A good deed, a good dog -neither is forgotten

Twenty years later, Dr. Joel Locketz can still remember the woman and girl with the sick puppy. They came into his Animal Medical Clinic on Hennepin Avenue in Minneapolis holding Boots, a spaniel mutt that their neighbor was planning to take to the pound.

Boots was stricken with the parvovirus, which was almost an epidemic at the time. She had been vomiting and was dehydrated and, if left untreated, would certainly die.

But the woman, Elaine Franczak, had very little money. The medication cost $500, far more than Franczak could afford.

Locketz looked at Elaine and her daughter, 10-year-old Alisha, and the little dog, Boots. Don't worry about it, he said, we'll pay for the medicine.

Elaine and Alisha crushed the pills up in baby food and force-fed the dog. Elaine sat up with her around the clock for several days, caring for Boots, making sure she ate and drank water. Slowly, she got better and better and eventually recovered completely.

Elaine Franczak intended to pay Locketz back. "She'd stop by with a dollar or two," Locketz recalled, "whatever she could afford that week."

After a while, Elaine Franczak stopped coming. What Locketz didn't know is that Elaine was a heroin addict. So was her husband. For several years, they rotated in and out of rehab. Alisha never knew when one of her parents would disappear. Sometimes she lived with one or the other, sometimes relatives took her in.

Not surprisingly, Alisha faced struggles, too. "I was 23 and pregnant and not on a good path," she said. "I even had an arrest warrant out on me, I think. I was going to have a child and I told myself, I'm not going to be that person."

Alisha took her GED tests and got stellar scores. She got accepted into the College of St. Catherine in St. Paul, became a respiratory therapist and recently went back to school to further her career. She moved in with her dad, who took his oath of sobriety in 2004.

It turns out Boots was a survivor, too. She lived for 15 years, Alisha's loyal companion through all of the heartbreak and success. "This was the best dog ever," Alisha said.

Elaine Franczak died of lung cancer in 2006. Before she died, she said there were two things she regretted. One was not seeing the ocean. The other was that she never paid back the veterinarian who saved Boots.

Alisha tried to take her mother to see the ocean, but she only made it as far as the Miami airport before being rushed to a hospital, where she died.

So she sat down and wrote a letter:

"Dear Joel, I wanted to thank you for being such a wonderful advocate for the pets you care for. I also want you to know how your compassion and charity changed my life," it began. "My mother and I always kept your generosity in our hearts and we always were thankful for what you did."

Alisha wanted to pay the bill, but Locketz suggested she make a donation to a no-kill animal shelter instead. But he is still struck that his gesture meant so much that Alisha would try to pay him back 20 years later.

"I treated the dog without any idea we would ever be paid for it," Locketz said. "Most vets will help people out sometimes because you know what pets mean to people, it's a member of the family. You see people in these circumstances where they've lost a loved one, or they are disabled, and the pet is a gateway to a more fruitful life. I was impressed that [Elaine] really tried to pay me back then, to keep her dignity."

When he read Alisha's letter, he said "it really went straight to the heart."

Locketz's son, Garrett, sent the letter to the newspaper, but Alisha was initially hesitant to share her story.

"But I open the newspaper every day and read so much bad news," she said. "I thought it would be a good thing to see that people still have charity and generosity, and that it is appreciated."