the lickle puppeees to the science lab, make them smoke fags till they gags, then their fluffy tails won’t wag!” interrupted the voice of of Orrible Orange Orson, who had sneaked up on us again.
I lost my rag and went for him. Dinah and Chloe hauled me off.
“Who cares anyway?” laughed Orson, dusting himself down and backing away. “They’re only dumb animals.”
“You should know!” I yelled after him.
He turned round and gave me a sign that I can’t repeat in a family book, but Dinah and I gave it him back, and Chloe half did, before going red and putting her hand in her pocket instead.
“What a loser,” I said, panting. “He’s never even seen my puppies. Why doesn’t he get a life?”
“That is his life,” Dinah said. “He’s very happy with it.”
“Where’s that girl gone?” said Chloe, looking around. “She seemed nice.”
“I think Orson scared her off,” Dinah said. “Who wouldn’t run away, seeing his ugly face? Anyway, where were we?”
I looked glumly at the brainstorming.
“Who’s Cheeky Eric?” asked Chloe.
“He’s a puppy! You don’t even know their names. That shows how much you care.”
“Lay off, Trix,” said Dinah. “The only one you go on about is Bonzo. The others are always curled up on top of Harpo and it’s pretty hard to tell them apart.”
“But they’ve all got amazingly different characters,” I said. “Just like people. Eric’s mischievous and cheeky, Marigold’s cute and pretty like that actress who came to do puppet workshop, Fattypuff has big film-star eyes and is incredibly lazy, Gertrude is shy and kind, like Chloe, and her tail is just like a Curly-Wurly. And Bonzo…”
I tailed off. I could see I was losing them. It was a bit like Mum’s friend who pops in for a “quick cup of tea” and then bores on and on for hours about her horrible dribbling squawking baby.
“Of course, you never see them as individuals cos you’re not there all the time like me. And Harpo rules them with a paw of iron,” I added.
“Can anyone remember what any of this means?” said Dinah, turning our brainstorm paper upside down as though it might make more sense that way. “Looks like some of that poetry my mum writes when she’s in a mood.”
“Well, BEG and PLEAD were about trying to change my parents’ mind,” I said. “Oh, yeah, and DAD!!!! was because I can usually get round him so I had a brainwave of persuading him…”
“And PLAGUE and BITE were about telling people the puppies are dangerous, so no one will want them,” said Chloe.
“Excellent!” said Dinah. “That’s a good start. We’ll begin with you trying to persuade your dad to make your mum keep the puppies. If she won’t relent, you’ll do everything you can to make sure no one wants the puppies anyway.” She squinted at the piece of paper. “Oh yes, and if that doesn’t work, we’ll erm, either disguise the puppies as, erm, something else, or hide them, or run away from home with them! OK? This is the beginning of our campaign. We’ll get lots of support to save them from experiments. Let’s do a petition this evening and call it Puppies Are People Too.”
“YES. If we can persuade the whole neighbourhood your parents are trying to sell the puppies into slavery, we can probably get the RSPCA to help, or the police,” said Chloe.
“Don’t overdo it. If my folks go to jail, who’ll buy the dog food?”
“Of course, you couldn’t get anyone interested if you’d only lost your pet ant,” Chloe added sadly. I think since her last ant got hoovered up she is taking her new one, Anty, too seriously. She needs a new interest. And she needs to stop worrying about School.
“Maybe,” Chloe went on, “we could tie this in with our Pride of Bottomley project.”
There! What did I tell you??
“You have to be kidding, Chloe,” said Dinah, putting an arm around her. “Saving the Puppies will be an adventure. The Pride of Bottomley isn’t an adventure; it’s a punishment.”
“But Trixie’s puppies are part of the Pride of Bottomley,” Chloe protested. “She’s proud of them. We are too, even if we don’t know all their names.”
“Or which one can play the piano with its back paws, and which one can do Sudoko and speak Chinese,” cackled Dinah.
“Shut up,” I said. But an idea was beginning to hatch somewhere in the murky depths of my brain.
“We could bring in the science lab at Mandleton, where they do Animal Experiments and Testing,” Chloe said, getting excited. “That would come under ‘The Shame of Bottomley’.”
“Yeah,” said Dinah. “Animal rights. Save the Snail.”
I was cheered up, despite Dinah’s jokes. I knew that with Dinah and Chloe on my side, the puppies were in with a chance. And we were getting our Warty project done at the same time!
But when I got home, a nasty shock awaited me. A very flash car was parked outside the gate. And a very flash woman with bright pink hair and stiletto heels to match was teetering out of our house, carrying an enormous box and squealing to the driver, “They’re purrrrfect. Exactly what we were after! I’m taking them all!”
I couldn’t believe it! Mum had only just that morning mentioned the pups might have to go and she’d found a buyer already! They were going out of my life, squashed inside a cardboard box!
I flung myself in the way ofthe horrendous pink witch.
“Over my dead body!” I squeaked.
Unfortunately, what with the stiletto heels and the surprise at seeing a tiny furious girl barring her way, the pink witch tottered, squawked and then seemed to go in four different directions at once. One leg went south, one leg went north, her arms went out sideways, her pink hair blew off in a gust of wind revealing some quite ordinary hair underneath, and the box of puppies went soaring into the air.
“Ohmigod! The pups!” I squealed, leaping up to catch it on its way down.
“Ohmigod! The pups!” screamed Wigless Witch, struggling to get up and catch the box as well.
We collided of course, and the box landed on our heads with a horrible crashing, tinkling sound. Then it slid to the ground and split open.
I stared. There were no bruised, whimpering, terrified puppies to be seen.
There were a lot of cups and saucers and plates. Or what had once been cups and saucers and plates. What had once been, in fact, the valuable tea set belonging to my gran that Mum was selling for a lot of money. Even I could see that no amount of superglue was going to save it.
I looked at Wigless Witch accusingly. Why had she made me do that? Hadn’t she yelled “Ohmigod! The pups!” when she dropped them?
Obviously not, said another part of my brain. Obviously she’d said “cups”.
Dad came out looking miserable. He doesn’t really do cross, my dad. My mum does cross, but Dad does sad, which makes you feel worse. He took a wad of cash out of his pocket and picked up the witch’s once-pink-and-now-mud-spattered wig, and solemnly returned both to her. I looked shamefully down at the ground.
