A Deer Called Dotty E-Book

Helen Peters

• Herausgeber: Nosy Crow
• Kategorie: Für Kinder und Jugendliche
• Serie: The Jasmine Green Series
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2020

Seitenzahl: 83

Beschreibung

Jasmine's dad is a farmer, and her mum is a large-animal vet, so Jasmine spends a lot of time caring for animals and keeping them out of trouble. Unfortunately, this often means she gets into hot water herself... A perfect animal story for younger readers by Waterstones Children's Book Prize-shortlisted author Helen Peters, with beautiful black-and-white illustrations by Ellie Snowdon. Jasmine's mother is called to help a pregnant deer who has been hit by a car. She performs an emergency Caesarean and delivers tiny, helpless Dotty, before handing her over to Jasmine to raise... Brilliant storytelling that will make you laugh and cry, this is Dick King-Smith for a new generation. Look out for Jasmine's other adventures! A Piglet Called Truffle A Duckling Called Button A Sheepdog Called Sky A Kitten Called Holly A Lamb Called Lucky A Goat Called Willow An Otter Called Pebble An Owl Called Star

Leseprobe

iii

iii

For Marie

H. P.

For Siâny

E. S.

1

Chapter One

A Terrible Accident

“Good dog, Bramble,” said Jasmine, as the spaniel came trotting back across the orchard with a battered tennis ball in her mouth. “Good dog.”

Bramble dropped the soggy ball and Jasmine stroked her silky head. Then she picked up the ball and hurled it into the long grass.

“Fetch!” she called, and the spaniel wagged her tail and bounded after it. She was old now, but she still loved to play.

Bramble lived with Jasmine’s pet pig, Truffle, in the big orchard at Oak Tree Farm. It was an 2unusual friendship, but they had been friends ever since Jasmine had brought Truffle to the farm as a tiny runt. When Truffle was younger, she would chase balls too, but now she preferred to spend her days rooting around under the apple trees.

Jasmine’s sheepdog, Sky, nuzzled into her knee. Jasmine looked down at the handsome black-and-white collie.

“Good boy, Sky,” she said. “You’re tired now, aren’t you?”

She and Sky had just returned from a long walk in the woods. They didn’t normally stay out this late, but it was a Friday and the beginning of the May half-term holiday, so Mum hadn’t fussed about bedtime.

Sky licked Jasmine’s hand and looked up at her adoringly. Jasmine ruffled the fur on the top of his head.

She had found Sky as an abandoned puppy, ill-treated and starving, and had nursed him back 3to health. They had been devoted to each other from the moment they met, but it had taken a long time before Sky could really trust people again. He had bitten Jasmine once when he was frightened, and even now he sometimes got spooked by unfamiliar people and situations. But he was a very different dog from the frail and terrified puppy that Jasmine had scooped out of a hedge almost two years ago.

Jasmine looked up as car headlights appeared on the farm track.

“There you are,” she said to Bramble. “Dad’s back. You’ll get your supper now.”

Jasmine’s dad was the farmer at Oak Tree Farm. He normally drove a truck, but he had used Jasmine’s mum’s car tonight to take her older sister Ella out to practise her driving. Ella had been having driving lessons for months, but she didn’t seem to have made much progress.

“It will help her confidence if you take her out,” Mum had said to Dad. “Bless her, she’s 4such a nervous driver. It will be good for her to practise in the evening too. She’s only ever driven in daylight.”

Jasmine noticed that her mum hadn’t offered to take Ella herself. Ella was extremely clever and hardworking, but she was not a natural driver.

“If she could learn it all from a book, she’d be fine,” Mum had said. “It’s actually driving the car that’s the problem.”

“I can’t wait to start driving lessons,” Jasmine’s little brother, Manu, had said. “I’ll be the best driver ever.”

Manu was staying at his best friend Ben’s house tonight. Which was lucky, because otherwise he would have wanted to sit in the back of the car while Ella was driving. And Manu’s comments were not the sort of thing a nervous driver needed to hear.

The car continued its jerky progress along the track. Jasmine smiled. “That’s definitely Ella driving,” she said to Sky.5

6Suddenly, the engine revved loudly. There was a horrible dull thud. Brakes screeched. Glass shattered.

Jasmine stood rooted to the spot. The engine stopped and she heard doors opening and then a terrifying high-pitched scream.

Jasmine unfroze. She raced out of the orchard and up the garden path. She burst through the back door of the farmhouse.

“Mum!” she yelled.

Her mum was reading at the kitchen table. She looked up as Jasmine ran into the room. Her eyes widened in alarm.

“What is it? Jasmine, what’s wrong?”

“It’s Ella,” gasped Jasmine. “I think she’s hurt.”

Nadia sprang to her feet. “Where is she?”

“On the track. The car crashed and Ella was screaming.”

But Nadia had already left the room. Jasmine sprinted up the farm track after her.

Dad was running towards them, his boots 7pounding on the tarmac. In the beam of the headlights, Jasmine saw Ella kneeling in front of the car, her head in her hands, sobbing loudly, next to a brown mound of something Jasmine couldn’t make out.

“Oh, thank goodness you’re here,” panted Dad.

“Is Ella OK?” cried Mum. “What happened?”

“Ella’s fine,” said Dad. “It’s a deer. We hit a deer on the track.”

Mum ran towards the car, Jasmine following her. She could see now that the brown mound was actually a beautiful deer, stretched out on its side with its eyes open in a fixed stare. Ella was hunched on her knees beside it, rocking to and fro with her head in her hands, wailing.

“Ella, are you OK?” asked Mum, crouching in front of her. “Were you hurt? Are you injured?”

“I’m a murderer,” Ella wailed. “I’ve killed a deer.”

“It wasn’t your fault,” said Dad. “Deer are really hard to avoid if they run across the road in 8front of you. It was just a terrible accident.”

“It was my fault,” sobbed Ella. “If you’d been driving, she’d still be alive.”

“I’m sure you did the best you could,” said Mum.

“You don’t understand,” wailed Ella. “I’m completely stupid. I’m the stupidest person in the world.”

Mum looked at Dad. “What actually happened?”

Dad sighed. “She panicked when she saw the deer. She tried to brake, but she pressed the accelerator instead.”

Jasmine winced.

“I put the handbrake on, obviously,” said Dad, “but by then we’d hit the deer.”

Mum put her arm around Ella. “Sweetheart, I know you’ve had a horrible shock, but I need you to get up and move out of the way. I have to examine the deer. We don’t want her to suffer any more than necessary, do we?”9

Thank goodness Mum was a vet, Jasmine thought. She always knew what to do.

“You don’t need to examine her,” wailed Ella. “She’s dead. I killed her.”

Nadia sighed impatiently and stood up. “Michael, can you deal with her?” she said.

Dad crouched beside Ella and laid his hands on her shoulders. “Ella, you’re in shock. I’m going to take you home. Mum will look after the deer. We’re going to have to walk, because Mum might need the equipment in the car. Can you manage to walk?”

Still sobbing, Ella allowed Dad to help her to her feet.

“Right,” said Mum. “Grab the torch from the glove compartment, please, Jasmine.”

Dad put his arm around Ella and started to guide her down the track. When Jasmine returned with the torch, Nadia was holding her coat over the deer’s head.

“Is she alive?” asked Jasmine.10

“Only just, I think,” said Mum. “I don’t think she’s going to make it.”

Jasmine watched as Nadia lifted the coat from the deer’s head.

“The reflex in the pupil of the eye is the last thing to work in a living animal,” said Mum. “If the pupil size doesn’t change when I shine a torch into her eye, then I’m afraid she’s not alive.”

She shone the torch beam straight into the doe’s eye. Jasmine watched as the shiny black pupil contracted.

“She’s alive!” she said.

“She is,” said Nadia, “but barely. I don’t want her to suffer any more.”

She paused. Then she gave Jasmine a serious look and said, “There’s something else, though. Something I didn’t want to mention in front of Ella.”

“What?” asked Jasmine.

But before Nadia could answer, Jasmine 11saw something in the light of the torch beam. Something that made her gasp. A movement in the deer’s stomach.

“Oh!” she exclaimed. “There’s a baby inside her!”

12

Chapter Two

An Emergency Operation

“We’re not going to be able to save the mother, I’m afraid,” said Nadia, “but if we work very quickly there’s a small chance that we could save the fawn.”

She shone the torch beam into the doe’s eye again. This time, the pupil didn’t move.

“Oh, no,” breathed Jasmine, and tears welled up in her eyes.

“Poor thing,” said Nadia. “But at least she didn’t suffer for too long. We need to work fast now. The fawn won’t live inside the mother for 13more than three or four minutes. Will you be my assistant?”

Jasmine’s heart sped up. “Sure. What should I do?”

“Can you fetch my box of instruments? I’m going to need a scalpel blade. And a towel to dry the fawn as soon as it’s born.”

Jasmine hurried to the car boot and took out a clean towel and the big case containing Nadia’s equipment. She set it on the ground beside her mum and opened the lid.

Nadia pulled on a pair of disposable gloves and unwrapped a gleaming scalpel blade from its sterile packaging.

“Normally I’d shave the animal’s hair around the area where I’m going to operate,” she said, “but in this case we don’t need to worry too much about hygiene. The only thing that matters is getting the little one out as quickly as possible. Can you hold the torch steady while I operate? It’s lucky you’re not squeamish.” 14

She inserted the scalpel blade into a handle and poised the blade above the deer’s stomach. “When I take the fawn out, you hold its back legs firmly and pull, while I help the rest of it out.”

“OK,” said Jasmine. She held the torch so its beam shone on the deer’s stomach. The mother’s reddish-brown coat rippled and bulged as the fawn moved inside her.

“Ready?” asked Nadia.

“Ready,” said Jasmine.

It all happened very quickly. Jasmine watched, fascinated, as Nadia pulled out a tiny pair of hooves, followed by the fawn’s skinny little back legs.