Another week, another earth-shattering loss.
All the way back in 2013, I went to Romania to write a piece on the plight of street dogs. I didn’t expect to rescue two of them – I already had four collies! – and then, 21 days later, drive the length of the country to pick them up in Dover. The dogs had travelled overland in a van.
The driver opened the back door to reveal row upon row of expectant furry faces. Oh, what heartache lay in store.
During my trip I had visited an infamous state dog pound in Craiova, run by a vet the locals called ‘the Butcher’ – he received €20 for every dog he neutered, no matter how old, sick or thin. Every time I tried to take his photo, a shot of his blood-stained hands and arms, the filthy operating table, staff tried to seize my phone. Cage after cage of cowering canines. I spotted a very small, old grey dog, slumped in a puddle like a collapsed umbrella. I took off my expensive sweater and scooped her up, wrapping her in the soft wool. It felt as though I was embracing a shivering, close-to-death sparrow. Next, I spotted a black and white puppy, cowering; the workers would throw dry kibble at the cages, but she was too small and weak to get any. She tried to raise her head, squirm, smile up at me, but soon collapsed from the effort.
I scooped her up, too. I was with a charity called K-9 Angels, run by three blondes who really were a force of nature. After a great deal of negotiation and bribery, we liberated the two dogs and ferried them to a local vet. The little grey geriatric – we guessed she was about 13, given she was almost toothless – had been picked up from a rubbish tip. She was placed on a heat pad and a drip. I named her Hilda. The puppy had distemper and an infected wound.
When I got the Romanian Two home finally to Yorkshire, I kept Hilda – on her passport, under breed, it merely said, ‘Grey fur’. Nic, then living in the cottage on my land (I used to own an annexe cottage! And land!), took in the puppy, who she named Rosie. Hilda was soon renamed ‘Perfect’, despite the fact she would climb on to the cooker and eat from a saucepan, and if she had made a nest in the duvet on wash day, on no account could you move her: ‘Let’s just leave her there, shall we?’ became an oft-repeated mantra.
When Hilda went missing for three days from my garden – I had popped her on the cobbles with a bowl of pasta, to stop the other dogs stealing her dinner – I called the Swaledale Mountain Rescue Team. ‘We usually only rescue humans,’ they said calmly, but duly turned up the next morning. Nic and I had merely been running round in circles, screaming; we had put posters up on every tree, in every shop, with a photo of Hilda’s pointy face and a description that included, ‘Has blonde eyelashes’. But Swaledale Mountain Rescue were forensic and methodical. A long line of volunteers and sniffer dogs searched every rabbit hole, every inch until we found her, crawling, soaked to the skin, on the opposite side of the raging river at the bottom of my lawn. How she survived the crossing we will never know. She was quickly wrapped in foil, like a runner at the end of the London Marathon. She died three years later.
But until last week, Rosie was still very much with us. She had become stiff with age, so Nic would take her for hydrotherapy twice a week. She was showing improvement, but on Monday last week she collapsed, could not stand. It felt exactly as it had when I lost my darling Gracie. Rosie was carried to the vet and on Wednesday a scan and an X-ray were performed. It was found she had large tumours on her chest, liver, everywhere.
She was put to sleep at home on Thursday. I always called her ‘Favourite’, as she was so sweet, despite her terrible start in life. Nic is broken. I’m hugging Mini Puppy even closer to me. Each morning the first thing I do is reach across to feel her, next to me on the bed; she always sleeps lengthwise, head on the pillow, like a human. Is she breathing? Is she still warm? I cannot bear to lose her, too.
JONES MOANS… WHAT LIZ LOATHES THIS WEEK
- I keep rescuing a toad from the cellar and placing him in my outbuilding, only to find him back where we started. Do they home?
- Adults who say, ‘Two more sleeps!’
- How do mosquitoes get inside my fridge?
- Baseball caps.
