This is the moment a mum wonders where her son is and finds him standing outside the front door of their flat with a guilty secret – a puppy that he wants to bring home.

The youngster admitted that after playing with the puppy, he wanted to take it home and feed it some food.

He planned to ask his mother if they could keep it, but he was worried about her response when he turned up at the home in Wuhu, Anhui, in China, on May 19.

The boy had picked up the puppy and taken it home but then admitted he got cold feet and was too scared to go inside.

He was escorted by his mother, looking sheepish and trying to hide the puppy behind him, but then he had to step aside and she saw the little pup and decided to let it stay anyway.

The puppy has been named 'Xiao Man' because it was picked up on the day of Xiaoman, a solar term in the Chinese calendar which marks the start of the rainy season, and the mum said that it had been checked and given its jabs to make sure it was healthy.