Melissa Kite Melissa Kite

The lost dogs of Surrey

Every other lamppost around here is covered with flyers showing mutts that have gone astray

[Parisa Shademan]

The woman pulled up in her flashy 4×4 which was meandering along the farm track in that way people have when they have ‘questions’.

People in Surrey often have questions as they drive past a farm. For example, I had a gentleman query why the horses were wearing ‘blindfolds’ recently, and I had to explain that owners often put their horses in fly masks during the summer, if that was all right by him? And he said it wasn’t. Because people who know diddly squat about rural matters have the strongest opinions, especially about horses.

This lady was meandering and looking out of the window into the stable yard as the cobs were munching their hay so I wearily walked up to her and introduced myself. ‘Hello, and how may I address your concerns about livestock management today?’ is what I ought to say.

But she wasn’t actually interested in the horses, and poking a leaflet out of the window she explained that she was looking for two cavapoos. I looked down at the leaflet which showed two of the daftest-looking mutts I have ever seen.

‘Oh dear, where did you lose them?’ I asked.

‘They were in the garden. They’re not mine,’ she added hastily. ‘I mean, the owner is on holiday. They ran off. Have you seen them?’ she asked. ‘No, I haven’t seen them,’ I said. ‘I think I would know if I had seen two passing… cavapoos.’

‘Yes,’ she said, forcefully, ‘I was thinking, they would probably make for safety. Look for shelter, you know, because they’d be frightened. So…’. And she looked long and hard into the stable yard. And she stared particularly hard at the guard dog warning sign above the stable block, ‘Big Dogs About!’, which only, in reality, refers to Poppy and Cydney, but they think they’re big.

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