Lizzie was so far out of her depth here that she felt she was drowning. She didn’t get involved. She never got involved!

She was standing on a school stage with an emotionally damaged eight-year-old clutching one hand and an anorexic teenager clutching her sleeve. Her great fat dog was sitting on her feet, the whole school was watching…

And what had Harry said? Basset groupies?

Harry was motioning to the boys at the back of the hall, who were grinning self-consciously back at him. ‘As everyone here knows except you, Dr Darling, these boys are the Birrini Punk Squirrels.’

‘The Birrini Punk Squirrels…’

‘They look pretty ordinary in their school clothes,’ Harry called. He was grinning like a Cheshire cat, thoroughly enjoying himself. ‘But you should see them in leathers.’

‘Or bare-chested,’ one of the boys yelled, and the kids in the hall dropped their collective jaws to their ankles.

‘I know them,’ Lillian breathed in Lizzie’s ear. ‘They’re the best band. The best. They get gigs all over the state…’

‘They’re adopting your pups,’ Harry called. ‘Until such time as they go to nice family homes, Phoebe’s puppies will be the band mascots. The boys want a pup apiece.’

‘But-’

‘The boys don’t mind if Amy has one puppy,’ Harry called. ‘But the rest are taken. Now…if the principal’s agreeable…We’re celebrating a few things here. No one’s made a public announcement about Lillian’s brilliant art win and it needs to be celebrated. Amy’s done a fantastic painting, too, and there’s a puppy coming her way. And the boys want to celebrate the impending birth of Phoebe’s pups. In honour of all of that-do you mind if the boys take centre stage, Mrs Hill?’

‘Go right ahead.’ The principal looked even more out of her depth than Lizzie. Which was clearly impossible. ‘Go right ahead, Dr McKay,’ she repeated weakly.

‘Fantastic.’

So the stunned group on stage stood to one side and the four boys surged forward with whoops of delight and enthusiasm, bringing their guitars and drums along with them. They hauled out their shirts, loosened their school ties, fixed their young audience with grins that only eighteen-year-old boys knew how to produce-and proceeded to transfix every single member of the audience.


‘You realise they can’t have the puppies.’

They were in Lizzie’s car, heading back to the hospital. Phoebe was sound asleep in the back, worn out by all the excitement.

Lillian was being taken back to the hospital via a coffee-shop-‘Because maybe we need to talk,’ Lillian’s mother had said, fixing Lillian’s father with a look that said if he knew what was good for him he’d shut up about doctors and lawyers and start saying good things about artists.

Amy had been soundly hugged by both her parents, assured they really meant what they’d said about keeping a puppy and was now surrounded by a group of envious little girls who really, really wanted to be her friend.

The Punk Squirrels were walking back to the senior school, probably taking the longest route they could think of.

‘Of course they can’t keep them,’ Harry agreed. ‘That’d be counter-productive. I can’t really see those lads being saddled with the responsibility of puppies for many a year yet.’

‘But you said-’

‘I said the puppies would be the boys’ mascots until they were ready to be family pets. That means the puppies can be mascots for about eight weeks. Being mascots doesn’t necessarily mean they have to travel with the band. Maybe a small silver basset shape to hang from their navel piercings will do the trick.’

‘I don’t believe this,’ Lizzie said faintly. ‘How on earth did you manage it?’

‘I thought this was a great idea,’ he said, looking sideways at her in the car. ‘When May told me what you intended I just extrapolated your theme.’

‘Extrapolated…’

‘Expanded.’

‘I know what extrapolated means.’

‘That’s good,’ he said approvingly. ‘Very good.’

‘Don’t patronise me!’

‘I would never patronise you,’ he told her, and all of a sudden the laughter wasn’t there. Nowhere. Not even close.

‘But…’ Her voice was a squeak and she tried desperately to turn it into a cough, and tried again. ‘But…’

‘I know those kids that have been bullying Amy,’ he told her, taking pity on her discomposure. ‘That’s what being a family doctor is all about. You get to know your patients, warts and all. The kids that have been doing the bullying…Kylie and Rose come from dysfunctional families. They’ve had rotten treatment in the past. I have Social Services involved now, and I’m hoping it’s not too late. They’ve grown into two little thugs. Giving Amy a puppy by having her win the art competition was a brilliant idea but those two are going to try and take her glory.’

‘So…’

‘So the boys-the Punk Squirrels-are in year twelve at the senior school. They’re considered so cool by the rest of the town kids-and by themselves-that they’re practically ice. And they owe me.’

‘They owe you?’

‘The four of them came down with mumps, one after the other,’ Harry said, grinning. ‘Just before last year’s State Bandfest. The whole town was riding on the outcome and if it had got out that the boys couldn’t play because of mumps they’d have been laughing stocks.’

‘So…’

‘So they contracted epidemic parotitis.’

‘But…’ Lizzie frowned. ‘Parotitis is mumps.’

‘Oh, come on, now.’ Harry was grinning at her across the car. ‘How can you say such a thing? Mumps is an undignified kid’s complaint, engendering fat necks and not a lot of sympathy. Parotitis, on the other hand-whew. An almost unheard-of infection that maybe has something to do with parrots. Weird and exotic and just the thing for a bunch of cool eighteen-year-olds with navel piercings.’

‘You’re kidding?’

‘Nope.’

‘And you got away with it?’

‘We got away with it, yes.’

‘And they recovered?’ Lizzie was choking back laughter. The man was clearly brilliant.

‘They did,’ he told her. ‘In the end half the kids in the town came down with a really undignified case of mumps, so their audience would have been halved. But still they stood out as being different. The boys’ parents were in the know, but no one else. While we were immunising kids for mumps as fast as we could go, we also had parents enquiring about immunisation for this strange new disease called parotitis. But we were able to explain that it was only kids who were really weird who got parotitis, and not the general run-of-the-mill population. The band’s street cred soared.’

‘So today…’

Harry’s grin deepened. ‘So today was payback time. They’ve made a fuss of Phoebe, the thought of weird basset-something puppies as temporary mascots appealed enormously, and as a byproduct they’ve also seen what Lillian did.’

His grin faded, to be replaced by a look of intense satisfaction. ‘You’ve done good there, too, Dr Darling. For Lillian to do that… Incredible.’

‘It was you who did good,’ Lizzie retorted, trying not to flush. ‘Getting her parents there.’

‘They were due for a kick in the butt. When May told me what was happening I rang them and said their kid was doing them proud so to get to the school and make a fuss of her. They’ll bring her back to hospital-we have a long way to go with her yet-but we’re making progress. You’re making progress. More progress than I would have dreamed possible.’

‘It feels good,’ Lizzie said, and he nodded.

‘It does. Do you want to stay?’

‘Stay?’

‘Stay here. I’ve told you. I could really use a partner. Birrini is big enough to employ two doctors full time, and to have a sympathetic female doctor…’

‘I don’t do family medicine.’ Her fingers were suddenly tightly clenched on the steering-wheel and Harry glanced across at her, his face thoughtful.

‘You do, you know,’ he told her. ‘You care.’

‘It’s because I care that I can’t do it.’

‘It’s because I care that I’m forced to do it,’ he said, and his voice sounded strained suddenly, all traces of laughter gone. He sounded suddenly bereft. ‘Alone.’

Lizzie thought about that as they swung into the hospital parking lot. They came to a halt but made no move to get out of the car. Instead, she stayed silent, staring out the window at the little hospital nestled in the trees. A county bush nursing hospital. It was about as far from her ideal medical environment as she could imagine. And here was this man…

‘Alone, you said,’ she murmured cautiously, and Harry nodded.

‘Alone.’ The desolation was still in place.

She ventured a fast glance at him and then looked away. He looked miserable.

She thought about it. About the way he’d said the word. Alone…

And she cast him another sideways glance. To confirm her suspicions.

‘Phoebe does this,’ she told him. ‘About half an hour before dinner.’

He looked startled. ‘Pardon?’

‘She looks devastated. As if the end of the world is nigh and the only person who can save her from starvation or worse is me.’

‘You’re telling me…’

‘It’s your cocker spaniel look,’ she explained apologetically. ‘If you hadn’t said alone with quite that amount of pathos…’

‘Hey!’

‘You need to work on your act, Dr McKay. It’s good but not good enough. I’ve been trained by an expert. After Phoebe…no, a mere alone doesn’t cut it. You’re OK to hop into the hospital alone, then, Dr McKay?’

‘Yes, but-’

‘Fine, then.’ She grinned. ‘See you later. Come on, Phoebe, we have work to do.’

Then, as he broke into stunned laughter, she climbed out of the car and slammed the door behind her, clicked her dog to heel-sort of-and then walked into the hospital, leaving him staring dumbfounded after her.


‘He’s sweet on you.’

Two hours later Lizzie just happened to be walking past Lillian’s door. The girl had been dropped back at the hospital by her parents and had gone instantly and soundly to sleep. With a body as severely malnourished as hers was, it took little to exhaust her. Now, though, the minute Lizzie walked through the door she pushed herself upright in bed and giggled.