if she tore out one of the sides.

She leapt to her feet and pulled the stack of boxes apart, searching for the cleanest one, then raced back to the cat. Should she move her?

Just as she was dithering over the wisdom of trying to lift her on her own, footsteps sounded in the alley and the broad white beam of a torchlight shone square in her face.

She shielded her eyes. ‘Josh?’

‘I’m here.’

Thank god. Two little words from him and that’s all it took; tears she’d been fighting to hold back roared up like a freak wave and overflowed down her cheeks.

‘I think she’s been hit by a car. Her breathing’s all funny and her tail’s all still.’

‘We can’t do anything here. Put your hands under her head and I’ll do the back. We’ll lift her into the box on three. Ready?’

No. She wasn’t ready, but she slid her hands under grey cat’s head and shoulders anyway, lifted as Josh commanded.

The cat gave a low, low yowl, then subsided into silence.

‘Is she—’

She couldn’t finish the question.

‘Hold the torch,’ said Josh. ‘Graeme’s with Hannah getting a table prepped. Vera?’

She hurried along beside him, shining the torch where his feet needed to step.

‘Yes?’

His voice was firm. ‘This doesn’t look good, Vera. You need to be prepared.’

She swallowed back a sob. ‘I know.’

Lights were blazing in the vet clinic, and Hannah was in hairnet, mask and gloves when they raced into the operating room.

‘Anaesthetic,’ said Hannah.

‘On it,’ said Josh, pulling on a pair of gloves then lowering a conical mask over the cat’s face.

‘Back’s not broken,’ said Hannah, as her fingers slid along grey cat’s spine and around her haunches. ‘But that leg is. She’s going to need surgery to pull— Oh, the kittens are still alive. There’s movement.’

Vera let out a breath.

‘Feel here, Josh,’ said Hannah. She grabbed Josh’s hand and slid it over the belly of the cat.

‘But her leg,’ said Vera. ‘What’s going to happen?’

Hannah started to answer but Josh cut her off.

‘Grey cat—Daisy—is badly injured, and the leg may not be the worst of her problems. She may have internal bleeding, and if that’s the case, then our job is to help her on her way as quickly and painlessly as possible. We also need to deliver these kittens by C-section. There’s a lot of unknowns, Vera. They may well not live. You need to step out into the waiting room.’

She shook her head. ‘No, Josh, please. I can’t leave her.’

‘That wasn’t a request, Vera. Off you go.’

She looked at his face. No smile in his eyes. No look of the easygoing sweetheart she’d pushed out of her life. He looked like a stranger.

‘Can’t I stay? Please. She’s all I’ve got.’

Graeme slipped his arm around her shoulders. ‘Come on, honey. We’re stepping out the door, and we’re staying right there, close by.’

Vera walked out to the dimly lit waiting room and collapsed in a chair, covering her face with her hands. There was no way she’d be allowed to keep kittens in prison.