Mrs Parry was as pleased as the girls, and they told Mr McPhail the plan as soon as they got back to school. When the Maxview arrived, Mr McPhail assembled it for them on top of the stables, with a clear view of the sheep paddocks.
‘Are we going to have to leave the sheep here as bait, though?’ said Hannah, looking worried. ‘Valentina isn’t going to want to be tearing around a paddock – she might ruin her lovely fleece, or worse!’
Mr McPhail rubbed his forehead with his hand and shook his head.
‘Hang on!’ said Abbey. ‘I’ve got the best idea.’
Everyone else groaned, but Abbey didn’t hear them – she had already run halfway up the path towards the school.
She was back within five minutes, carrying a bone wrapped in plastic wrap.
‘But isn’t that . . .?’ said Hannah.
‘Miss Finch said I could have it back. She didn’t really know why Mrs Bristow had sent it over to her, and she was a little nervous about asking,’ laughed Abbey.
She ran to the table where all the wool from the morning’s shearing demo was left for sorting and came back with an armful.
‘What on earth are you up to, Abbey?’ said Mr McPhail.
Abbey carried her wool and bone out into the paddock, right in front of the camera. ‘Making a sheep,’ she said. ‘Isn’t it obvious?’
Mr McPhail started laughing as Abbey used the wool to create what looked like a sheep curled up on the ground, but in the end, even he had to admit it was a brilliant idea.
‘We can even watch what’s happening from our room! With the Maxview 2000, you can watch every movement on your mobile device from the comfort of your own home,’ said Talika excitedly.
Hannah couldn’t help but giggle. ‘Your father would be so proud of you right now!’
After dinner and their showers, the girls settled in with some of Talika’s Indian snacks and cushions, watching the screen of her iPad with great interest. There in the darkness sat the bone, covered in a pile of wool. The real sheep were tucked away safely in the arena.
‘We haven’t even named it,’ said Abbey, crunching on a butter murukku.
‘Let’s call it Bob!’ laughed Hannah. ‘Bob Down. The Sheep.’
The girls cracked up, but then suddenly Talika stiffened and grabbed Abbey’s arm. ‘It’s coming,’ she said, and pointed to the screen.
Nobody moved or spoke. They were almost afraid to, in case the dog somehow sensed it. The lights from the school cast just enough of a glow to light up the paddocks. The dark shape was unmistakable. The dog was crouched low and skirting along the fence. It came to a point where it pushed under.
‘Well, at least we know where it’s getting in,’ whispered Hannah.
Staying low, the dog made its way across the paddock. But instead of heading for Bob, it was heading towards the arena where the real sheep were locked up.
‘Oh no,’ said Abbey, ‘it’s not going for Bob – it’s trying to dig under the arena fence!’ She pointed to the corner of the screen. ‘It must have been working on the hole. Look, it’s halfway under!’
The girls watched in horror as the dog dug furiously at the hole under the fence.
‘We’ve got to go!’ cried Abbey. She flung open the door and they bolted down the stairs. They didn’t care who heard. This was an emergency!
They ran down the path towards the side of the arena where they knew the dog was.
‘It’s gone!’ said Abbey, when they got to the hole.
‘Is it in there with them?’ said Talika, fear in her voice.
Abbey unlocked the gate. ‘I guess there is only way to find out,’ she said, entering the dark arena.
‘Abbey, look out!’ screamed Hannah from a high spot on the fence.
Abbey spun around in time just to see the dog running up behind Valentina, Hannah’s sheep.
‘Get out of it!’ bellowed Hannah. She leapt off the fence, into the arena, and grabbed the rake that lay against the wall. She charged at the dog and took a swipe at it, but the dog scooted sideways and took off.
Hannah was not giving up. With her nightie flapping behind her, she raced after the dog with the rake high in the air. She chased it all the way back to where it had come in, and smacked the fence as hard as she could.
‘Get home!’ she yelled, as the dog disappeared into the night.
By now, all of the lights of the boarding house were blazing, and the night was filled with voices and shouts as Miss Beckett and the boarders came running down the path.
‘I guess now we have our video evidence!’ gulped Talika.
‘I cannot believe that yell came out of you, Han!’ called Abbey, running across the paddock to meet her brave friend.
‘What is it? What’s going on?’ cried Miss Beckett. She, too, was in her nightie, and even from a distance she looked like she had seen a ghost.
Talika started telling the house supervisor and the surrounding girls what had happened. They all stared in disbelief at Hannah as she approached.
Elizabeth gave her sister a hug. ‘Are you all right?’ she said. ‘I got such a fright when I heard you scream!’
Hannah looked up at her big sister. ‘I guess I’m getting pretty good at telling things off,’ she said.
Elizabeth pulled her in closer. ‘Well, maybe there were some things around here that needed telling off,’ she said gently.
‘Come on, girls,’ said Miss Beckett, obviously relieved that no one was injured. ‘We’ve got a few holes to block up.’
Abbey couldn’t help but smile at what people would have thought if they had seen the girls from Willowvale Girls Grammar lugging rocks around a paddock in their nighties at midnight.
They all stood in silence in Ms Sterling’s office as she watched the replay of the footage the next morning.
Abbey had to bite her lip to stop from laughing when she saw her slender blonde friend running around a paddock swinging a rake and bellowing like a mad woman in the darkness. Mr McPhail and Mrs Parry were clearly gobsmacked and kept looking from the screen to Hannah and back again.
‘Well,’ said Ms Sterling. ‘A number of things cross my mind when I watch this. Firstly, Mr McPhail, a call will need to be made to the council immediately. This dog simply can’t go on entering school property like this.’
Mr McPhail nodded and left the room to make the call on his mobile phone.
‘Secondly,’ said Ms Sterling, this time facing Hannah and pausing as she looked at her closely. ‘Secondly, bravery comes in many forms, and often from the most unlikely places. While chasing dogs in nightwear is not something you will find in our handbook, I do applaud the courage that you have shown here, and appreciate that under the circumstances there was little else you could do but break the rules.’
Abbey watched Hannah standing stiff and unmoving, staring at the wall ahead of her.
Nobody said anything for a few moments.
‘Hannah,’ whispered Abbey, giving her friend a nudge. ‘We’re not in trouble. You can breathe!’
Hannah let out a huge sigh of relief, and everyone in the room laughed.
‘Well, blow me down,’ Mr McPhail said when he came back in. ‘This just gets trickier and trickier. Apparently the neighbours have also been onto the council because the dog has been barking incessantly and crying. When they went next door this morning to try to talk to the owner about it, they looked in the windows and it seems he’s done a runner. All packed up and gone.’
‘He’s left the dog behind?’ gasped Hannah.
‘It appears so. They tried to catch the dog, but with no luck.’
‘What will happen to the dog if the council does catch it? It is so thin and neglected looking,’ said Talika, fear creeping into her voice.
‘I don’t imagine it’s the sort of dog they could rehome easily,’ said Mrs Parry gently. ‘D
ogs like that are often put to sleep.’
The girls didn’t know what to say. Suddenly they felt terribly sorry for the dog they had spent so long trying to convict.
‘I wonder if that house will be up for rent now?’ said Mr McPhail, almost to himself.
‘You could live there and look after the dog!’ said Abbey, leaping in. ‘I’m sure if you fed it, bathed it, fixed the fence and trained it, it could be a great dog. Border collies are really loyal, if you treat them well –’
‘Whoa,’ laughed Mr McPhail. ‘I think we’re getting a little bit ahead of ourselves! It’s really hard to retrain a dog that has a taste for killing sheep . . . but I have seen it done, and it is quite a young dog.’
‘We could help you,’ said Hannah. ‘I’m sure once the poor thing has food in its stomach it will be less likely to get into trouble.’
‘And it would be very handy living so close to your work,’ added Miss Beckett, beaming.
‘Yes, well,’ said Mr McPhail, raising his hands in surrender, ‘the first thing is to try to catch this dog before it gets up to any more mischief.’
They all left the principal’s office, and Mrs Parry and the yawning girls headed to science. Talika was carrying the box with all their parasites in it.
Everyone put their specimens on the benches and the life cycle drawings they had done next to them. There were lice, flies, flukes, mites, worms, ticks and leeches, all in different stages of their life cycles.
‘I am so impressed, girls!’ said Mrs Parry as they walked around from bench to bench, learning about each one.
Abbey was particularly proud of her lungworm. She was certain that was the thing that got them an A in the end. Talika couldn’t wait to ring her parents and tell them. But she thought maybe she wouldn’t tell them exactly what the A was for.
Two weeks later, the girls rode past the old house on their horses. It had freshly mown lawns, a fixed paling fence and neatly trimmed shrubs.
‘G’day, Drover!’ called Abbey to the border collie sitting in a basket on the verandah. He had a new collar, a shiny coat and a fat stomach.
Woof! barked Drover, wagging his tail.
Mr McPhail opened the newly painted door and waved. ‘Morning, girls,’ he called.
‘Morning!’ they replied.
Abbey grinned at her friends. Then she leaned forward over Pepper and gave him a nudge with her heels.
‘Race you home!’ she cried as she flew off down the road.
Hannah and Talika looked at each other and laughed.
It was going to be another wonderful day at Willowvale.
The road to success has been, and continues to be, a long one. Had it not been for the incredible people I have been lucky enough to have around me, urging me on when times were tough, I would have given up on this dream. To all of you (and you know who you are), thank you!
To Clare Forster, Lisa Riley and Katrina Lehman, I feel as if we know these girls already! Thank you for sharing this vision and turning it into an even better reality.
Hannah, Abbey and Talika are new recruits at Willowvale boarding school’s special Vet Cadets program. This term, it’s all about cattle. Abbey is determined to prove herself in a cattle-cutting competition against a nearby boy’s boarding school.
But when Talika’s little pony, Pudding, falls dangerously ill, the friends need all their investigation skills and determination if they’re to save his life.
Abbey, Hannah and Talika are new recruits at Willowvale boarding school’s Vet Cadets program. And what a year it is turning out to be! Henrietta, the school pig, has had a very large litter of piglets. But something is wrong with Itsy Bitsy, the smallest piglet, and the girls must work together to fight for her life.
There’s also the mystery of some stolen cattle to solve – it seems that saving lives and crime fighting through science are all just part of a normal school day for these clever Vet Cadets.
Abbey, Hannah and Talika are new recruits at Willowvale boarding school’s Vet Cadets program. Mrs Parry, their science teacher, has given each of the girls a chick to raise and train, but not everyone is happy about it!
When a game of horseback hide-and-seek turns into a matter of life and death, rules are broken and the friends’ courage sorely tested. This time, a solution might be out of the Vet Cadets’ hands . . .
PUFFIN BOOKS
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First published by Penguin Random House Australia Pty Ltd, 2017
Text copyright © Rebecca Johnson, 2017
The moral right of the author has been asserted.
All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
Cover and text design by Bruno Herfst © Penguin Random House Australia Pty Ltd
Cover photograph ‘Teenage girl kissing Border Collie’
© Beate Zoellner/F1online/Getty Images
All other cover photographs © Shutterstock.com
Internal illustrations p174 © Shutterstock.com
penguin.com.au
ISBN: 978-1-76014-648-1
THE BEGINNING
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