The Secret Dog

by Joe Friedman

  Fortunately, it wasn’t a full roll. Those weighed a ton.

  They walked in silence, dressed in their work clothes: loose jeans and flannel shirts. Calum wore a worn grey rucksack, full of tools, U nails, a staple gun and other items they might need.

  ‘Josh, I’ll be out Thursday night at the Crofters’ Association meeting,’ said Calum. ‘And Saturday a couple of my old friends from the SFU – the Farmers’ Union – will be coming over for a drink and some dinner.’

  ‘No problem,’ Josh said. That meant he could spend more time with Reggae on Thursday, and maybe see Yvonne on the Saturday.

  They walked on in silence. Then Calum began again.

  ‘I was thinking about the other day. When you found our sheep on the commons. How did you manage to gather two lambs and two ewes and bring them back on your own?’

  Josh stumbled. He’d deliberately been vague about the number of sheep that he’d found. How had Calum figured it out?

  Then Josh knew – by the state of their fleece and the wounds that Dunham’s dogs had inflicted. Calum must’ve inspected the whole flock. As Calum well knew, it was almost impossible to gather four sheep on your own. Even two was a stretch without a dog.

  ‘Normally, it would have been hopeless,’ Josh said. ‘But just by chance I had a couple of long ropes in my rucksack.’

  Josh was happy to leave it at that. But Calum wasn’t.

  ‘I still don’t get how you managed to get them together.’

  Josh’s mind spun like a hamster on a wheel, rejecting one possible explanation after another.

  ‘They weren’t that far away. You know the gorge with the wooden fence around it, on the way to Alastair’s house?’

  After a moment Calum replied, ‘Yes. Watch this hole here.’

  They manoeuvred the roll of wire around the erosion hole.

  ‘Well, they were grazing against the fence. I had some Polo mints in my pocket. From lunch. I sometimes give them to the sheep as a treat.’

  ‘You lured them using mints?’ Calum didn’t sound at all convinced.

  ‘The two ewes had tasted them before. They knew it was a treat. I got hold of the lambs when they came to get milk. It took a while.’

  ‘I’ll bet it did!’ Calum exclaimed.

  ‘It was one of those times a mobile would have been handy,’ Josh said quietly. ‘Or a dog.’

  Calum ignored the comment about the phone. ‘A working dog would be handy . . . This way.’

  Josh wondered what Calum meant. Did he suspect something?

  They reached the fence and got to work. Josh stood by one post holding the tape measure as Calum walked to the next one. They needed to replace the whole length.

  A few months ago on his way home from school, Josh had seen one of the islanders repair a fence by weaving new fencing into the broken strands. He’d asked Calum about this.

  ‘He thinks he doesn’t have time to do a proper job,’ Calum had said. ‘But he’ll have to repair it again within the year. And if he didn’t have time to do it right the first time, when will he have time to do it over?’

  At first, Josh had thought Calum was nit-picking, but later he’d seen the same crofter repairing the fence again. And he’d realised Calum was right. It was better to do things properly the first time.

  ‘Four metres,’ Calum announced. He pulled out two pairs of worn leather gloves from his rucksack, and threw a pair to Josh.

  They unrolled the fencing and measured out four and a half metres. Calum stapled the old wire to the first post. Then, while Josh held the new wire in place, Calum stapled it too.

  This was the easy part. What was hard was stretching the wire tight to the next post, and holding it while it too was fastened securely. This was Josh’s job. He remembered the first time he’d done it, several years earlier. He’d still had city muscles, then. They’d had to come back a couple of months later to tighten what he’d done.

  Josh anchored his feet to the ground, and started to pull the wire tight. His arms ached.

  Calum got the staple gun ready. ‘So you noticed the sheep had been attacked?’ he asked.

  Josh almost lost his grip but recovered quickly. ‘Of course.’

  ‘And you have no idea how it happened.’

  ‘No,’ Josh said, trying to sound convincing. ‘It must have happened before I found them.’

  Calum started stapling. When he finished, Josh relaxed his grip. He stretched out his arms and made several fists with his hands to release the tension.

  ‘I can’t think what would have done that kind of damage,’ Calum said. ‘Except a badly trained dog.’

  Had Calum guessed? Josh hoped not. But what if Dunham found out about Reggae? He might tell everyone it was Josh’s dog that had hurt the sheep!

  ‘A really badly trained dog,’ Josh agreed carefully. ‘Either a wild dog, or one whose owner didn’t care about other people’s sheep.’

  Calum nodded slowly. ‘I don’t like to think there’s anyone like that on the island.’

  Josh said nothing. He knew only too well there was.

  Chapter 18

  ‘The idea is not to guess the name of the angle,’ Yvonne said, in a frustrated tone. She was beginning to lose patience. Josh didn’t blame her. His second maths tutorial was turning out exactly as he’d feared – Yvonne was beginning to see what a total dummy he was.

  ‘I’m trying!’ he protested. ‘No one talks about “acute” or “obtuse” angles in real life.’

  ‘Just memorise it!’ Yvonne said. ‘Acute is less than 90 degrees, obtuse more.’

  ‘It’s all right for you,’ Josh snapped. ‘Your brain absorbs everything you put into it. Mine’s different. Things have to make sense to me.’

  Yvonne just stared at him. Then she nodded, as if to herself.

  Josh watched his friend. Was it all over? Had she decided she had better ways to spend her time?

  ‘Okay,’ she said calmly. ‘Then we need to find a way to have it make sense . . .’ She stared into space for a moment. ‘I’ve got it!’

  She grabbed a blank sheet of paper and drew a group of animals on it – Josh could tell they had four legs, but he wasn’t sure what they were supposed to be.

  ‘Dogs?’ he guessed.

  ‘Sheep,’ Yvonne corrected, with a small smile. ‘A group of sheep.’ She drew a line behind them. ‘And this is a cliff.’

  ‘Okay.’

  Under the sheep, Yvonne put a large X and a small x next to each other. ‘These are you and Reggae.’

  Josh nodded.

  ‘If you say to Reggae, “away”, where will she go?’

  On the piece of paper, Josh showed her where Reggae would run – anti-clockwise around the sheep.

  Yvonne jabbed her finger onto the paper at a point on the dog’s journey. ‘What kind of an angle do you have here? Less than 90 degrees or more?’

  Suddenly, Josh understood where Yvonne was going. ‘More. And if I said “come by”, she’d go clockwise. And then, the angle would be less than 90 degrees!’

  ‘Just remember this picture,’ Yvonne said. ‘Away means “obtuse”, come by means “acute”.’

  Josh felt a huge smile spread across his face. ‘Have I ever told you you’re brilliant?’ he said.

  Yvonne looked away and smiled shyly. ‘Twice in one week . . . not that I’m counting . . .’

  * * *

  Josh whistled as he walked along the road. It was a tune that had come back to him the night before – ‘Jamming’. His mum used to sing it to him. He only vaguely remembered the chorus. But his mum had explained that it meant the two of them would always win out in spite of everything. He’d certainly felt good when she was singing to him . . .

  He turned into the car park of the small general store. As was his custom, he quickly walked along the five small aisles, to make sure no one he knew was there. Then he picked up a small plastic basket and pulled out the shopping list his uncle had written in his crabbed handwriting. A tin of kidney beans,
Bisto and apples. First he picked up a couple of tins of dog food for Reggae then, smiling as he remembered Yvonne’s drawing of sheep, he grabbed a bag of apples and went in search of the gravy mix.

  ‘This isn’t your local store.’ A gruff voice interrupted his train of thought. Startled, he looked up to find Dunham peering down at him. ‘Been to your aunt’s again? The one on the mainland?’ he asked sarcastically.

  Josh froze. There was dog food in the basket! Quickly, he shifted it to his left hand, so that it was half-hidden between him and the shelves of food. As if to explain this movement he extended his right hand to Dunham.

  But Dunham ignored it. ‘You haven’t told anybody about meeting me the other day?’

  ‘No!’ Josh said, in a high-pitched voice. He struggled to control his shock and fear. ‘I said I wouldn’t.’ That sounded better.

  Dunham smiled, as if he found something very amusing. ‘It’s our little secret, is it?’

  Josh nodded, not understanding what was so funny.

  Dunham turned away with a twisted smile that somehow scared Josh more than the threats he’d made the other day. ‘Our little secret,’ he repeated under his breath, as if such a good joke had to be savoured.

  * * *

  Josh was furious with himself. How could he have been so absent-minded? He couldn’t afford to relax, especially now that the Gathering was so close.

  Had Dunham seen the dog food? Josh pictured the basket in his head. The tins had been pretty well hidden by the bag of apples. And he’d put it all out of sight almost immediately. Surely Dunham would have made a comment if he’d seen it. And even if he had, he’d think Josh was buying it for someone else. Josh breathed a sigh of relief. He’d got away with it. This time.

  Josh knew Dunham didn’t like trusting him not to say anything. Dunham didn’t trust anyone. But surely he must realise that Josh hadn’t said anything about the attack on the sheep – Calum would have been knocking on his door if he had. Which meant Dunham could trust Josh.

  * * *

  As he neared Reggae’s shed, Josh looked cautiously around, to make sure no one saw him go up to it. Like closing the stable door after the horse has bolted, he thought bitterly. Still, he couldn’t let the lapse in his attention become a habit.

  ‘I’m here,’ he whispered. He heard Reggae panting inside.

  He opened the door and the little dog was upon him, licking his face. Josh had taken her for a long run before he’d gone to Yvonne’s for his tutorial. But he knew Reggae would have preferred to spend more time with him. At least she hadn’t been tied up outside the shop when Dunham had appeared . . .

  He opened the tin of dog food and put it into Reggae’s dish. She sat obediently, waiting for Josh to release her, salivating at the thought of dinner.

  ‘Give me five,’ Josh said. Reggae held out her right paw. Josh shook it. ‘Now the other five.’ Reggae held out her left paw. ‘Good girl. Go.’

  Reggae charged over to the bowl and started eating noisily.

  Josh told her about his day, and about his second tutorial with Yvonne. ‘If anyone can teach me, she can.’

  He decided Reggae didn’t need to know about his encounter with Dunham. It would just worry her.

  He just wished he knew what Dunham had found so amusing.

  Chapter 19

  Josh wasn’t sure how he was going to get to sleep. He’d been lying in the dark for hours already. His room was like a steam bath. And his mind kept going back to his encounter with Dunham . . . and his ‘joke’.

  Thinking about Dunham reminded him of Kearney. Yvonne hadn’t brought it up again, but he knew she was unhappy with what Josh had done. And if he was honest with himself, it didn’t sit well with him either. It had left a sour taste in his mouth. He didn’t like to think of himself as a bully. He wasn’t! But that meant he owed Kearney an apology.

  He checked the Velux window again. It was open as far as it could go. But without any other window there was no chance of a through draft of cooler air, and so the room, just under the roof still hot from the day’s sun, just would not cool down.

  He glanced at the digital clock. Midnight. How was he going to go to sleep? He took out Yvonne’s MP3 player. Maybe “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” would do the trick. He was in the middle of Act 2. This was his third go through the whole thing. He was finding that even the speeches that at first had seemed like a foreign language to him were now making sense.

  Josh fumbled with the player in the dark. The sound of a rap artist came through the headphones. For a moment he was confused. Then he realised it was a radio station. He fiddled with the dial, rapidly passing through traditional music, pop music, French conversation. Then he found something which was familiar. Reggae. Josh settled into the pillow and started to relax. His mother used to play music like this to him at night. Marley, Toots and the Maytals, Jimmy Cliff. He’d always thought she did this to put him to sleep. Though as he listened now, he realised these songs were about as far away from lullabies as you could get, with their heavy beat and rousing words.

  Suddenly, he realised his mum hadn’t played reggae at night to put him to sleep. She’d played it because she liked it. There was something she’d called herself . . . what was it? A white rasta! That was it!

  He still found it hard to imagine his white rasta mother and Calum were brother and sister. Calum did like fiery music like his mum . . . but for Calum, it was traditional fiddlers playing at a hectic pace.

  But strangely, listening to the reggae did make him feel tired. He closed his eyes and a memory popped into his head: how his mother would sit by his bed, talking to him, and the way, when the music moved her, she’d stand to dance, even in the middle of a conversation or story. He could almost see her small body swaying and bobbing alongside his bed, as sleep claimed him.

  * * *

  ‘In the morning,’ Josh explained to Yvonne as they walked to school, ‘I found my headphones on the pillow. Actually your headphones. They were playing something completely different. I hope the reggae wasn’t a one-off.’

  They were approaching the school now. People were being dropped off from cars, and walking towards the gate from every direction. A sea of green uniforms.

  ‘It may be a regular show. You can look up the station’s schedule on the web. But you still have to listen to “A Midsummer Night’s Dream”.’

  ‘That’s no problem,’ Josh replied. ‘I like listening to it. Still, if they played reggae every night, I’d never have trouble falling asleep. It makes me feel my mother is still close.’

  As they went through the gate, Josh saw a group of boys clustered around Kearney at the other side of the yard. It looked like they were passing an object from hand to hand. When a boy got the object, he’d put it up to his eyes and swivel around to face a group of girls standing just outside the entrance to the school. Then he would hand it to another boy.

  Josh was reminded of his resolution the night before. He had to apologise. . . . But surely he should wait until it was just Kearney . . . No, Josh told himself. You’re making excuses. Now or never.

  ‘I’ve got to talk to Kearney,’ he said to Yvonne. They walked towards the group. As they got closer, Josh saw the object being handed to Kearney, who swivelled and faced him and Yvonne.

  Binoculars. Kearney was watching him through them. Josh felt like a bug under a microscope, but he’d promised himself he’d do the right thing.

  The walk across the playground took forever. Kearney must’ve been given the binoculars as a present, and brought them to school to show them off.

  When he was just a couple of feet away, Kearney took them down from his eyes. Everyone was staring at Josh now.

  ‘I wanted to apologise for what I said the other day,’ he said.

  For the briefest of moments, Josh thought Kearney was taken aback, vulnerable even. Then his face reset into its normal sneer.

  ‘You? Apologise to me? What could you ever possibly do that would hurt me?’ Kearney laug
hed at the thought, and his gang, taking their lead from him, joined in.

  Josh stood there, paralysed. Yvonne gently put her hand on his back and steered him away.

  Angus said loudly. ‘He needs a girl to rescue him!’

  The boys laughed and made catcalls. Josh wished he could disappear into a hole in the ground. If this was what happened when you did the right thing . . .

  Strangely though, Kearney didn’t join in with his friends – he wasn’t laughing, or shouting at Josh. He just watched as Yvonne led him away.

  * * *

  ‘There’s a lot of talk about immigration in the papers at the moment,’ Mr Sampson began their history class. ‘Where did the people on this island come from?’

  ‘My family’s always been here,’ a blond boy asserted. ‘For hundreds of years.’

  ‘Mine too,’ several other dark-haired children chimed in.

  ‘In fact,’ Mr Sampson said, ‘Everyone on this island has come from somewhere else. There have been at least five distinct waves of immigration, including the Vikings. Today, I’d like to think about immigration and how it has shaped who we are.’

  Josh could hardly believe his ears. Everyone on the island had come from somewhere else? Then the only difference between himself and the people who saw him as a ‘blow-in’ was that they ‘blew in’ a few years earlier!

  He thought, ‘Thank you, Mr Sampson.’

  * * *

  As Josh headed home, his heart lifted as it always did, when he was about to see Reggae. He was walking alone this afternoon. Yvonne was at maths club. This meant he could go at his normal speed. Yvonne always struggled to keep up with him.

  Thinking about Yvonne reminded him of her MP3 player. He stopped, pulled it out of his rucksack, and put on the white headphones. He switched from the radio station he’d been listening to the previous night to ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’. It was one of his favourite bits, in which Titania the fairy queen falls in love with the character called Bottom.

  As Josh emerged from the woods, he looked around to make sure he was alone. Then he headed up the hill to the boundaries of his uncle’s farm. On the player, the theatrical troupe were starting to rehearse their play. As usual, Bottom was being a know-it-all, telling everyone what to do.