Doofus, Dog of Doom

by Emma Laybourn

  Chapter Nineteen

  Although it was only five minutes’ ride to Miller’s Clough, by the time Holly got there Clive’s bike had disappeared far behind her.

  Along the way, she kept telling herself that Clive was probably right about the cat being fast asleep somewhere. He usually was right where animals were concerned: though who was to say that a Stone Age sabre-tooth would act the same way as a modern lion or tiger? Nobody had observed a sabre-tooth.

  Until now. She thought of that predatory golden eye, observing her. The stone pressed against her leg. She was sure it was important, but she had no idea why, or what she could do with it.

  At the moment, all she could think of was to warn Mum. Even if the cat was miles away, or snoring somewhere with a stomach full of lamb, she had to know that Mum and Nan were safe. Again, a mournful, gut-wrenching howl from Doofus seemed to echo through her head.

  She gritted her teeth and pedalled even faster. Typical Mum, going out this early. It was barely nine o’clock when Holly’s bike swerved into the car-park: too soon for the ice-cream van. There were no more than half a dozen cars there.

  Holly couldn’t see Mum or Nan, but she knew which path they must have taken: the wheelchair-friendly one, a gentle loop that twined through trees to the bottom of the waterfall and back again.

  If it was wheelchair friendly, it was bike-friendly. As soon as she saw Clive wobbling into the far end of the car park, she set off down the path, pedalling furiously past indignant pairs of walkers who had to leap out of the way.

  “No bikes!” one shouted. She ignored him and flew on between the trees.

  Then she heard the howl.

  Doofus… This time the howl was not inside her head: it was real, piteous and compelling. A surge of dread and panic flooded through her. Thrown off balance, she skidded sideways and nearly crashed into a tree.

  As she dragged the bike upright, a second howl came to her ears: it was both a warning and an imperious summons. And then there was a third howl, and a fourth – layer on strident layer of alarm. Five, six, seven: howl after howl. She knew they were all Doofus. He must be going crazy.

  She abandoned the bike by the side of the path and ran round the last bend to the waterfall. There was Mum, bending over Doofus, trying to quieten him, with apologetic smiles at the walkers who were frowning at this interruption to their peaceful morning. Doofus would not be quieted. Another howl echoed round the leafy banks like a baleful siren.

  How many howls was that now? Holly asked herself in dismay. How many deaths did that mean? Nine, ten? Whose deaths was he howling for?

  Doofus stood rigid, head pointing at the waterfall, and howled yet again, the harrowing sound rising over the steady rush of water.

  “Stop it, Doofus, for goodness sake!” snapped Mum, tugging at his lead in vain. Nan, in her wheelchair, looked anxious. Mum glanced up and saw Holly.

  “Oh, Holly, thank heavens you’ve arrived! Can you get him to calm down? Because I can’t. I don’t know what’s got into him. Do you think he’s hurt?”

  Holly ran to Doofus. She did not fling her arms around him as she had wanted to do earlier. Instead she squatted next to him and said softly,

  “What is it, Doofus? Where is it?” She followed the line of his gaze with her own eyes.

  Trees clustered round the falls, which were a series of several torrents tumbling down the narrow cleft. High up on each overgrown bank were thick tangles of bushes and brambles.

  She couldn’t see anything unusual: but she thought she detected the faint waft of a dark, pungent smell. The skin prickled on the back of her neck and down her spine. Doofus howled again, his whole body tense and stiff as steel, as if it pained him. That must be twelve howls by now, at least.

  “What do we do, Doofus?” she whispered; and then it hit her.

  Maybe there was nothing to be done. If the sabre-tooth was up there, watching, waiting, what could they do? They were just prey. A dozen slow, unarmed, unwary humans, most of then looking disapprovingly at the noisy dog.

  They would be powerless if the sabre-tooth attacked. Maybe the fitter ones could run, but not very far. How could you defend yourself against a cat that was heavier than a tiger and had fangs half as long as your arm?

  Even Doofus, strong as he was, would be powerless against an animal like that. That was why he was howling: to warn them that there was a killer up there, because warning them was all that he could do.

  And then she saw it. It was the merest sandy slither in the bushes: the smallest flicker of a sliding golden eye. But she knew it was there. It was high up on the far side of the stream, and watching them.

  Holly sprang up in alarm and ran over to the wheelchair. Nan was the most helpless of all the people present.

  “Mum! Get Nan away from here!” she cried, trying to turn Nan’s wheelchair round. It wouldn’t budge.

  “You’ve got the brake on,” said Mum. “Why? What’s the rush?”

  “There’s something dangerous in the bushes,” she said breathlessly, releasing the brake lever and heaving at the wheelchair. It still wouldn’t move. Its wheels dug into the gravel. Clive appeared, falling off his bike and staggering over to them.

  “What sort of something dangerous?” Mum demanded.

  “A sabre-tooth,” said Holly, and she turned to address Clive. “It’s there, Clive, in the bushes up above the falls, where Doofus is staring. We’ve got to get everyone away!”

  “What on earth are you talking about?” said Mum.

  Clive took a deep breath. “That,” he said.

  They turned and saw it walking out into full view. Emerging from its cover, it stood above the steep bank on the far side of the falls, and looked down at them. They could see the enormous size of its powerful, thickset body, and the full, horrific length of those scimitar-like fangs as its mouth gaped in a snarl.

  The falls were no barrier: it could leap them easily, thought Holly, or just wade through the water. The stream was not deep enough to even slow it down.

  The cat was watching them watch it, with an intentness of gaze that seemed to pin her to the ground. Yet many of the sight-seers didn’t even notice it at first. It wasn’t until Clive shouted, “Everybody group together!” and pointed, that all the other people realised it was there.

  And then, of course, nobody grouped together. One screamed; several ran, and a woman said, “Is that a model?” until it moved again, at which she both screamed and ran.

  But Holly could not run with the wheelchair. She could barely push it: it crawled across the gravel. Meanwhile Doofus stood as rigid as a statue, facing the beast which was now prowling along the far bank, starting to scramble down.

  “We’re safer in a group!” yelled Clive. “Everybody stare at it! Get stones ready to throw!” He picked up a stone in one hand and a stick in the other. Holly stooped automatically to take a stone in either hand, at the same time wondering just how effective sticks and stones would be against a sabre-tooth.

  “Tigers like to surprise their prey,” Clive panted, as if he guessed her thoughts. “They don’t like to be stared at, or having things thrown at them. And they don’t like groups, they’d rather pick one person on their own.”

  As if to prove his point, the sabre-tooth turned and prowled back half-way to the bushes before swinging round again. It stalked to and fro along the bank, first left, then right, with sinuous, heavy grace. Always its golden stare was fixed on them, seeming to weigh them up. Doofus stood stock still on the near bank, his black eyes watching it across the water.

  “If the rest of us run away it’ll just charge,” said Clive. “Better to face it.” He strode up to stand next to Doofus at the stream’s edge, and hurled his rock towards the sabre-tooth. It fell short and landed in the water, its splash lost in the clamour of the falls. The big cat took no more notice of it than of a raindrop.

  Holly was dreadfully afraid. All her instincts shouted at her to run, no matter what Clive said. But she could not abandon N
an, nor leave Clive standing there alone.

  Three of them – two children and Doofus – would make more of a barrier than just two. It was a sort of group, at least. And Nan had to be protected at all costs, because she could not protect herself.

  So, despite her thumping heart and the voice inside her head that was insistently telling her that this was really, really not a good idea, Holly marched up and stood beside Clive, a futile stone gripped in each clammy hand.

  The big cat paused in its stalking to and fro. For several seconds it did not move at all: and then it seemed to go into slow motion. Gradually, very gradually, one hind leg stepped back, and then the other: slowly the muscular haunches lowered themselves into a crouch.

  And then, with startling suddenness, it leapt. It sprang down agilely from its bank, landing heavily on a stone platform in the middle of the falls. There it halted amidst the fountain of white spray, still watching them, poised to spring again.

  Clive yelled and threw his stick. And Doofus threw himself.

  Doofus charged, splashing through the water, and launched himself at the sabre-tooth’s back, away from those huge fangs. It twisted round to snarl and lunge at him, swiping with a mighty claw.

  Holly’s heart was in her mouth. Big though he was, Doofus was no match for a beast that size. It must be four or five times his weight. It would only be a matter of time before it killed him.

  The cat’s first lunge tore at Doofus’s hind leg, ripping through his flesh. As Doofus whipped around to attack it from another angle, it wheeled to follow him. With a rasping, menacing roar, it lunged again.

  Clive was yelling at the top of his voice. He picked up handfuls of gravel and threw them uselessly towards the cat. Holly hurled both her stones, shouting incoherently, she wasn’t sure what – maybe get away, or maybe Doofus, Doofus! Blood began to stain the water red. She forgot about feeling frightened for herself. Instead she just felt desperately afraid for Doofus.

  Her two stones hit the big cat’s sandy hide, and bounced off without effect. There were no other large rocks lying within reach: nothing except gravel.

  But there was a stone weighing down her pocket. She pulled it out and flung it at the sabre-tooth.

  At the instant it left her hand, she thought bitterly, why did I go to all the trouble of fetching that blue rock, just to throw it away? How stupid am I? A little stone like that won’t stop it.

  Then she stopped thinking, because she could see through the hole in the stone as it arced in the air. A tiny point of fierce white light blazed through it momentarily. Yet the sun was nowhere near it.

  The stone seemed to halt in mid-air: then, turning while it fell, it hit the sabre-tooth in the middle of the back.

  The cat reared up, snarling in annoyance. Its eyes latched on to Holly as it bared its fangs in fury and roared again, showing her all the anatomy of its fearsome mouth. Doofus charged: the cat swatted him aside with a giant paw. And then it made a leap towards her.

  In the same second, the pattern of the falls began to change.

  It was as if they took a new course, or an extra ton of water was suddenly thrown down from the moors to surge past with a deafening, forceful roar, much louder than the sabre-tooth’s. A huge cloud of white spray wrapped itself around both sabre-tooth and dog. They were completely hidden.

  “What’s happening?” Holly cried. She could not hear her own voice. Clive dragged her backwards as the spray flew out at them. Immediately they were both soaked through.

  For a moment, Holly was blinded by the flying water and had to turn her face away. When she looked back, the surge was subsiding. The cloud of spray began to dissipate. She could see the black shape of Doofus standing in the middle of the water, his head drooping – but no sabre-tooth.

  “It’s gone,” she said. “Where is it?”

  “I don’t know,” said Clive. He sounded faint and stunned. Both dripping wet, they looked up and down the stream. No sabre-tooth: yet there was nowhere that it could have bolted to without being seen.

  “Help me push Nan,” begged Mum behind them. “That animal must have slipped away somehow, thank goodness. We need to move this wheelchair before it comes back!”

  Clive ran back to Mum, who was in the middle of a small huddle of onlookers: the other walkers had, after all, followed Clive’s advice about staying in a group. Now they began to help push Nan’s chair off the gravel onto the smooth path.

  But Holly went the other way and splashed into the falls, wading through the rushing water to reach Doofus.

  He stood with his head down, panting heavily. Trickles of blood ran down his flanks and swirled away in the hurrying stream.

  “What happened, Doofus?” she asked him as she tried to wipe the blood away with her hand. More blood took its place. “Where did the cat go?”

  Doofus took a shuddering, gasping breath, and leaned against her legs. He wasn’t looking for an enemy any longer. He wasn’t looking anywhere. His eyes kept closing and opening again.

  “Come on then,” said Holly, suddenly much more anxious about Doofus than about the vanished sabre-tooth. “Come on, let’s get out of the water.” She took hold of his collar and persuaded him to move, walking slowly alongside him, feeling his weight lurch against her as they stepped onto dry land.

  The wheelchair was being swiftly pushed away by now: Holly saw Nan look back at them from amongst her helpers. Her hand fluttered in concern.

  “He’s fine,” called Holly, and then she said encouragingly to Doofus, “Okay, let’s follow Nan.”

  But Doofus wasn’t fine. That was increasingly obvious: his blood-drenched flanks were heaving. He stumbled, and righted himself with an effort. Holly wondered what to do. Everyone else was way ahead of them by now. If he were to collapse here, she could never carry him.

  At last Doofus began to move again. Somehow he kept walking, although every few steps he halted, his breathing laboured, his head down. She rested her hand on his broad back and whispered gentle nothings to him until he shuffled his feet on again.

  In this manner they crept towards the car park, where there was a noisy crowd of people all talking at once to the flummoxed warden. Doofus closed his eyes; and with a sigh, slumped slowly to the ground.