by Megan Rix
The next dog was so excited to be let out that he leapt up at the adjutant’s face and licked his nose.
‘The colonel won’t like that.’
A wolfhound a little further along stood on his back legs and put his front paws on the bars on his cage. The cavalry adjutant jumped back in surprise.
‘Just saying hello,’ Kenneth told him mildly.
But the man wasn’t listening to him. He’d stopped at the next cage.
‘This one,’ he said as he looked at the puppy cuddled up to his ball.
‘Oh no, not that one, sir,’ Kenneth said.
‘Why not? Does he have a ferocious nature? Is he a bit of a biter?’
Kenneth was riled by this insult to Sammy. ‘Indeed he is not. He’s the exact opposite in fact.’
‘Good – then I’ll take him.’
‘There’s lots of other dogs …’
‘I’ve seen the one I want and I have to get on. We’re leaving for the front any day and there’s no time to lose.’
Kenneth sighed and opened the cage door.
‘His name’s Sammy,’ he said.
Sammy yawned as Kenneth clipped a lead to his collar. He trotted obediently up and down past the other dogs in their cages with the soldier.
The cavalry adjutant was very impressed with how well Sammy walked on his lead.
‘He’s perfect. Do you know what he’s like around horses?’ he asked.
Kenneth didn’t.
‘Never mind. I’m sure he’ll be fine.’
Chapter 13
‘Was ist das?’ the young German sniper asked, looking through his periscope out at no-man’s- land.
The German soldiers had heard rumours that the British soldiers did all sorts of nasty things and were very sneaky, but now it looked as if a cat was heading towards them from the British trench.
Could it be a trick? A trick to draw them out? A spy cat or worse: a cat with explosives strapped to it, or a cat with rabies …
You could never tell what the British might do.
Mouser saw the periscope move with her sharp eyes and went to investigate. She peered over the top of the German trench and saw the soldiers cowering away from her below. None of them seemed eager to stroke her and that just made her want to be stroked. She slipped down into the trench and headed towards the men as they backed away from her. She looked just like a perfectly ordinary grey tabby cat, but they couldn’t be completely sure.
‘Miaow,’ said Mouser, and then she miaowed again. She was tired and she was hungry, and her coat had far more mud on it than she liked. One of the soldiers put a tin plate with some sliced sausage on the ground and then backed away quickly without even trying to touch her.
The smell of the food was too much for Mouser to resist and she hurried to the plate and started to eat.
‘Looks like an ordinary cat and eats like an ordinary cat,’ the soldiers told each other in German as they watched Mouser eating.
One of the soldiers took a step towards her, but the sergeant wanted to be completely sure the cat was safe to touch before his men got too close.
‘Halt!’ he told the soldier and the soldier immediately stopped dead.
Mouser looked up briefly before putting her head back down to finish her meal. Once the sausage was gone, she began to lick her forepaws and wash the mud and dirt away from her coat as best she could while the soldiers watched.
‘Looks like an ordinary cat, eats like an ordinary cat and washes like an ordinary cat,’ the soldiers told each other. They were almost positive Mouser was safe, but still they hesitated because they knew she’d come from the British trench. After she’d cleaned herself, Mouser hopped on to one of the sleeping shelves the soldiers had cut into the side of the trench, kneaded the blanket and sacking that already lay there, curled up and very soon fell fast asleep, exhausted from her ordeal.
One by one the German soldiers took it in turns to watch her and finally it was decided that the cat was safe to stroke, and when Mouser woke a few hours later everyone wanted to do so.
‘Mietze, Mietze,’ they called to her.
Soon they began to wonder if the cat might be good at rat-catching, as they had the same problem with rats that the British did.
‘Ratten?’ they asked her.
Mouser yawned and stretched out her claws. She didn’t know what these men were saying, she didn’t recognize any of the sounds, but she was glad to have found somewhere comfy to rest where she was well fed and stroked.
The cavalry, meanwhile, were treating Sammy very well at their HQ in Whitehall. He’d slept on a pillow with a soft blanket covering him and when he woke up he was given liver and kidneys for breakfast. He gobbled it all up just before the man in charge arrived.
‘What a fine little chap he is,’ the colonel said as Sammy trotted over to him and wagged his tail. ‘What’s his name?’
‘They’ve been calling him Sammy, sir,’ his adjutant said.
‘Then so will we. Don’t want him getting confused.’
The colonel stroked Sammy and Sammy licked him on his face, under his nose, where he had fur. The man laughed. ‘I’ve already completed my morning ablutions, thank you!’
Sammy was sure laughing meant the man liked being licked very much and so he did it some more.
‘We’ll need to get Sammy measured up for a proper collar and a bandana in the regiment’s colours,’ the colonel said to his adjutant. ‘And I want my saddle adjusted so he can ride with me into battle.’
‘Yes, sir,’ the harried adjutant said, and he hurried out to give the orders.
‘There’s someone I want you to meet,’ the colonel said as he picked Sammy up and tucked him under his arm. ‘She’s in the stables.’
Sammy looked about him as the colonel carried him into the stable building. The air was full of very interesting new smells.
Suddenly a horse neighed at him and Sammy yelped in surprise. He’d only ever seen one horse up close before, but in the stables there were lots of them putting their great heads over their doors and blowing and neighing. He cringed back when one of them, a huge chestnut mare, shook her head, sending flecks of spittle about.
‘It’s all right,’ the colonel said as he stroked Sammy. ‘There’s nothing to fear here.’ He put his hand out and rubbed the white blaze down the chestnut mare’s forehead. ‘This is Dobby. Dobby, meet Sammy. Sammy, this is my horse Dobby. I want the two of you to be the best of friends.’
For a moment the two animals looked directly in each other’s eyes and Sammy’s fear disappeared. He wagged his tail as Dobby blew gently through her nose at him.
Chapter 14
Arthur and Lizzie hurried round to Sammy’s kennel on Saturday morning. But Sammy wasn’t there.
‘Maybe someone else is taking him for a walk,’ Arthur said. He couldn’t keep the disappointment out of his voice. He thought of Sammy as their special charge and was looking forward to playing football with him again.
Kenneth came over to them, his face grim.
‘Where’s …’ Lizzie started to ask, but her voice trailed off as Kenneth shook his head.
‘Has something happened to Sammy?’
‘He seemed fine when we left him, not sick at all.’
‘He’s gone,’ Kenneth said, and he took Oliver’s football out of the kennel and gave it to them.
‘Gone?’ Lizzie asked as she took back the ball. ‘What do you mean?’
Kenneth sighed. ‘I tried to get him to take another dog instead. But he wasn’t having it. Sammy was the one he wanted and so Sammy’s the one he got.’
‘Who?’ Arthur asked. ‘Who’s got Sammy?’
‘The cavalry. He’s gone to be a cavalry mascot.’
‘No,’ Lizzie said. ‘I don’t understand.’
‘’Fraid so. I didn’t want to let him go, but the truth is he’ll make a fine mascot. Pets as well as people have got to do their part.’
‘But he’s so little,’ Lizzie said.
‘They’ll take
good care of him,’ Kenneth said, and he was sure they would. ‘The soldier that took him seemed very taken with him and I’m sure his commanding officer, the colonel, will be just as much so.’
Lizzie nodded. Anyone who met Sammy would fall in love with him. They couldn’t help it.
‘I’ll miss him so much,’ she said tearfully.
‘We were hoping he could become our dog one day,’ Arthur said, swallowing down the lump in his throat.
Kenneth nodded. ‘There’s other dogs that need your attention now,’ he said, hoping to take Arthur and Lizzie’s minds off Sammy. ‘And cats too.’
Lizzie and Arthur followed him to meet the other dogs and cats that needed them, but they couldn’t help worrying about Sammy.
‘Every cat is unique, just like every dog and all animals in fact, including people,’ Kenneth told Lizzie and Arthur as he opened the cattery door. ‘And they all cope differently with what life throws at them.’
He stopped at the first cage. It had the name ‘Jango’ written on it and a black cat with a white spot on his front stared out at them from inside.
‘Jango is quite a sociable cat and very talkative,’ Kenneth told Arthur. ‘He quite likes being handled, but will let you know when he’s had enough.’
‘Just like Mouser,’ Arthur said. Secretly, he was still hoping Mouser might turn up at Battersea one day and they’d finally be able to take her home. He and Lizzie always looked out for her when they went out and asked their friends if they’d seen her, but so far no one had.
Kenneth handed Arthur a cat brush. ‘Try grooming him if he’ll let you.’
Arthur took the brush.
‘Here, Jango,’ he called as he crouched down and waited for Jango to come to him as Kenneth had told them to.
‘Can’t force a cat so it’s better to let it make the first move.’
As Lizzie and Kenneth carried on down the line of cages, Arthur scratched his fingernails back and forth on the floor of Jango’s cage and the cat came over to investigate. Arthur stroked him and then tried brushing him with the soft brush. Jango really seemed to like that, but only on his back, not his tummy.
Kenneth stopped outside a tiny room that had once been a cupboard.
‘Daisy and Daffodil,’ he said, nodding at the room where there were two lumps under a blanket, but no other indication that there were any cats in there. The cat basket in the corner was empty.
‘They’ve come from the same home, but have only been here a few days and are very nervous of people. Spend a bit of time with them and chat to them. If they’ll let you stroke them, all well and good. But, if they won’t let you, don’t worry – just keep on chatting or singing to them if you prefer. It’ll get them used to human company.’
‘Right,’ Lizzie said, and Kenneth left her to it.
Lizzie opened the door and went into the small room. ‘Hello, little cats,’ she said, and she sat down on the stone floor.
She thought it would be better to chat than sing to the cats as she wasn’t very good at singing. At school some of the children had been selected to sing in a choir to raise money for the war effort. But the elderly choirmaster had told Lizzie she wouldn’t be needed when he’d heard her voice.
One of the cats peeped out from under the blanket as Lizzie told them about what had been happening recently.
‘We’re still looking for our own cat, Mouser. We’re not sure where she can have got to … Oh,’ she exclaimed, when she saw the little face peering out at her, ‘aren’t you beautiful?’
The little cat was pure white apart from its bright blue eyes. It tucked its head back under the blanket and the other one peeped out.
‘Hello there.’ Lizzie smiled, but her enthusiasm was too much for this cat and it disappeared back under the blanket. Lizzie carried on talking. ‘I was just telling your friend about how our cat’s gone missing. She always used to sleep on my bed and now it feels much too big without her stretching herself out on the pillow.’
The cats started playing together under the blanket and Lizzie smiled. If they were feeling secure enough to play, that had to be a good sign.
Kenneth came to find her ten minutes later.
‘They’re such pretty cats,’ Lizzie said.
‘They look a bit like Siamese cats to me,’ Kenneth told her. ‘But they’ve got longer coats and haven’t developed the usual markings. Want to meet your next one?’
Lizzie scrambled to her feet. ‘Bye, little cats,’ she said, but there was no response from under the blanket. She closed the door as she went out to join Kenneth.
‘Amelia wants to take some of the pets into the hospital where she works and I think it’d be just as good for the cats and dogs we have here as it would be for the patients,’ Kenneth said as they walked.
Lizzie thought it was an excellent idea. ‘But not Daisy and Daffodil yet?’
‘Oh no – not until they’re much happier and more confident around people. Amelia has to get permission from her matron first and she’s a bit of a stickler for the no pets rule. Mellie’s got a meeting with her today and, although she hasn’t said so, being Amelia, I know she’s worried about it.’
He stopped outside a cage with a large ginger tomcat inside.
‘This is Herbert,’ Kenneth said. ‘Now he would make a perfect hospital visiting cat. He’d be happy to just sit on someone’s lap and get stroked all day long. Why don’t you give him a bit of attention? You can take him out and sit in the chair there.’
He pointed to an ancient but comfy-looking armchair in the corner close to the cages.
Lizzie carried Herbert to the chair and did find him very soothing. Once he’d kneaded her lap enough for him to decide it was comfortable enough to do so, he curled up and went to sleep.
‘It’s most important that kittens gets lots of handling right from the start if they’re going to become well socialized and make good pets,’ Kenneth told Arthur as he led him to the kitten area.
Arthur spent the next ten minutes playing with some kittens that had been born at the shelter. He was glad it was a Saturday so they didn’t have to rush off to school.
Meanwhile Amelia’s meeting with the matron at the hospital was not going so well.
‘I truly feel that bringing animals into the hospital will help the patients. Especially those who’ve been traumatized by the war. You know yourself how therapeutic it can be to stroke a cat or a dog.’
But the matron did not know this, nor did she agree that it was true.
‘It’s unhygienic to have pets in a hospital. And you’re intending to bring strays in. What if one of them had the rabies infection?’
‘That’s hardly likely –’ Amelia started to say, but the matron continued.
‘And, as for a cat bite, they don’t even need to have rabies to cause extreme infection.’
‘Second only to being bitten by a human,’ Amelia agreed. Human bites were the most dangerous. ‘But these will be very calm cats and dogs and there’ll be no risk of anyone getting bitten. Out on the front animals are bravely doing their bit every day, you know. There are messenger dogs and mercy dogs risking their lives to help the soldiers.’
‘I’ve not heard of such things,’ said her matron curtly.
‘Britain doesn’t have them yet, but the French and Belgian and German armies do and no doubt we will soon. Mercy dogs find injured soldiers on the battlefield. They provide them with medical supplies that are strapped to their bodies in a bag with a red cross on it. They even have small canteens of water tied across their chests so the soldiers can have a drink. I’ve read about one French Red Cross dog called Captain, who located thirty wounded men in a single day by taking one of the wounded soldier’s caps back to HQ for help and then leading the rescue party right to them. And –’
‘I’m sorry,’ the matron interrupted Amelia, ‘but I simply cannot allow animals in the hospital.’ She didn’t add that she herself had been bitten by her grandmother’s dog as a child and had never felt co
mfortable around them ever since.
‘But –’
‘That’ll be all.’
Amelia left the matron’s office feeling very frustrated that her suggestions weren’t being properly considered. All sorts of different treatments were being tried to help heal the traumatized and often shell-shocked soldiers and get them back to the front as soon as possible. She knew that spending time with a calm pet would do nothing but help. Why would no one listen?
Chapter 15
Sammy liked Dobby the chestnut mare very much and wasn’t frightened of her at all when he had all four paws on the ground. But it was a different matter when he was perched high up on Dobby’s back in the saddle pocket that had been made for him, wearing his regimental bandana. He could feel the heat coming from her body, and her chest rising and falling as she breathed in and out, and then she’d snort, and her hooves would move very fast and thump and thunder on the ground. He didn’t like that. Not even a little bit.
The colonel didn’t realize quite how frightened Sammy was until after they’d been riding for the first time together, because Sammy had been willing enough to sit in the saddle when Dobby was standing still. But, when he lifted Sammy down from the saddle after the ride, he found the little dog couldn’t stop shaking and he whined and whimpered.
‘It’s not so bad,’ the colonel said. ‘You’ll get used to it and very soon you’ll like it.’ But even as the colonel said the words he didn’t totally believe them.
As soon as the colonel put Sammy down on the ground, he ran away back to his pillow bed and hid under it.
The next day Sammy and the colonel and the rest of the cavalry and the horses boarded a ship for the front. It was the first time Sammy had ever seen the sea. He looked down at it suspiciously from the colonel’s arms.
When they docked and left the ship, Sammy tried to taste some of the big wavy water, but the colonel told him: ‘No, that’s not for drinking – too salty, old boy.’
Oliver spent a lot of his time digging to maintain the trenches. So much so that he often thought he wouldn’t mind at all if he never saw a shovel again once the war was over. Everyone hated the mud that got everywhere, and now the rains had come it was even worse. But they dug on even when their hands were covered in blisters.