Charlie left the room, took a quick look around to orient himself, and headed for the office. He picked up the phone and dialed his teacher's number. Ms. Wile was especially nice. She had given all her students her home phone number on the first day of school and told them that if they ever had a question when they weren't in school to call her and ask instead of having to wait until the next day in school. Charlie listened to the phone ring, reflecting how lucky he was to have such a wonderful teacher this year. Other years his teachers had been very mean to him. Not Ms. Wile, though. She genuinely cared for her students.

"Hello?" Ms. Wile's voice came over the line.

"Hello Ms. Wile," Charlie said, "It's Charlie…Charlie Bucket."

"Charlie!" Charlie could hear the pleasure in her voice. "How can I help you?"

"I have a question," Charlie said.

"That's why I gave you my number," Ms. Wile said, "Shoot."

"It's actually about something other than class," Charlie said hesitantly. "You see…Mr. Wonka just got a horse and we need to have it checked out by a veterinarian and a farrier. I remember you have a horse, too, so I was wondering about what veterinarians and farriers you could recommend?"

"Oh," Ms. Wile said. "Well, I've always used Dr. Brand and Mr. Conway for Glory. They're both good. Loyal. Dedicated. Determined. But gentle and kind with first time clients. I got Glory when she was just a baby after she was weaned away from her mother, and I've been using them both all this time. Want me to give you their numbers?"

"Yes, please!" Charlie exclaimed.

After she had given Charlie the phone numbers, Ms. Wile said, "Oh, and Charlie?"

"Yes ma'am?" Charlie said.

"Thanks for thinking of asking me about this," Ms. Wile said. "I'd love to see a picture of Mr. Wonka's horse some time."

"Sure," Charlie said, "Bye."

"Goodbye, Charlie," Ms. Wile said, and hung up. Charlie went back to Cocoa's new stall. Willy was now outside, leaning on the new gate, watching Cocoa. Charlie told him what Ms. Wile had said and they agreed to call the numbers and set up appointments as soon as possible.

The first appointment, the one with Dr. Brand, was about an hour later. Dr. Brand turned out to be a middle-aged woman. Her hair was black with some silver mixed in. She wore it in a braid. Charlie went out to meet her and open the door to the side entrance so she could drive in. She got out and they introduced themselves. Then Charlie led her into Cocoa's stall by the outer entrance. Willy was still leaning on the gate as they came in. He looked up and then straightened up and came inside the stall. "I'm Willy Wonka," he said, holding his hand out. "Are you the vet?"

"Yes," Dr. Brand said, shaking his hand then looking at Cocoa. "Is this the patient?"

Willy nodded. "This is Cocoa," he said. "It's kind of sudden I have him," he explained. "I found him outside my gates this morning and decided to take him in."

Dr. Brand started her examination, "Someone's probably missing him, then," she said as she worked. "A horse like this isn't likely to have lived wild all his life. See how calmly he's standing for me? A wild horse wouldn't do that." Dr. Brand checked his eyes, his nose, his ears, the inside of his mouth, and used her stethoscope to check his heart, lungs, and digestive tract. She turned to where Willy and Charlie stood. "He seems pretty healthy, except that he hasn't had a lot to eat for a few days at least. He also has worms, so that's contributing to the problem. It's clear he hasn't been on his own for too long. I'd say a couple weeks at most. He can start having grain again. I'd say, though, you should give him some cod liver oil with it." Willy pulled a face. His father had given it to him when he was a kid and he had found it to be nasty tasting stuff. Dr. Brand laughed. "Horses don't seem to mind the taste of it, and it helps them gain weight if they've lost it." She recommended some other supplements and a kind of grain. Charlie jotted them all down for later. Then, after worming Cocoa, she went to get a little gadget that she said would tell if he had a microchip in his neck. All horses who were registered did these days. If he was registered, it would be fairly easy to find his owner. She used the reader on Cocoa and found that he had a microchip. She wrote down the number, gave Cocoa a quick pat, she left.

"She's a keeper," Willy remarked after Charlie came back from seeing her to her truck.

"I'm not surprised," Charlie said.

A half an hour later Mr. Conway showed up. He trimmed Cocoa's hooves and sprayed the left front one with a medical spray because he'd developed thrush. He told them that Cocoa had never had shoes put on. He didn't really need them, Mr. Conway said. His hooves were good and strong. Both he and the vet had turned out to be as good as Ms. Wile had said they were. Willy decided to keep using them for Cocoa.

"What about when Dr. Brand finds his owners again?" Charlie asked.

Willy brushed this off. "Let's not think about that, 'kay?" he said.

The two of them took off in the elevator to a tack store that was rumored to have really good merchandise. They set about buying the stuff they needed. Willy, of course, got everything purple and everything of the finest quality. A worker at the tack store called a nearby farm to make an order of hay and told them to come to the store where they would accompany Charlie and Willy (In a VERY full glass elevator) back to the factory. Willy paid for everything and then he and Charlie squeezed into the elevator, fighting to make room for themselves among the stuff. They took off, the truck with the hay following them.

They landed the elevator in Cocoa's paddock. The truck was waiting outside the side entrance. The doors opened. Charlie managed to wriggle himself free of the stuff, but Willy was stuck. Charlie started unloading and setting stuff on the ground until finally Willy could get out. They finished unloading and stacked all the stuff between the gate to Cocoa's stall and the door leading to the factory. Then they took Cocoa inside and shut the door just to make sure he would be safe. Finally, they got the truck as close as they could to where the hay would be stored and started unloading. Willy and Charlie formed a team and could manage a bale between them. The oompa-loompas also helped. It took twenty of them to carry a bale inside. Fortunately there were a lot of teams of twenty. Everybody just had to be careful not to step on them. Some of the people who had come with the load could manage one or even two bales at a time. After a bit the hay was all in, the people who had delivered the hay gone, and the new stuff they had bought in place. Cocoa sighed contentedly as if to say, "Peace at last."

The next few days passed quickly. There was no news from Dr. Brand about the number on Cocoa's microchip, so Willy began to hope that nothing would come of it. He had the oompa-loompas taking care of cleaning out the stall and paddock and feeding. Some of the tools they had bought had to be modified so the tiny people could use them. A hole was dug and lined with metal outside in a corner where nobody would notice it unless they knew it was there. It was fenced off to keep Cocoa from wandering in the neighborhood. The dirty bedding and manure picked up from the paddock was dumped out there and it went, like all the other trash, to the incinerator.