Shhh! Scribbler at Work

The Smallest Thief

[prompt: 'steal' 16/11/18]

The first time we saw Taffy we thought she was a guinea pig, or maybe a long-haired bat, or... ?

"What IS that in the back of the cage? A rat?" Kanute wrinkled his nose in distaste. Pet rats and mice have never been our scene. Too many 'wild' ones causing too much damage on a farm to even vaguely like any rodent-type creatures.

"It's a guinea pig, definitely," I said, but then took a closer look. Huddled dejectedly in the far corner, the black fur ball was... "A dog!" I exclaimed. "It's a tiny little puppy."

Fitted comfortably into my cupped hands, the only way to tell front from back was when her dear little pink tongue came out to lick anything in sight. At probably only five or six weeks old Taffy desperately needed a mother. Some moist-eye pleading later, Kanute reluctantly agreed to my plea, "just one more... we have SO much space", and following a cuddly hour+ trip home, our bonding was complete between new mother and daughter.

Kanute wanted to call her 'Scruffs' but I found that too awful and derogatory for this tiny darling. A compromise was soon reached when her true nature emerged—that of a thief—and she earned her name thanks to the old rhyme...

Taffy was a Welshman,

Taffy was a thief,

Taffy came to my house,

And stole a leg of beef

I went to Taffy's house,

Taffy wasn't home,

And all that was left,

Was a bare beef bone.

In short order you could shout 'Scruffs', 'Scruffy' or even 'Hey you'. The name mattered not—she would always come, wagging her tail in helicopter fashion and smiling from ear to ear. A true character of the first order.

'Scruffy' was the most faithful description of her nature... and appearance more often than not. Especially as she emerged from the cow's drinking trough - her idea of bathing after a 'swim-through' of the dairy dirt-yard full of unmentionables.

At shearing time she saw it as her life's most important duty to protect us from those vicious sheep - by furiously barking beneath the slatted floor of the shearing shed.

But the day she stole my heart completely was when I was trying to return an amorous, absconding bull to his personal paddock from the hill road alongside our property. Taffy saw my dilemma when he turned on me and my small car, pawing the ground and snorting heavily at both of us. She came racing across the paddock below faster than a speeding black bullet. With no thought of her own precious little self, she confronted him and when all else failed, latched onto his tail, amazingly ducking his vicious kicks and ignoring his enraged bellows.

In minutes, he was on the run, with the terrifyingly tenacious Taffy hot on his heels all the way. What a saviour, and what a love fest we enjoyed that day and every other of the many days of her life.