by James Barrie
His wife Marjorie answered it.
‘There’s a dead dog on the verge,’ he said.
‘I’d better go and get Wally,’ Marjorie said, peering past Jonathan. ‘He’ll know what to do.’
Jonathan smelled home baking coming from inside the house; then the front door closed.
A minute later Wally emerged from the side of his house. He crossed over to where the dog lay and knelt down. ‘It’s dead,’ he said.
His eyes were moist. He blew his nose on his handkerchief.
‘It’s Geoffrey’s dog. His guide dog. Hasn’t had it a year.’
‘Who’s going to tell him?’
‘I’ll go and get him,’ Wally said.
Jonathan sat down on his front wall and waited. He stared at the white Audi parked on the grass verge opposite his house and the flowers flattened below its tyres.
He heard a door creak behind him. He turned and saw Theodore saunter out of the front door. He must have left it ajar. He couldn’t be bothered trying to get the cat back inside. Instead he watched as the cat approached the dead dog.
Theodore carried out a cursory examination of the crime scene.
He immediately noted the soil on the dog’s paws, where she had been digging in the flowerbed.
There was dried blood around an ear and around her nostrils, the result of a single blow. Not from a passing vehicle but from the back of a spade.
He then examined the verge in front of the body. He saw two parallel lines, a paw’s width wide and four cat paces apart, impressed in the grass. The lines started from the footpath and ended in deeper ruts, where the wheelie bin had been pulled over so its contents could be deposited onto the grass.
Theodore looked back to the point where the wheelie bin had been pulled onto the verge. It had come from further around Constantine Crescent, and not from York Road.
Ten minutes later, Jonathan watched as Geoffrey and Wally approached.
Geoffrey was wearing a navy blue dressing gown and brown suede slippers. He tapped a white stick in front of him.
‘She’s right here,’ Wally said. ‘Just to your left. Two feet away.’
‘I’m not blind,’ Geoffrey said.
‘You’re not?’
‘I am visually impaired.’ Geoffrey retracted his stick with a click of a button, so that it looked like a little white truncheon and then knelt down on the footpath beside Lucy. He moved his hands over the dog. He stroked her for some minutes.
‘I’ll take her to the vet’s Tuesday morning,’ Wally said. ‘Leave it to me.’
Geoffrey didn’t say anything. He stroked Lucy.
‘They won’t be open tomorrow, it being Easter Monday,’ Wally said.
Geoffrey got to his feet. ‘She never came back in last night,’ he said finally. ‘I let her out but she never came back. I looked all over for her… Must have got out of the garden. It’s not like her at all.’
‘Must have got hit by a car.’
Wally now looked across at Steve’s Audi parked on the verge in front of Linda’s house and shook his head slowly from side to side.
‘I’ll phone the guide dogs on Tuesday,’ Geoffrey said. He clicked a button and his stick extended back to the ground. ‘I’m sure they’ll soon be able to sort something out. A replacement…’
From below Jonathan’s dark blue Volvo, parked on the driveway, Theodore looked from the dead dog to its owner. Geoffrey wore his mirrored sunglasses. The sunglasses hid his eyes. They hid his feelings. They gave nothing away.
Theodore watched as Geoffrey tapped his way back along the street. Jonathan went back inside the house and Wally left but shortly returned with a blue tarpaulin. He lifted the dead dog onto the tarpaulin; then folded it over. He carried the dog away.
A minute later, from the front door of the house next door, Steve appeared, his golf bag in his hand. While he struggled with his bag and the door, Charlie the Chihuahua shot out. Steve put his golf bag in the boot of his car. He looked for a moment at the fat little dog darting about the street. He looked up at the bedroom curtains of his house that were closed. Then he got in his car and drove off.
In the house opposite, Theodore saw the Venetian blinds snap back to the horizontal, and knew that Linda, the neighbour opposite, had been watching the proceedings.
Then he made his way along the side of the house. He squeezed below the gate and was in the back garden. He was shortly on top of Wally’s shed roof: his favoured surveillance spot.
Stuart had been up early, hiding little foil-wrapped chocolate eggs in his garden while his wife Leslie had a lie in.
Theodore heard him call to his children: ‘Dougie! Daisy! I believe the Wee Scottie Bunny has been.’
‘Tell us the story of the Wee Scottie Bunny, please daddy,’ Daisy said.
‘Do we have to?’ Dougie said.
‘Pleeaaase.’
‘All right,’ Stuart said and clapped his hands together. ‘It was a Sunday, an Easter Sunday like today, and Jesus had been dead a few days. The Romans had put him in a cave and rolled a big rock across the entrance to the cave. And this big old rock was egg-shaped…’
‘And that’s why we have chocolate eggs at Easter, dad,’ Daisy said. ‘Isn’t it?’
‘That’s right,’ Stuart said.
‘Can’t we just look for the eggs now?’ Dougie said.
‘No,’ Daisy said, ‘I want to hear dad tell the Easter Story…’
Stuart carried on with the story: ‘That morning, a wee little bunny was out hopping around in the early morning sunshine, and he heard a voice coming from behind this large egg-shaped rock. “Let me out!” the voice called from inside the cave. “Let me out!”’
‘It was Jesus, wasn’t it?’ Daisy said. ‘It was Jesus in the cave.’
‘That’s right,’ Stuart said. ‘So the bunny jumped against the rock. But it didn’t move. He tried again and still it wouldn’t budge.
‘The wee little bunny looked up to the heavens and he prayed to God that he be given the strength to roll that rock away and release whoever was trapped inside.
‘Then he jumped against the rock and this time the rock moved. It didn’t just move. It rolled away. And Jesus appeared, and thanked the wee bunny rabbit.’
‘Did that really happen, daddy?’ Daisy said.
‘Of course it didn’t,’ her brother Dougie said. ‘Can we look for the eggs now?’
‘Aye, go for it,’ said Stuart. ‘Go and get your eggies!’
Dougie and Daisy ran into the garden in their pyjamas. Dougie was ten, Daisy a couple of years younger. They both had their father’s red hair.
‘I can see one,’ Dougie shouted, dashing across the garden to where a speck of tinfoil caught the early morning sunshine. He wiped the soil from the little egg and tucked it into his pyjama pocket and darted after another.
‘I can see one too,’ said Daisy, her hands in the soil.
‘I’ve got four!’ Dougie called out.
‘I’ve got something on my hands and it smells,’ Daisy said.
Theodore looked down and saw that Daisy’s hands were streaked with brown.
‘Looks like cat shit,’ Stuart said from the patio. ‘A fresh one too.’
Daisy started crying, her palms held out. ‘It smells, daddy,’ she said.
‘Bloody cats,’ Stuart said. ‘Get inside and wash your hands.’
Dougie was still pocketing the little chocolate eggs. ‘Silly Daisy,’ he said.
Daisy ran inside, crying. ‘Mummy!’ she shouted. ‘I’ve put my hand in cat poo! Mummy! Mummy!’
‘Don’t wake your mother,’ Stuart shouted after her. ‘She’s having a lie-in.’
He looked up and saw Theodore peering down at him from the top of Wally’s shed roof.
‘Did you do that?’ he said, pointing an accusing finger up at the cat.
Theodore looked down at the angry Scot. What if I did it? You don’t expect me to go in my own garden? He turned his back to Stuart.
‘It
might have been Hamish,’ Dougie said, stuffing more eggs into his bulging pyjama bottoms.
‘Hamish knows not to shit in his own back garden,’ Stuart said.
Exactly, thought Theodore.
Wally and Marjorie were sitting on a bench in their garden.
‘When I hear the children over there, all excited, I do wonder what it would have been like…’ Marjorie said, ‘if we could have had some of our own.’
‘Now, now,’ Wally said, ‘there’s no point thinking like that.’
‘I know,’ Marjorie said. ‘I just sometimes wonder…’
‘No point wondering about what never happened.’
‘I suppose not.’
They both drank from their mugs of tea.
‘I’ve got something for you,’ Wally said, getting up from the bench. ‘For Easter.’
He crossed to his shed, and a moment later emerged carrying a large chocolate egg.
‘Oh, my favourite, Wally. How did you know?’
‘We have been married for nearly forty years.’
‘Well, I’ve got something for you too.’
Marjorie got to her feet and disappeared inside the house. A minute later she returned carrying a large chocolate egg.
‘Oh, my favourite, Marge! How did you know?’
‘We have been married for nearly forty years.’
Theodore looked down at the old couple sitting together on their garden bench. Marjorie’s face was pink in the early morning sunshine, and Wally had a glow to his cheeks, like red dabs. They each held identical chocolate eggs.
‘I might have a bit of mine now,’ said Marjorie.
‘I might do the same,’ said Wally.
Like the Stamp
Penny Black had left York and gone to study at university in Bristol. After she had graduated with a first class degree in graphic design, she had stayed on in Bristol. She got a job with a marketing agency and got engaged to Tom, who she had met on her course.
Penny had a by-line: she’d say on the phone to clients: ‘It’s Penny… Penny Black – like the stamp!’, and people remembered it; they’d ask for her by name when they called up the agency. It was a memorable name after all. She already had a stable of half a dozen clients. Her future looked bright.
Penny was glad of the geographical as well as emotional distance that existed between her and her alcoholic of a mother and psychopath of a sister. She had managed to avoid forcing her family on Tom so far; she preferred to keep it that way.
She usually called her mother on her mobile phone every few days to make sure she was all right. When Tessa didn’t answer, she began to wonder. When her mother’s mobile went straight to answerphone, she began to worry. In a panic she called the landline but that too went straight to answerphone. She didn’t have Ellen’s mobile number. She doubted she had one.
Penny went out Saturday night to a trendy bar with Tom, but she couldn’t relax, no matter how much she drank in the bar, where she sat with a group of their friends.
When they got back to their flat, they watched a programme in which young couples have to convince the viewing public that their feelings for each other are genuine, otherwise they get voted off, their 15 minutes of fame over, but Penny couldn’t engage with the programme. She couldn’t help but think that something terrible had happened to her mother.
Sunday morning she woke early. She got dressed, and leaving Tom sleeping, a note left on her pillow, she set off for the railway station to get the train to York.
She thought she would be back that evening. Easter Monday at the latest. She would never return.
The Great Barbecue Disaster
Emily’s parents arrived shortly before midday.
Emily’s father Patrick carried a large blue cool box through the kitchen and into the back garden. The cool box contained the prawns and lamb cutlets that Patrick was going to cook on the barbecue.
Patrick ordered his clothes from slim brochures that fell out of The Times. Theodore appraised his attire from the bottom to the top, as was his way. He eyed his well-worn suede loafers that were shiny with wear at the extremities. His trousers were flat-fronted, brick-red chinos, held up by a woven leather belt, acquired while on holiday in the north of Ibiza. His shirt was blue and white vertical stripes, which exaggerated his belly that hung over the aforementioned belt. Theodore finished his examination, noting his balding pink head that glistened with sweat.
Patrick got the barbecue out of the garage and placed it on the patio. The cool box was left in the shade cast by the garage wall.
They were waiting for the charcoal to heat up when Theodore heard a tapping from the garden behind.
There was a woman at the back door of Ellen’s house. She had long, dyed-red hair and wore dark designer sunglasses and a red dress. She knocked again on the door, more loudly. ‘It’s Penny,’ she called. ‘Let me in… I know you’re in there.’
Penny turned round. Theodore noticed that she was of a similar physique to her sister, Ellen. She wore bright red lipstick that matched her red dress. She paced in front of the door. She looked at her wristwatch. She looked up at the bedroom windows. The curtains were closed.
‘I think something has happened to the woman who lives behind,’ Jonathan told Patrick. ‘Looks like her other daughter has turned up now. To see what’s going on.’
‘Trish said that you’ve been developing something of an imagination,’ Patrick said. ‘Well, just be careful… Dangerous things: imaginations.’
‘It’s not just my imagination,’ Jonathan said. ‘Something has happened to her, I’m sure…’
‘Have I ever told you the story of the three-legged pig?’ Patrick said, changing the subject.
‘I don’t believe so,’ Jonathan said, shaking his head.
Patrick began to tell Jonathan the story of the three-legged pig: ‘A man is driving down a country lane when he has a puncture. Not having a spare tyre or mobile phone, he finds a farmhouse and knocks on the farmhouse door. As the door opens, a pig runs out. The man notices that the pig only has three legs… “Why has your pig only got three legs?” he asks the farmer…’
But Jonathan was still looking over at the house behind, not really paying attention to Patrick’s rambling story.
Penny Black was standing in the garden now, looking up at the bedroom windows, hands on hips. Then she disappeared down the side of the house and then Jonathan heard faint banging and knew that she was at the front door; she hadn’t given up.
Jonathan turned his attention back to Patrick.
‘Then the pig waited by her until the ambulance arrived,’ Patrick said.
Jonathan looked round again. He couldn’t see Penny. Maybe she had given up and gone home. But didn’t she live in Cardiff, or some far-flung place. She wouldn’t come all this way and leave again after five minutes.
He then noticed a patch of silver fur at the bottom of the hedge and realised that Theodore was also keeping an eye on the proceedings.
In the kitchen, Emily and her mum Trish were making salads to go with the lunch.
‘I’m not sure I’m cut out for this,’ Emily said, slicing cucumber.
‘Cut out for what?’ Trish said.
‘You know,’ Emily said, holding up the kitchen knife. ‘All of this… The house, Jonathan, suburbia… Getting up at seven o’clock every morning. Going to a job I don’t like. Coming home and sorting out dinner.’
‘What you need to do,’ Trish said, ‘is to get married and have children.’
‘I’m not sure I’m ready… And besides, Jonathan hasn’t asked. He’s never mentioned marriage…’
‘Well, it was a mistake moving in together before marriage. All this try before you buy. It might be all right for cars or televisions but not when it comes to husbands.’
‘What if I’ve made a mistake?’ Emily said, putting the knife down on the chopping board.
‘Everyone makes mistakes,’ Trish said. ‘You just have to live with them the rest of your life.
That’s why you should get married before you cohabit…’
‘Why’s dad weeing in the garden?’ Emily said.
‘He’s always doing that,’ Trish said and sighed. ‘It’s better than him traipsing dirt into the house every time he needs to go. Weak bladder…’
In the garden, Patrick turned from the hedge and said, ‘Then the farmer said, “Well, I didn’t want to eat it all at once”.’ He laughed until his cheeks were bright pink.
‘I don’t get it,’ Jonathan said.
‘I think it’s time to put the prawns on,’ Patrick said, struggling with his flies.
He bent over and retrieved a large bag of uncooked prawns from the cool box.
He had placed tin foil on the wire rack of the barbecue. He now carefully set out the prawns, fingering each one attentively.
‘Five minutes!’ he shouted across to the kitchen door.
Then Theodore spotted Charlie the Chihuahua. Charlie nipped through a small gap in the bottom of the hedge and made for the cool box. He placed his paws on the rim of the box that had been left open and tilted it towards him. He then launched himself upwards and into the box, ending up on top of the lamb cutlets, the lid snapping closed over him.
Patrick was bent over the barbecue, sweating fiercely. Jonathan was looking in his direction but also at the house behind. Penny was bashing on the backdoor, as hard as she could without doing it lasting damage.
After they had eaten the prawn starter, Patrick announced he would put the lamb cutlets on the barbecue before the heat from the charcoal began to die down. He flipped open the white lid of the cool box.
‘Holy mackerel!’ he exclaimed. ‘There’s a Chihuahua in the chiller!’
Jonathan got to his feet with his crutches and crossed over. ‘Is it alive?’ he said.
Patrick picked up the dog and held it to his chest. ‘It’s alive but it’s chilled to the bone,’ he said. ‘I know… I’ll warm it up a bit.’
He held the Chihuahua a couple of feet over the barbecue, so that the heat from the charcoal could warm up the frozen dog. The dog soon began to jerk back to life.
