“There are various modes of operation resorted to by dog-thieves. They steal dogs either directly in pickpocket fashion or by cunningly enticing the unfortunate creature. It is only in a school reader or natural history primer that a dog is a faithful animal. Once allow even the most faithful of dogs to smell a fried horsemeat sausage and it’s lost. It forgets its master by whose side it is walking, turns around and follows you with its mouth-watering, and in anticipation of the great joy over the sausage, it wags its tail in a very friendly way.“
About these words of the Good Soldier Švejk remembered Lionа when the little boy gave a quick note of what he had seen happened to the little Yorkie on today's chilly morning. On his way to school, he had seen a man's dirty hand stretching a sausage to the little dog. Ares - that's how the dog was called, had quickly forgotten everything his young owner Liona had taught him about not eating food from strangers. And he was also quickly caught in the dark boot of the red van. Liona, horrified by the loss of her faithful friend, rushed around the streets and inquired about him.
In her hand, she was carrying leaflets which she had quickly printed with Ares's colour photograph. She had already questioned over twenty people, but besides the old woman who had seen Ares in a nearby garden next to the library three hours ago, and the young boy, no one else could help her with information. Unfortunately, Liona had ignored the advice to put a chip on the dog, and of course, she was regretting it now. Around 4 pm, however, Liona received a call from a neighbour from Colman Road, who offered to give her information about the red van she had mentioned in her leaflet. The news she heard was more than good.
It turned out that, contrary to her fears, the red-van guy was not a dog thief, but the gardener in her neighbourhood. He had picked up her little dog, due to his fear of him being run over by the fast-moving cars nearby. He himself had already left a note in the nearby off-license for a found dog. When I asked her if she believed that Ares would ever be found, Liona said, "When the boy that had last seen Ares told me about the man with the red van, I thought there was no hope of finding Ares. I thought they had taken him very far away. But despite all this, I was hoping." Already laughing she added," But Švejk is right about the sausage – don’t you think? "
Raya Uzunova- Bancroft's School
