The man gave a start, seeming to notice her for the first time. ‘Hello there, old chap!’
Freja blushed.
Holding out a gloved hand, the man said, ‘Tobias Appleby at your service.’
‘You’re Tobias Appleby?’ gasped Freja.
‘I am indeed!’ the man cried.
Curiosity outweighing her shyness, Freja moved a little closer and presented her hand. ‘I’m . . . I’m Freja Peachtree.’
‘Freja Peachtree!’ Tobias smiled and shook her hand with such enthusiasm that her teeth rattled. ‘Freja Peachtree! The delightful daughter of Clementine Peachtree! Well, well, well. Fancy seeing you here!’ He rubbed his jaw and shook his head as though truly astonished.
The dog whined and flopped his chin on the seat of the motorcycle.
‘But you were coming here especially to fetch me,’ whispered Freja. ‘Weren’t you?’
Tobias frowned and then, suddenly, his eyebrows and arms shot upward. ‘Yes! I was coming to fetch you! Which is why I am here, killing fairies and trampling gardens! Well, the killing and trampling were not part of the plan, but I am pretty certain that I was here to fetch something . . . and if my memory serves me right, that something was a spiffing lass. You, in fact!’
They stared at one another for a minute or two, both blushing and awkward. Freja searched her mind for something sensible to say, but the best she could come up with was, ‘I’m ten.’
‘Marvellous!’ cried Tobias. ‘I used to be ten!’
Another long pause ensued.
The dog sneezed.
‘Is he yours?’ asked Freja.
‘Absolutely!’ said Tobias. ‘This is Finnegan. He’s just a puppy, really. Ten months old.’
The sidecar, built to fit a goodly-sized man, seemed barely to contain the puppy.
Tobias, noticing the tag on Freja’s duffel coat, leaned forward and squinted. ‘THIS CHILD BITES,’ he read aloud.
Freja blushed once more. She would not have written such a label had she realised what a fine fellow Tobias was. She’d already managed to exchange a few awkward but friendly words. He’d even called her ‘spiffing’! But now her stupid tag was going to ruin it all. Such a kind fellow would not want to associate with a girl who, were the label to be trusted, might at any minute bare her fangs and lunge at his throat like a rabid wolf.
I’ve messed things up again, thought Freja. I’m hopeless with people. She hung her head and kicked at a shard of fairy wing.
Tobias stood up straight and considered the words for a moment. ‘THIS CHILD BITES,’ he repeated, then nodded his approval. ‘Well, that’s jolly useful! Always good to have fair warning. And I dare say you would only bite when truly pressed. You don’t look the type to run around snapping and snarling and biting willy-nilly. You appear thoroughly charming.’
Freja looked up hopefully.
Tobias continued. ‘In fact, we should all come with warnings dangling from our toggles. Finnegan should probably have one that says, “THIS PUPPY LICKS.” He’s a habitual licker. Shows no restraint when it comes to his nose or the floor . . . or my nose for that matter. And I should most definitely come with a tag that says, “THIS MAN DAYDREAMS,” for I’m a dreadful daydreamer. I’m often staring into space, stumbling into babbling brooks and leaving pots of soup on the stove until they boil dry.’
A smile twitched at the edges of Freja’s mouth.
‘Truly!’ Tobias declared. ‘It’s because of my daydreaming that I’m so terribly late in arriving. I was so busy holding a conversation with an imaginary mountain goat that I missed the turn-off to London. It wasn’t until I passed a sign saying, “Welcome to Biggleswade” that I realised my mistake. We did an extremely rushed U-turn on the village green, didn’t we, Finnegan? Scared the feathers off a rather large duck, I’m afraid.’
Finnegan grinned and dribbled.
‘Yes, yes!’ Tobias chuckled, running his hand through his tangled curls. ‘There was also that embarrassing incident with the mud flying up from the rear wheel and splattering all over that poor woman. I remember, Finnegan. But, in my defence, it was a complete accident . . . and I called out a hearty apology over my shoulder as we zoomed away . . . and mud washes off, doesn’t it? It’s not as though it was beetroot juice or indelible ink.’
‘Tobias!’ Clementine was standing on the front steps.
‘Clementine!’ bellowed Tobias. He flung his long, gangly arms wide with joy and slapped Finnegan on the side of the head. Accidentally, of course, but that was little consolation for the poor hound.
Tobias bounded up the steps two at a time and threw himself at Clementine.
And as their arms wrapped around each other and their faces pressed cheek to cheek, Freja couldn’t help noticing how happy, truly and deeply happy, Clementine appeared. Complete. As though she had just found something precious that had been missing for a long, long time.
CHAPTER 5
A face full of dog and tears
Freja skirted around the edge of the living room, half-watching, half-hiding. Clementine and Tobias spent a lot of time staring at one another, smiling, touching each other’s arms and cheeks and hands. In between silences, they said mysterious things like, ‘Remember the Faraway Fair?’ and ‘I wonder what became of Miss Frecklington?’ and ‘I eat a whole box of raisins every Easter, just because I can.’ None of it made any sense to Freja. But to Clementine and Tobias, these simple remarks seemed to contain the seed of great, meaningful episodes of their lives, deep pools of emotion.
‘Freja,’ said Clementine, as though suddenly remembering a world beyond Tobias and herself, ‘duck upstairs and grab your things. Then we will have tea and sandwiches and a lovely chat, the three of us, all together.’
Freja stepped over Finnegan, who lay by the fire licking the hearth, slid along the wall into the hallway and climbed the stairs. She stood in the middle of her bedroom feeling small, scared and alone. Clementine might be just metres away now, but soon she would be far, far away.
Lifting the flap on her satchel, Freja drew out the tiny felt hare and rubbed it against her cheek. ‘It’s an adventure,’ she whispered. ‘I must show Clementine that I can be brave.’ She clutched the hare in her hand for a moment, then popped it into her pocket.
Shrugging her backpack and satchel onto her shoulders, she repeated, ‘An adventure.’ She heaved the suitcase into her right hand and tottered down the stairs, dumping her load by the front door. Creeping back along the hallway, she stopped and listened.
‘So she’s . . . she’s just like us,’ said Tobias in hushed tones.
There was a long pause before Clementine said, ‘Yes.’
‘Does she know?’ asked Tobias.
‘No,’ said Clementine. ‘Please don’t tell her . . . Not yet. We’ll know when the time is right.’
Freja’s head spun. Her thoughts ran wild. Like us? Does she know? Don’t tell? ‘What does it mean?’ she whispered. ‘Are Clementine and Tobias —’
‘Beasts!’ Mrs Thompson burst through the front door, waving a broken white fence picket in the air. Squashing Freja into the wall, she galumphed along the hallway and into the living room, grumbling and growling.
Clementine, used to smoothing over Freja’s muddles, stepped forward to make peace on Tobias’ behalf. Unfortunately, Finnegan stepped forward at the same time. Or perhaps lunged forward would be a more accurate description.
Finnegan, while totally unconcerned by Mrs Thompson’s threatening behaviour with the fence picket, was quite agitated by her fluffy blue slippers. He was, you see, a sight hound, the kind of dog who grows rather excited at the appearance of cats, rabbits and other fluffy things that move about.
It began harmlessly enough with a soft, deep growl at the back of his throat, but escalated every time Mrs Thompson moved her feet. And because she was outraged, she blustered, stomped and shuffled a great deal.
The blue slippers shifted to the left. Finnegan dropped to the floor and bared his teeth.
&nb
sp; The blue slippers stamped to the right. Finnegan snarled and smacked his front paws on the floorboards. Once. Twice. Thrice.
The blue slippers shuffled forward. Finnegan scuttled from side to side like a crazed crab, snapping and barking.
The blue slippers hurried backward and Finnegan went in for the kill. Leaping at Mrs Thompson, he knocked her off her feet, snatched one of the slippers in his teeth and dashed upstairs.
By the time Freja reached her bedroom, the slipper was no more. Tufts of blue fluff drifted through the air, clung to the bedspread, littered the floor and stuck to the hound’s large, wet nose.
On seeing Freja in the doorway, Finnegan whined, dropped to the mat and hid his head between his paws. Just like a scolded child.
Freja moved slowly, cautiously, across the room and sat down beside him. After a few moments, she rested her hand lightly on his back. Several minutes later, when sure that he was comfortable with her presence, she stroked his neck and whispered, ‘I understand. I never quite know how to behave with people either. I get it wrong all the time. As a matter of fact, I did something very similar to Mrs Thompson’s cardigan just yesterday.’
Finnegan lifted his head and blinked. He poked his wet nose into Freja’s ear and she giggled.
‘Perhaps,’ she said kindly, ‘we can help each other along. Learn from one another’s mistakes.’
Finnegan licked her hand and grinned.
And Freja might have thought that this fine hound had understood every word she’d said, even agreed to the mutual support, had he not, at that very moment, leapt to his feet, bounded down the stairs and made a grab for Mrs Thompson’s second slipper.
A great deal of time was needed to soothe Mrs Thompson’s nerves. Clementine sat her neighbour on the lounge, brought her numerous cups of tea and fed her the sandwiches that had been made for their lunch. Tobias wrote a large cheque that was sure to cover the loss of slippers, fence, fairy and flowers, then paced back and forth, wringing his hands, fiddling with the knotted fringe of his scarf and staring, wide eyed, at Mrs Thompson’s large, fleshy face and hands. He might even have muttered the words ‘fearsome’ and ‘blubber’ and ‘lard’. Freja retreated to her hiding place beneath the table. Finnegan joined her and passed the time by licking every square centimetre of the floor, the underside of the table and Freja’s gumboots.
By the time Mrs Thompson was sent on her way, Clementine’s taxi to the airport was waiting outside, horn honking. Clementine, Tobias, Finnegan and Freja bustled out onto the footpath, a jumble of suitcases, warm coats, muddy paws and anxious feelings.
Freja stared at the motorcycle and wondered where she and her luggage were going to fit. But after five minutes and some serious shoving, coaxing, grunting, growling, snapping and an apologetic lick, she found herself wedged into the sidecar wearing a spare riding cap and goggles. Finnegan sat on her lap, bits of him spilling out all over the place. Freja’s suitcase was tied to the rear of the sidecar. Her backpack and satchel hung off Tobias’ shoulders.
‘Oh, Clementine!’ sobbed Freja, stretching her hand past Finnegan’s enormous grey body. ‘I . . . I don’t want to go. It’s too soon.’
Clementine held her hand and smothered her face with kisses and something warm that might have been tears. ‘You are in good hands, my love.’ She stepped back and smiled at Tobias. ‘The best hands.’
Tobias leaned out from the seat of his motorcycle and pecked Clementine on the cheek. Finnegan stretched up and sneaked in a cheeky lick.
Tobias kick-started the bike, yelled, ‘Hold on to your hats!’ and roared away from the footpath. He swerved back and forth across the street, narrowly missing the mailman on his bicycle, until he found himself somewhere towards the left of the road.
Freja shouted back over her shoulder, ‘I love you, Mummy Darling Heart!’ But an explosion from the exhaust drowned out her words and Clementine climbed into the black taxi without looking up. It felt as though her mother had just disappeared from the world altogether. Freja pressed her face into Finnegan’s scruffy grey hair and sobbed.
CHAPTER 6
Carrots and crime
Freja awoke the next morning to a surprisingly warm and pungent breeze blowing on her face. She opened her eyes and found herself staring into a pair of big brown doggy eyes. Finnegan lay on top of her, blinking, waiting to be noticed.
‘Hello,’ said Freja.
The dog flicked his large pink tongue across her nose before resuming his warm, heavy breathing.
Freja scanned her surroundings without moving, just as Clementine had taught her to do in the wild. She found that she was lying in a pretty white bed, made up with pale blue-and-white striped sheets, a powder-puff eiderdown and a handmade quilt. The room was an attic nook, not much bigger than the bed. The sloped ceilings came all the way down to the floor, reminding Freja of the tent that she and Clementine sometimes camped in during the summer.
‘Clementine,’ she whispered. All thoughts returned to Clementine. Freja’s eyes stung and she sniffled.
Finnegan licked her nose again. Three times. Softly and lovingly.
Sunlight streamed in through a small, square window, blazing a trail across the quilt, along the bare timber floor and out the door. Wriggling out from beneath the huge dog, Freja stood up and stretched. She was still wearing yesterday’s clothes. Tobias must have carried her from the sidecar straight to bed when they arrived last night. She hadn’t woken for even a moment.
Leaning her forehead against the cold windowpane, Freja gasped. ‘Oh, how lovely! Fields, hedgerows, a river, a forest.’ She felt her body relax, as it always did when she escaped London and returned to a more natural world. Reaching into her pocket, she wrapped her fingers around the small felt hare.
Finnegan sprang from the bed and put his front paws up on the windowsill beside her. His heavy breath fogged up the glass. Freja giggled and wiped clear a patch through which she could continue to gaze.
Tobias dashed into the garden at the back of the cottage. His cardigan flapped about as he leapt and ducked and waved his arms in the air, acting out some sort of drama. A horse in the adjoining meadow followed along on the other side of a low stone wall, but Tobias didn’t seem to notice his chestnut shadow.
Tobias stopped.
The horse stopped.
Tobias stared into space and tugged at his ears.
The horse craned her neck over the stone wall and nibbled at Tobias’ sleeve.
Tobias spun around and laughed. Pulling a carrot from his cardigan pocket, he fed it to the horse and rubbed her nose. Then, turning away, he continued to dash back and forth, waving his arms in the air, thrusting his fists forward and, occasionally, yelling. The horse followed, despite the fact that she was struck across the nose twice as Tobias made sweeping gestures with his hands.
On his third crossing of the garden, Tobias stopped once more. This time, he pulled a notebook from his hip pocket and drew a pencil from behind his ear. He began to write apace, stopping every now and then to scratch his head with the pencil or feed another carrot to the horse. When all the carrots were gone, the horse contented herself with nibbling on Tobias’ shoulder. The cardigan pulled and stretched and grew quite slobbery, but Tobias didn’t seem to care . . . or perhaps he didn’t notice. He was completely absorbed in his notes.
‘What on earth is Tobias Appleby doing?’ asked Freja. ‘He seems quite distracted. Rather mad, really.’
Finnegan whined and leapt back onto the bed.
‘More importantly,’ said Freja, ‘who is Tobias Appleby?’
Turning from the window, she crouched down before her suitcase, opened the lid and muddled through the clothes until she found the treasure chest that Clementine had given her two days ago. Placing it on the windowsill, she sat back down on the bed and stared at it. It really was a poor battered thing, quite small and ugly.
‘Who is Tobias Appleby?’ she murmured, scrunching her nose.
The treasure chest gave nothing away.
The Irish wolfhound did not reply. He was far too busy chewing on the corner of the pillow. This reminded Freja that it was a long time since she had last eaten. Her tummy rumbled.
Time for breakfast! Rolling across the bed, she headed out of the attic, down a steep, narrow flight of stairs and through the nearest doorway. But instead of the kitchen, she found herself in a cosy, cluttered living room.
‘Wow!’ she gasped. ‘How . . . how . . . how terribly messy.’
An entire wall was covered in books, old and new, crammed upright, sideways and any-which-way so that not even an ant could find a gap in which to set up camp. In front of the bookcase stood a large timber desk crowded with an ancient typewriter, a stack of papers, ink pots, pencils, pens, a teapot shaped like a pineapple, piles of books, an old-fashioned telephone and three cups and saucers containing varying amounts of tea dregs.
Two green velvet wingback chairs, plump and worn, sat in front of a crackling fire. Perched precariously on the arm of one chair was a cardboard box labelled: ‘LIBRARY BOOKS WHICH ARE SO TERRIBLY OVERDUE THAT I AM EMBARRASSED TO RETURN THEM.’
Freja giggled. ‘Naughty but honest,’ she said.
The floorboards were partly covered by a Turkish rug that looked rather grand, except for where it had been burned by cinders from the fire or stained with droplets of black ink. Every other spare surface was scattered with journals, books, partially chewed footwear, mail and scraps of paper bearing handwritten notes and diagrams. It was, in short, like standing in a museum or an ancient library through which a herd of musk oxen had stampeded. The overall effect was one of disorderly charm and Freja liked it very much.
She stepped forward to examine the telephone. It was black with a dial for the numbers, just like she’d seen in old movies. She reached out to lift the receiver, but was distracted by the pile of books on which it sat. Her hand froze mid-air as she recognised the name on the spines of the books.
‘Tobias Appleby,’ she read aloud. The back of her neck tingled with excitement.
The Girl, the Dog, and the Writer in Rome Page 3
