Caramel was just finishing the food when Helena’s mum hurried into the kitchen. She was a bit late getting breakfast ready, and she was rushing. She banged the door open without thinking and Caramel shot into the corner, trembling and pressing himself against the side of the cupboard.
“Mum! You scared him!” Helena gasped.
“Oh! Sorry, Caramel…” Her mum shut the door gently, and crouched down, holding her hand out for the frightened cat to sniff. “I’m really sorry, Helena, I didn’t realize the door would frighten him so much. He’s been so good this weekend.”
“I know…” Helena agreed sadly. “But I suppose he’s still upset, deep down. It’s going to take a while for him to get over that.” She looked at her mum. “He will be happier again one day, won’t he?”
“I’m sure he will.”
But Helena didn’t think her mum was very sure at all.
[Êàðòèíêà: _9.jpg]
“Be good, Caramel.” Helena ran her hand lovingly down his silky back. “Have lots of lovely sleep. Gran’s going to come and see you at lunch time, and I bet she’ll bring you treats.”
[Êàðòèíêà: _27.jpg]
Caramel stood in the middle of the kitchen, looking up at her uncertainly. He wasn’t sure what was happening. Since he had arrived at Helena’s house, early on Saturday morning, Helena had been with him almost all the time. She had even come down in the middle of the night to check on him. But now she had a coat on, and a bag with her. It looked as though she was leaving him behind.
At his old house, his owner had gone out to work most days. Caramel had lazed the time away, curled up on the back of the sofa so that he could watch the people passing in the street. And the cars. Caramel laid his ears back with a frightened little hiss.
Most days he’d slipped out of his cat flap and patrolled his territory in the gardens behind the house. There were several other cats in the street, and he was one of the youngest and newest, so he’d had to be careful to stay out of their way. But he still had plenty to explore. There was a pond a few houses away, and he liked to watch the frogs. And catch them, sometimes. He could creep up on them among the plants around the water. But his owner hadn’t liked it when Caramel had brought one home. He had taken Caramel’s frog outside, and locked the cat flap so that he couldn’t slip out and fetchit back in again.
But here, there was no window to watch from, and no cat flap to slide out of. He was all alone in this little room. It was better than the cage at the vet’s surgery, of course, but being shut up still made him want to claw at the door and fight his way out. When would Helena and her mother come back? Perhaps they weren’t coming back at all? His old owner had fussed over him, and fed him, and loved him, but now he was gone. Maybe Helena had gone,too. Caramel stared anxiously at the kitchen door, hoping to hear them coming back. But there wasn’t a sound.
Perhaps he could go and find them himself?
Caramel hobbled across the tiled floor, sniffing hopefully at the door out to the garden. There was a faint breath of fresh air around the side of the door– just enough to make him desperate to go out. He scratched at the door, but not very hard. He could already see that he wasn’t going to be able to get out.
Wearily, he trailed back to his basket. His broken back leg was aching, not used to carrying his weight. Caramel snuggled into the basket, and hoped that Helena hadn’t left him for ever. He hoped that she would come back soon.
[Êàðòèíêà: _28.jpg]
[Êàðòèíêà: _29.jpg]
“So does anyone have any exciting news from their weekend?” Miss Smith looked round at the class as she finished marking the register.
“Tell her!” Katie hissed, nudging Helena in the ribs with her elbow. “Helena does, Miss Smith!”
Helena went pink, but she nodded.“I’ve got a cat.”
“Oh, lovely!” Miss Smith smiled. “Where did you get him from, Helena? Or her?”
“He’s a he. And he came from the vet’s where my cousin Lucy works,” Helena explained. “He was run over last weekend.”
Everyone in the class sat up and started listening more closely. Until then there’d been a bit of a Monday-ish feeling going on, and most people had been staring vaguely at the whiteboard, or whispering to each other.
“Run over?” one of the boys asked. “What happened, was he hurt?”
Helena nodded.“He’s got a fractured back leg. But he was lucky. Often they have to operate on cats and put pins in, but he’s just got a cast.”
“But who does he belong to?” Miss Smith asked, sounding a little confused. “Was he a stray? Has no one claimed him?”
“No. And the vet’s even put a little article about him in the local paper. That page where the animal shelter usually puts a photo of a cat or dog that needs a home.”
“Oh, that’s how we got our dog!” Marley called out. “We saw him in the paper.”
“Mm-hm. The article was in on Wednesday. But still no one claimed him. So we reckoned it was OK to take him home. We think maybe he’s been lost for a while, even before he got hit by the car. He’s quite thin.”
“Show them the photo,” Katie suggested, and Helena pulled it out of her bag. She’d brought it in to show Katie and a couple of her other friends. It was Caramel curled up asleep in his basket, and you could see his plaster cast. She passed it round, and all the class murmured about how cute he was and how sad his leg looked.
[Êàðòèíêà: _30.jpg]
“He’s come home with us because otherwise he would have had to go to the animal shelter,” Helena went on. “He’s been really lucky. All his vet care’s been paid for by donations from the shelter he almost went to, and the PDSA.”
“The what?” someone called.
“It’s a charity, isn’t it?” Miss Smith asked.
Helena nodded.“It stands for People’s Dispensary for Sick Animals. It’s a big charity, but they have a clinic close to here, in Thirtover Road. They look after animals when people can’t afford to pay. Vet bills can be really, really expensive. Thousands of pounds, my cousin told me.”
Helena frowned thoughtfully. Ever since Molly had told her that the PDSA were helping to pay back the surgery for Caramel’s treatment, she’d been wishing she could do something to help. Something more than just giving them her pocket money. She’d already decided to get her mum to buy their Christmas cards from the PDSA – they made very cute ones with cats and dogs in the snow – but it would be good to thinkof a way to raise some money, too. So that if another cat got hurt like Caramel, there wouldn’t be a worry about having enough money to look after it.
Lucy had said that when she’d phoned the shelter to tell them that they wouldn’t have to take Caramel after all, the girl on the phone had been relieved. She’d said they were full to bursting. They needed a lot of money just to feed all the animals, let alone pay for vet care.
“Miss Smith, do you think we could try to make some money for the PDSA, and some for the shelter? We could have a cake sale or something?” Helena asked hopefully. “Mr Brown said he wanted all the junior classes to think about fundraising for charities. It was in assembly, back at the beginning of term.”
“He did…” Miss Smith agreed. “It’s a good idea. What about the rest of the class, though? What do you all think?”
[Êàðòèíêà: _31.jpg]
“I definitely want to raise some money for the shelter!” Marley nodded. “There were loads of other dogs there when we went to get Chester. It was really sad – my mum cried. And the other charity sounds good, too,” he added.
Everyone in the class was nodding, but Alice, another of Helena’s friends, waved her hand at Miss Smith. “Can we do something different, though? Everyone does cake sales.”
“That’s because everyone likes cake!” Katie pointed out, and Alice shrugged.