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Published on November 10, 2007

Then she sees her T-shirt, covered in blood. Then she sees the little poodle in her arms.

"Please help my dog," the child sobs.

She knows the child - and the dog - well. They live a few doors down from her clinic. The child feeds the dog, bathes him and plays with him. An only child, the poodle is the only brother she has ever known.

Just a few minutes before, she was playing with the little dog, when, without warning, he dashed out into the busy street, where a car hit him. He is killed instantly.

The child hasn't realised it. She herself picks the dog up, ignoring the blood, and rushes the broken body to the vet.

The vet knows immediately that the dog is dead. She pats the body gently and then turns to the child to tell her the bad news. At first, the girl doesn't believe her. The dog's eyes and mouth are open. Surely, there is something that can be done.

The child stays with the dog for hours, speaking softly to him. Then, as the little body grows cold, she finally understands.

Some people feel that a 10-year-old child is old enough to be taught about death. "That experience was a good lesson for her," someone tells me when I describe later what happened.

Myself, I think it would have been better for the child if the dog had died of old age and not so violently. Life leaves us no choice, though. One second you have a companion. The next, he's gone. The vet is also shaken by the experience.

It's hard enough for her to deal with the violent death of a dog. To see the little girl in so much grief strikes her to the heart.

That night, she phones me. "Please be careful when you open your gate," she says. "Wan-Wan can easily run outside and be hit by a car."

I already know how fast my poodle-pup is. I accidentally drop a piece of sausage on the floor, and before I can stoop to retrieve it, the doggie has swooped it up and gulped it down.

Let me open the gate, and an apricot shadow slips outside, oblivious to the dangers of motorcycles as well as the top dog in the soi, who would never bite a person but would kill a little dog.

Wan has already learned "stay". At times, she even obeys, waiting patiently at the door when the gate is open.

If someone she knows is at the gate, though, she can't help herself. Her body starts shaking happily. Her eyes open but her brain closed down, she dashes towards the open gate. With a brief greeting to the visitor, she keeps on dashing.

Even though she loves her romp, even though she's intelligent, even though I love her, I know I can't trust her. Before the gate opens, I hold her or put her in her cage.

By Laurie rosenthal

The Nation