Black Dog

Black Dog

Chapter Four

Dog liked the kennels. It was still a prison of sorts, of course, but the food was wholesome and plentiful and the young women who looked after him were usually more than willing to groom him and scratch his chest and rub his ears. They took him for walks as well and tried very hard to interest him in chasing a ball but gave up, laughing at his contemptuous look. However, they did find that he was happy to play tug-of-war with a loop of rope, mock-growling ferociously.

Then, one afternoon, Kirsty, his very own favourite girl, appeared at the door of his pen accompanied by another young woman.

"Well, we don't know quite what he is," she was laughing, "though we guessed part Pyrenean Mountain Dog, part Newfoundland, part curly coated retriever and part pit pony."

The other woman smiled and pushed her brown curls back from her face.

"He looks just the thing for me," she said. "There have been three burglaries in my road in the past four months. But there're a lot of kids, too. How's his temper?"

"Nine out of ten. He passed the bone test with flying colours," Kirsty looked proudly at her protégé. "He did growl at the vet, but if the vet had been doing to me what the vet was doing to him I'd have growled too. Shall we go inside?"

Kirsty opened the gate and led the woman into the enclosure then turned to Dog and snapped her fingers.

"Come on, lazy," sheooed. "Come and say hello."

Dog stood up and shook the straw from his coat and ambled over to butt his head under Kirsty's hand.

"Oh, who's an old softy, then?" Kirsty said and rubbed his ears gently. "What do you think?"

Dog looked up at the woman and their eyes met. She was dressed neatly but cheaply in a straight skirt and sweater with a zipped jacket hanging loosely over them and her eyes were a warm golden brown, the colour echoed by the slightly frizzy curls of the hair most of which she had caught up behind her head with a slide. Her face was tired but she smiled down at him kindly. Then he caught her scent more fully and his ears perked. She was scared - it was obvious to his sensitive nose - not of him or Kirsty but of someone or something else. The worry and the need came off her in waves, tinged faintly with hope and he stepped forward and she met him halfway. He stood quietly while she ran her hands over his head and back.

"He likes his chest scratched," Kirsty said hopefully.

Dog leaned heavily against her leg and relaxed as she scratched him and she giggled.

"Oh, I think he'll do," she said. "Does he have a big bark?"

Kirsty giggled too.

"Does Big Ben have a big clapper? It's like the crack of doom. You'll take him, then?

Oh, I'm so glad. The big boys are always the hardest to find homes for and - well - we can only keep them for so long and we all love this one. He's a super old thing - not that he is old, of course, five or six, maybe." Kirsty paused while she stooped and clipped a lead to Dog's collar. "His condition's still a bit poor for the op so can you bring him back in about a month? Normally, it can be done while you wait but the vet will want to use a full general - he's too big a dog to chance a local and a whiff of gas."

"Is it really necessary?"

"Policy, I'm afraid. We neuter all dogs on rehoming, but you," and she patted Dog comfortingly, "you get to keep your family jewels for a few more weeks, lucky dog. Oh, the way he's looking at us!"

The woman laughed.

"It's almost as if he understands!"

*

Dog's new home was nothing special, a small stone terraced house in a street full of small stone terraced houses in a little town of small stone terraced houses set in a valley between high windy hills laced across their faces with dry-stone walls. The woman had loaded him into the back seat of her little green car and had driven carefully out of the city, concrete and glass giving way to fields and coppices, then turned off the main roads and onto narrower lanes. Eventually they entered the little town, threaded their way through the traffic in the main street and turned off into the even narrower streets of a residential area. She parked on the roadside and came round to open the passenger door, lean the seat forward and reach inside to clip Dog's new lead to his new collar.

"Out you come, then?" she said tugging gently and he climbed awkwardly through the small gap and out onto the pavement.

Immediately, he was surrounded by a gaggle of children with bikes, scooters and an elderly and very battered skateboard.

"Jeannie! Is that your new dog?" one demanded and the others chimed in with a chorus of questions.

"Is he safe?"

"Is he the one off the telly?"

"Aah, he's lovely, can I stroke him?"

"Can we help take him for walks?"

"Muuum! Jeannie's brought a bear home with her."

Jeannie laughed.

"No he's not a bear and let's find out whether he likes people before we start to play with him." Dog, who was standing behind her peering suspiciously at them, gave a sheepish wag of the tail and followed her thankfully into the house.

The front door opened directly into a long narrow sitting room with a flight of stairs opposite the door, but Jeannie led him through to the little kitchen. There she filled a bowl with water and another with dry dog food and put them on a mat in the corner.

"There you go," she said. Dog, who had been watching, tail waving eagerly, stepped forward and began to eat.

"I wonder what your name was?" Jeannie asked herself. "Sweep? Butch? Nero? No, no reaction." She sighed. "How about Fang? Rover? Blackie? Oh....no, false alarm. You're no help. Oy, Dog, I said....Dog?" For Dog's head had lifted and he was looking at her, ears raised.

"So... your name's Dog," Jeannie made a face. "Not desperately imaginative but I suppose it will do. There's a good boy."

She made herself a cup of tea and sat at the kitchen table while he finished his food, then opened the back door.

"There you go," she said, "your garden. Try not to widdle on the flowers too much please and if I were you I'd stay away from Tib."

As narrow as the house, the garden was bounded by a high stone wall on one side and larch-lap panels on the other. Part of it was paved and part under grass with a few small flowering shrubs, there were a dozen flat plastic bags against the wall with tomato plants in them and a large grey cat was sunning itself on top of the water butt beside the little shed. Dog sniffed at the plants until Jeannie shooed him away from them, he avoided the cat who was staring at him in outrage, and then he ambled down onto the grass where he subsided with a groan and treated himself to a long and luxurious roll. In the meantime Jeannie cooked her own dinner, keeping an eye on Dog all the while. She ate it at the kitchen table, under his supervision, for he had come bounding back to scratch at the back door the moment he heard the clatter of cutlery, then she washed up and took her coffee through to the sitting room and curled up on the couch to watch television. Dog nudged her with his nose until she uncurled one leg and rested her foot on his shoulder.

"That's how I got you," she told him, nodding towards the local news. "They said the big dogs are hard to place and I wanted a really big dog." She rubbed her foot against his shoulder blades and laughed as he turned over, tongue lolling and eyes rolling back in his head in what she had already christened his 'demon-dog-from-hell' look.

"You're a lovely old thing but ..." she sniffed and wrinkled her nose. "I think maybe I ought to..." She carefully avoided saying the word but got up and climbed the stairs to the bathroom where she half filled the bath with tepid water, added a little special dog shampoo then went to the top of the stairs. To her surprise, Dog was already standing looking up at her.

"Here, Dog," she said, adding hopefully, "Don't make me come down and get you."

Dog ascended the stairs in a glad rush, darting past her and through the bathroom door and into the bathroom. He paused for a moment sniffing then sprang into the bath with an enormous splash.

Later, Jeannie with her hair wrapped in a towel - she had got so wet and doggy that she had had to have a shower herself - rang a friend.

"Yes, I got him this afternoon and I already need to redecorate the bathroom...... Dog...Yes, I know it's not the most exciting name in the world but its what he answers to. It can be his everyday name. Sundays and special occasions I'm going to call him Deefer.... Yeah, Deefer Dog!......I have no idea. He's jet black with the most gorgeous blue eyes you've ever seen. They said he was a combination of Pyrenean, Newfoundland, retriever and pit pony but I think he's part walrus!"

*

Remus and Harry sat eyeing each other tensely and Ron looked from one to the other of them in puzzlement.

"What...?" he began but Remus held up a hand and Harry made a fierce face.

"Sshh!" he hissed.

Ron scowled at them both until a melodious whistle announced that the kettle was successfully boiling and they both made a show of flopping back in their chairs with relief.

"What?" he said again. "She only went to make the tea - she didn't exactly have to trap it and tame it and bend it to her will, you know."

"Well, that's where you're wrong," Harry pointed out in hushed tones . "The kettle has been extremely uncooperative about boiling and poor Hermione has been getting very upset about it."

"But it sounds like we have success," Remus continued happily, "and also tea, which is never a bad thing. Put that box thing on Harry. 'Mione said she wanted to watch the weather forecast."

Harry snorted.

"A bit of seaweed is good enough for most people," he grumbled. "That bit by the back door has had a ninety per cent accuracy over the past six months."

"She says she can't understand its Norfolk accent. Put it on, Harry."

Harry picked up the little plastic box from the table, scowled at it, pressed the green button and the television lit up and began to whisper to them.

"Hey, cool," Ron grinned. "At least it's better than watching the wall paper. Not that you're ever here, nights, Remus. If what I hear is true?"

Harry laughed at Remus' suddenly shifty look.

"Everybody's favourite werewolf got a lot of letters in hospital," he told Ron in a stage whisper, "and has been replying to them - in person, if you know what I mean."

"Harry," Remus' eyes were modestly down cast, "you make it sound so sordid. I can honestly say that I have replied to every message of goodwill that I received, to do otherwise would be churlish. But, in some deserving cases, a - er - follow-up visit has been ..." he paused gesturing as he fished for the appropriate words.

"Deeply satisfying?" Harry suggested.

Ron shook his head, his expression one of deep concern.

"To think I've looked up to you all these years," he said. "Well, all I can say is - way to go, Lupin. Why doesn't anything like that ever happen to me?"

Hermione carried the tea tray very carefully in from the kitchen and placed it on the table in front of Ron.

"Will you be mother?" she asked with a smile.

He laughed and leaned forward to pour while she curled up on the couch beside Remus.

"Thank you for dinner, Remus," she said, smiling, "though I'm astonished you had the energy. I loved those potatoes."

"Lily's mum used to do them like that," he replied. "She showed me how when I went to stay one time."

"Well, you can show my Mum how to do it," Ron laughed, looking up from the tray. "If you can't boil it or fry it she doesn't want to know. Hey, look at that! Harry, turn the sound up."

The sound blasted from the set and Hermione clapped her hands over her ears and Remus winced then leaned forward in his seat, eyes wide.

".......sad story that broke last week has a possibility of a happy ending," the announcer was saying, "as the RSPCA reunite owners with stolen dogs rescued during a raid on a dog-fighting ring near Stafford." The picture of a man and two young children embracing a labrador changed to one of a uniformed man holding two small terriers.

"We want to find these little chaps' owners as quickly as possible," he was saying. "What would have happened to them if we hadn't had the tip off I dread to think and the larger dogs would have fared just as badly. Please take a look at these animals and if you recognise yours let us know." As he was speaking, the camera had been panning over a line of cages containing a collie, a pointer and an enormous black creature with blue eyes that was playing tug of war with a laughing kennel maid.

"I thought so," said Ron. "It was just a glimpse but that's - Harry, isn't that....?"

"The reason we were able to find this chap's owners so quickly," said the RSPCA man, patting the labrador, "is because he has been microchipped. This little device can be registered to your name and address and picked up by equipment used by vets, and animal shelters. The chip is easy and painless to insert and, once in situ, does not hurt the animal." An address and phone number began to scroll across the bottom of the screen and Harry snatched up a quill and wrote both down on his hand.

"Bloody hell," Remus' face was white. "A dog-fighting ring. Oh, Sirius."

Hermione reached across to him and seized his hand and he squeezed it painfully, trying to control his breathing.

"I knew it," he was whispering, "but to see him, to see him like that. Oh, Hermione."

She didn't reply. Eyes wide, she was remembering that evening the previous week when she had imagined - dreamed - she had seen the same black dog and she hadn't told them.

Ron was shaking his head in astonishment.

"And all this time I thought it was wishful thinking," he said. "Sorry Remus. Hey, but did you see that kennel maid? She was a bit of all right! Trust Sirius to find himself a bit of .... Where are you going?" he demanded, as Harry got up and made for the door.

"Harry," Hermione released Remus hand and followed him across the room. "What are you going to do?"

"I'm going to Stafford," he replied, "to bust my godfather out of jail, but first," he grinned, "I'm getting him chipped."

*