He's wearing a worn leather collar. It has no tags that I can see, but the collar means he must once have been somebody's pet, even if he's a stray now.
I talk to him in what I hope is a low, soothing voice like the one Dad was using, but I can't hide how upset and angry I am. “It's gonna be OK, boy,” I say, even though I'm not so sure.
He needs a name. I can't just keep calling him “boy.” We don't usually name the animals we rehab, but this case is different. “Chico,” I say softly. That means
boy
in Spanish. The dog's left eyelid twitches. “Chico,” I repeat. “That's your name. Listen, Chico, we're going to do everything we can to help you. Dr. Mac is the best vet in the world.”
I shout to Dad through the little window between the pickup bed and the cab. “How long do you think he was in that trap?” I ask.
I see Dad's eyes in the rearview mirror. He looks tired, sad. There are little bits of sawdust in his beard. “Almost too long,” he shouts back, shaking his head. “It looks like he may have tried to chew off his own foot to escape.”
I hear Sage swear again. This time Dad shoots him a look. “That's enough,” he says.
“Enough?” Sage asks. “What, so I'm supposed to sit here politely while some idiot is torturing animals?” He folds his arms across his chest. “OK,” he says. “I'll keep my mouth shut. Actions speak louder than words, anyway.”
Dad looks over at him. “What exactly do you mean by that, Sage?” he asks.
Sage just shakes his head, refusing to speak.
“Sage.” There's a warning in Dad's voice.
Sage looks out the window, his mouth set in that hard line.
I turn back to Chico. “It's gonna be OK,” I tell him again. “We'll take care of you.”
Maggie runs out as soon as we pull into the clinic parking lot. “What's going on?” she asks. Sunita, David, and Zoe are right behind her.
“It's a dog,” I explain. “He got caught in a trap.”
I hear gasps, then questions, but I'm too distracted to tell them any more. Dad and Sage are guiding the litter out of the truck.
“Oh, man,” Maggie groans when she sees Chico. “That dog is in trouble.” She runs into the clinic to let her grandmother know that we're here.
Zoe holds the door for us. Sunita and David just watch the litter go by, shaking their heads.
“That's awful,” Sunita says. “Aren't those traps illegal?”
We follow Maggie past the reception area and beyond the two exam rooms, right into the operating room. Dr. Mac has prepped the stainless steel table by disinfecting it and putting down a warm pad covered with an old towel. The pad, called a water blanket, is heated with hot water and helps stabilize animals who might be going into shock.
Dr. Mac asks Maggie, Sunita, and David to go back to their regular Sunday jobs, cleaning the reception area and the exam rooms. “Brenna, you can stay in here and help,” she tells me.
Dad and Sage gently lift Chico off the litter and onto the table. He doesn't even seem to notice or care where he is.
Frowning as she gazes down at the injured dog, Dr. Mac runs a hand through her short gray hair. “I guess I won't need to sedate him,” she says.
“He's pretty out of it,” Dad agrees.
“But let's get a real muzzle on him, just to be safe,” Dr. Mac continues. Then she looks at me. “You found him?” she asks.
I nod.
“We'll do everything we can,” she tells me.
“I know,” I say. “That's what I've been telling him. I've been calling him Chico.”
“Chico?” she asks. She looks at him again and pushes up her sleeves. “OK, Chico,” she says. “Let's get a temperature, pulse, and respirations.” She works quickly and efficiently, touching Chico gently. She reels off the numbers, and I scribble them down on a clinic record sheet.
Dr. Mac runs her hands all over Chico's body, checking for injuries. “Hmmm, he's definitely malnourished,” she says, as she feels his ribs. She takes a gentle pinch of his skin, lets go, and watches to see how long it takes the pinched part to spring back to normal. “Dehydrated, too. Brenna, can you grab an I.V. bag of Lactated Ringer's? We'll get him started on that right away.”
I get a bag from the cupboard and hang it on a metal stand, the way we've learned. Dr. Mac connects some plastic tubing to the bag. Then she inserts an I.V. catheter into Chico's left rear leg. “Normally, I'd want to put this in a foreleg,” she says, “but it might be in our way.”
After she gets the I.V. going, she prepares a couple of injections. “Antibiotics,” she says, as she gives Chico a shot. “And some steroids for shock. I'll give him pain medication, too.”
“What about a rabies shot?” I ask. “In case he hasn't had one recently.” There's no way to tell, since he doesn't have any tags on his collar.
Dr. Mac shakes her head. “We can't give him a rabies shot, or any other vaccinations, until he's recovered. We don't want to put any more stress on his immune system. For now, we'll just have to be careful when we handle him.”
Chico is still lying there quietly. The only movement that I can see is in his rib cage. He's panting a little bit.
“OK, let's get this thing off,” Dr. Mac says, making a face at the trap. “If you two can help . . .” She looks at my dad and Sage. “I'll hold Chico and stabilize the leg while you pry the jaws apart.”
Dad and Sage step forward. I can't see exactly how they do it, but in a minute the trap is off and Dr. Mac is looking at Chico's leg.
“Badly damaged,” she says, shaking her head. “That trap's been on for a while, and it's cut right through some muscles and tendons. The bone may even be fractured, and there's probably nerve damage.” She flushes the wound with sterile saline solution so she can see it better.
“But you can fix it, right?” I ask.
For a second, she doesn't answer. She's applying some ointment to the wounds, and she doesn't look up at me.
“Dr. Mac?” I need to know.
“I'm not sure, Brenna,” she tells me, meeting my eyes. “The tissue beneath the area where the trap was may be dead, beyond saving. If it is, it could become gangrenous, and that kind of infection could kill Chico.”
“So, what are you saying?” I hold my breath.
“We have to get him stabilized first, no matter what. Tomorrow, I'll take another look at the wound and see how it's doing. If there's any blood still moving through the foot, we may be able to save it.” She pauses and looks down at Chico. “But there's a good chance I'll have to amputate.”
Sage shakes his head in disgust. “If that dog loses its legâ” he begins, like he's going to make some kind of threat.
Dad shushes him. “Not now, Sage.”
I see Dr. Mac's eyes go from Dad to Sage. She knows my family pretty well, and she can tell when there's trouble between us. But I can't think about the tension between my dad and Sage right now. I'm trying to make sense of what Dr. Mac just said.
“Amputate?” Sunita looks horrified.
It's an hour later. Chico is settled in the recovery room, which has a row of cages in it supplied with extra-comfy blankets. The room is kept warm and quiet, and recovery room patients are checked frequently. There's a clipboard attached to each cage to keep track of information about things like medications and vital signs.
Chico is still very, very weak, and I can tell that Dr. Mac is worried about him. Dad and Sage are on their way home, and Dr. Mac is writing up notes.
I'm not ready to leave, so I join my friends as they clean the reception area of the clinic. I pick up a rag and go through the motions of dusting while I fill everybody in on Chico's status. Sunita's not the only one who's shocked to hear he might lose his leg.
“I can't believe it!” Zoe says.
“I can't believe it, either,” I echo.
“Poor Chico. It doesn't have to be the end of the world, though,” Maggie says, trying to cheer us up. “Last year Gran had this patient, an Airedale named Buck. His paw was broken really badly when he was hit by a car, and she had to amputate. That dog was up and walking around, like, ten hours after the surgery! And now when he comes in, it's like he always had three legs. You should see him chase after a ball or a stick. Buck runs just as fast as any other dog.”
“Still,” David says, leaning on his broom, “it's awful. But at least he's not a horse. Horses have to be put down if they break an ankle and the bone can't be repaired.”
David is our resident horse expert. He spends as much time over at Quinn's stables, helping to take care of his favorite horse, Trickster, as he does here at the clinic.
“Maybe she won't have to amputate,” Zoe says hopefully. She squeezes out her mop. “Maybe he'll be OK.” Zoe's always trying to look at the bright side, but even she knows things don't always work out the way you hope they will. One of her favorite dog patients died of cancer a few months ago.
“I hope he will be.” Sunita strokes Socrates, Gran's fat, rust-colored tabby. He's sleeping on the counter, in the middle of a pile of paperwork that Sunita is trying to organize.
Sunita has bonded with that cat, big time. According to Maggie, Socrates has never let anyone else get as close to him as Sunita is. He must sense what a huge cat lover she is. “I wonder where Chico's owners are,” Sunita adds. “They must be worried about him.”
“Dr. Mac says we should get to work on that,” I tell her. “We're supposed to call the shelter and the police and let them know he's here, in case somebody is looking for him. I said I would make some signs, too.”
“I'll help,” Sunita offers.
“We can all help,” Maggie says. She looks around. “I think we're done here, anyway. Let's go into the house and work on signs right now.”
“I'll make popcorn for everyone.” Zoe loves to feed people. “I think a snack might make us all feel better.”
She means well, but I know it's going to take a lot more than popcorn for my mood to improve. It's been a long, hard day, and Chico's lifeâor at least his legâis still in danger.
Chapter Four
I
know we shouldn't be doing this. Dr. Mac and my parents would be furious if they knew. But I can't help myself. I'm too furious
not
to do it. Maggie feels the same way. She was really upset and angry about what happened to Chico.
That's why we're here in the woods, hiding behind a boulder. Maggie and I talked about it at lunch today at school, and we agreed. We have to find the creep who set the trap that caught Chico.
It was easy to sneak out of the house. Mom's at work, Dad is in his shop, Jayvee is at soccer, and Sage is at an Animals Always meeting.
Our boulder is about twenty paces from the apple tree where I found Chico. Maggie and I aren't talking much. In fact, we're barely breathing. I feel like a detective on a stakeout, waiting for the criminal to return to the scene of the crime.
I check my camera to make sure that it's ready to shoot. The cut chain is still exactly where we left it yesterday, which means the trapper probably hasn't been by here yet.
That makes me even more mad. Dr. Mac told me that trappers are supposed to check their traps at least once every twenty-four hours. It's the law. If they check regularly, at least the animals they catch won't suffer too long. But Chico's trapper hasn't bothered to care about that. He hasn't bothered to check his traps in much, much longer than twenty-four hours.
My guess is that he'll be along soon.
The skies are gray and dreary, and it's a little chilly. My legs are stiff from sitting in one position for too long. I shift my feet, trying to get comfortable. “Ouch,” I say out loud as my muscles protest. A few good yoga stretches would sure feet great right about now.
“Shhh,” Maggie says.
I pull my jacket closer around me and adjust my fleece hat so that it covers my ears. We're lucky it wasn't this cold when Chico was caught in the trap. He might have died of hypothermia. Dr. Mac told me she's seen that happen to animals who are outside in the cold for too long. Their bodies lose the ability to fight the cold, their temperature drops, and they die.
I shiver just thinking about it.
I wonder how Chico is doing. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that Dr. Mac won't have to amputate. I can hardly stand the thought of Chico losing his leg, even if what Maggie says is true about dogs being able to adapt.
It's frustrating to have to sit here quietly, doing nothing, when there's so much on my mind. I think of what my mom would say.
Live in the moment, Brenna. Listen to the world around you and let your mind go quiet.
I take a deep breath and make myself very still. Instead of paying attention to my thoughts, I start paying attention to what's around me.
It worksâI feel more relaxed. A blue jay screeches in a nearby tree, and a squirrel chirrups back at the bird, telling it to mind its own business. Three different kinds of moss are growing on the rock near my face, and I spot a snail crawling over a leaf. I point it out to Maggie, and she smiles.
Her smile freezes. We both hear it at the same time: footsteps.
Somebody is stomping through the woods. And there's absolutely no doubt that the somebody is human. A human who is whistling cheerfully and crunching along.
This person has some nerve!
We hunker down even smaller and make sure we're well hidden. Then we peek around our rock, just in time to see the whistler arrive in the clearing.