Tea and Dog Biscuits Page 18

  It was a long list. It started with the usual questions. What should I feed this dog? How often should I walk the dog? How long should the walks be? He was obviously a caring person concerned with the welfare of the dog and the quality of its life. It was when we were up to around question number thirty – and I realised that I’d missed The Dukes of Hazzard – that I thought it was actually time to meet a dog.

  I remarked to Mr Thomas how fortuitous his timing was: that at the moment we had three dogs that might suit him as they weren’t the large dogs we usually took in. But Mr Thomas and I had different ideas about what constituted a ‘large’ dog.

  ‘Goodness – I only have a small house,’ he said on meeting Larry, the Labrador cross. ‘I’d have to get a bigger car,’ was prompted by the sight of Lurcher cross, Lottie. And ‘She would need a very big basket to be comfortable and stretch herself out,’ was his response to seeing Millie, the World’s Smallest German Shepherd.

  Now, we never take the view that it is part of our function to persuade a prospective home to take either any dog or any particular dog. We’re not in the business of ‘selling’ our orphans. But if we feel a dog has certain attributes that would make it suitable for the prospective home, then by pointing these out we can help the prospective owner to come to an informed decision. And I had a feeling that Millie would suit Mr Thomas and that Mr Thomas would suit Millie.

  ‘Shall we take her for a short walk?’ I suggested.

  ‘Oh yes. In fact I think I would need to come for several walks with a dog so that we were well acquainted with one another before I was to actually make a decision.’

  ‘Look at the dainty way she picks up her feet as she walks,’ I pointed out helpfully. Dressed in a suit, I thought at first that Mr Thomas must have come straight from work to our meeting, but it transpired that he was retired and I surmised that he had put on a suit especially for his ‘interview’. I suspected that his terraced house would prove to be as neat as Mr Thomas when it came to the home inspection, which we now usually did as a matter of course, so I pointed out to him on our walk that with her short coat Millie would be unlikely to get too muddy on walks.

  ‘Oh, I’m not bothered about that,’ was the response. ‘I’ve got plenty of time to brush her afterwards, and to vacuum up. No, what’s important is that she should enjoy her walks.’

  Good answer.

  ‘Would you like now to have a walk with one of the others?’ I asked when we got back from the walk with Millie.

  Mr Thomas smiled and shook his head.

  ‘Are you going to come another time then to walk Millie?’

  Another smile and another shake of the head. Then a pause before speaking.

  ‘Mr Hawkins – she has stolen my heart.’

  ‘Oh.’

  The day came at last when all Mr Thomas’ preparations were ready for the new member of his family to move in.

  We had learnt from experience it was a good idea to give the new owner some of the food we had been feeding the dog so that an abrupt change of food wouldn’t upset its tummy. As I scooped out a few days’ ration Mr Thomas said, ‘You know, Mr Hawkins, I don’t know if this sounds silly but I feel guilty.’

  I stopped what I was doing to listen.

  ‘Both the other two dogs you showed me were lovely dogs. I feel guilty at leaving them behind. I feel I rejected them when neither of them should be rejected. And they already have been.’

  I had never heard it expressed like that before by a prospective owner. It struck me what a meditative man Mr Thomas was.

  ‘They’ll be fine,’ I said. ‘We’ll find both of them good homes.’

  ‘Oh, don’t misunderstand me, I don’t have any doubts on that score. I just wish I could take them all.’

  I finished scooping up dog food and handed Mr Thomas his supply.

  ‘You know, Mr Hawkins, of all the questions you asked me, you didn’t ask the one I most expected you to ask.’

  Really? Oh dear. What had I forgotten? My anxiety must have registered on my face for Mr Thomas rested a hand on my arm.

  ‘Oh, I didn’t mean that as a criticism, dear man.’ He paused for a moment. ‘I thought you would want to know why it was that I wanted a dog, especially as I had never had one before in my life.’

  It was then that Dorothy appeared with Millie. She wasn’t an exuberant dog, not the sort of dog who would bound up to somebody because she was pleased to see them, but she made a bee-line across the kitchen to the man who, in getting to know her, had taken her for so many walks. She jumped up at him, in her delight standing on his polished shoes, leaving a muddy scratch mark, and a muddy streak to match on his trousers with their sharp crease. This produced a broad smile on Mr Thomas’ face. He gave her a gentle pat on the head – I had the impression he wanted to make a fuss of her but wasn’t sure how to react. He would learn.

  Dorothy and I walked him up the drive to his car, which he had left on the road.

  He nodded in the direction of the seat that overlooked the pond. ‘May I sit and enjoy the view for a minute or two before I go?’ he asked.

  It was a surprising request. I had expected him to want to get off home. But I often myself took a few moments to sit and enjoy the setting of the village pond, overlooked by the Queen Anne farmhouse and its paddocks with horses grazing.

  ‘I must go and walk the other dogs,’ said Dorothy. She held out her hand and Mr Thomas took it and clasped it for a moment or two.

  ‘It’s been a pleasure to meet you, Mrs Hawkins,’ he said. ‘I will look after Millie.’

  ‘I know you will.’

  ‘And I’ll bring her back every so often for you to see, if I may. And for you to check progress,’ he added.

  Dorothy gave him one of her big, kindly smiles and went off. Before she disappeared from view round the back of the cottage she turned and gave Mr Thomas and Millie a wave.

  Something in the pond prompted ripples on the water, diverting Mr Thomas’ attention for a few moments. Then he turned back to me.

  ‘I’ll have plenty of time on my hands to look after her, Mr Hawkins. My wife died last year and I have found that time hangs heavy. I feel that by giving a home to a dog that needs one I will be doing something useful with my empty days.’ He looked down at his dog. ‘And I think she is going to brighten those days for me.’ He looked up again. ‘Thank you.’

  Mr Thomas led his dog off to his little car.

  After he had driven off I stayed for a few minutes to take pleasure in the scene. Dorothy reappeared, Bo trotting happily by her side.

  ‘Argh! Don’t let that ferocious dog off!’ I called out.

  Dorothy unclipped his lead and Bo ran up the drive and across the green to me. He circled me twice with excitement and then sat at my feet without being asked to do so.

  ‘You’re unlucky,’ I said. ‘I know what you want but I haven’t got any cheese on me.’

  Dorothy clipped Bo’s lead back on. ‘That was a good one, Barrie,’ she said.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Millie and Mr Thomas. I think that’s going to be a good result for Millie and a good result for him.’

  ‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘Didn’t we do well?’

  ‘We’re getting on with it now, aren’t we?’ Dorothy said.

  ‘That was the thirteenth we’ve found a home for,’ I said.

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘You don’t believe all that superstitious stuff about thirteen, do you?’ I said.

  ‘No.’

  She turned to go, then paused.

  ‘Barrie… do you remember when we homed Digby, the boy out of the breakers’ yard, I said I thought it was time we had a celebration, that we should do something to celebrate having started the rescue.’

  Where was this leading? ‘I think I do vaguely remember something like that.’

  ‘You said that when we had rehomed ten we would do something. Well, we’ve homed thirteen!’

  ‘Bo’s waiting for his walk,’ I said.

&
nbsp; ‘As it’s Saturday, could we afford a Chinese takeaway?’

  ‘No. This week we have had a bill from the vet’s, a bill from the boarding kennels – and the size of the phone bill! I could have bought a new car with that. But we’ll have one anyway.’

  She turned and skipped away.

  ‘We’ll have to find you something nice to eat tonight, Bo,’ she said to him, ‘as we’re going to be having a Chinese!’

  I was longer collecting the Chinese takeaway than I had said I would be. I’d forgotten it was Saturday night and there would be a queue. And of course there was no Chinese takeaway in Wilberry. It was six miles there and six miles back for a chow mein. And I’d been late going to get it. Larry, the brown Lab cross had been sick in his pen for some reason and I’d had to clear that up. I would also have to clear up sweet and sour sauce when I got home: I’d gone round the roundabout too fast and the takeaway bag had tipped over, leaking sticky, bright red sauce onto the beige car carpet.

  Nearly ten o’clock – poor Dorothy would be starving.

  She wasn’t in the kitchen and I carried the goodies into the living room. She was lying on the floor, her hands on her stomach.

  ‘Have you passed out with hunger?’ I asked.

  ‘Oh, my Barrie,’ she said. ‘I’m in such pain.’

  I dumped the takeaway down and went to her. ‘Where?’

  ‘Tummy.’

  She screwed up her eyes and started to take gulps of air. She cried out suddenly and loudly. So loudly it made me jump.

  ‘Oh. Oh. Oh.’

  I was frightened. And I felt helpless.

  ‘What can I do, sweetheart?’ I said.

  She shook her head, unable to speak.

  ‘I’ll ring the doctor.’

  She nodded.

  I grabbed the phone, dropped it, picked it up again and dialled, forcing myself to dial slowly so as not to get the wrong number.

  The woman at the out-of-hours service asked questions that I could tell were to decide whether a house visit was really necessary.

  ‘My wife isn’t the sort of person to complain or make a fuss and she’s lying on the floor in too much pain to get up.’

  The doctor would come.

  First of all I watched from the window, pulling back the curtain. Then I opened the front door and waited. Then I went and stood out on the pavement in case they couldn’t find the house number.

  There are lots of doctors at our practice and it was a relief to see the call taken by Dr Marshall, who remembered Dorothy and called her by her first name. She knew about Dorothy’s operation. She felt Dorothy here and here and here, asked some questions, wanted Dorothy moved to the settee, gave me a kindly smile.

  ‘I think as a precaution we should get her admitted,’ she said, picking up her phone to make the call.

  Hospital? I felt as if I would cry, but couldn’t in front of her.

  I listened to the phone call, growing more tense as I gained the impression the hospital was reluctant to take my wife. This would happen on a Saturday night when all the drunks and yobs fill casualty.

  The patient is prostrate with very severe abdominal pain,’ I overheard. She went quickly through Dorothy’s recent history.

  The ambulance is on its way.’

  We put blankets around her to keep her warm. How long would the ambulance be?

  When it arrived, kindly paramedics stretchered her out into the back of the ambulance. I felt my heart thud in my chest when they put the blue light on.

  They clamped a mask on her face in the ambulance. What was it? Was it oxygen? Was it gas? I didn’t want to ask the paramedic, I didn’t want to distract him.

  I returned home hours later to see our celebration Chinese takeaway unopened on the table.

  Happy Anniversary

  I was hoping to get past the nurses’ station at the entrance to the ward without being noticed. The two nurses had their backs to me, conferring. I thought I’d made it. Then, eyes fixed on the two nurses, I nearly walked into a third.

  ‘Oops, sorry!’ I said.

  ‘Hello, Mr Hawkins,’ she said. ‘There’s a policeman been looking for your wife.’

  A policeman? A flicker of anxiety. Then I guessed: Charlie.

  ‘He’s with her now,’ said nurse number three and she gave me one of her big smiles I remembered from the last time Dorothy was in hospital. I remembered also she had told me her son wanted to study law and become a barrister and that she hoped he would so he could look after her in her old age.

  I asked about her son. ‘He’s applying to Cambridge.’ She raised her eyebrows to indicate her surprise.

  ‘He’ll end up a High Court Judge,’ I said. She gave me that big smile again and then bustled away.

  Dorothy and Charlie were sitting on the bed, chatting. Dorothy looked up as she heard me coming.

  ‘Hello, my Barrie! It’s not visiting time yet and I’ve already got two visitors.’

  ‘Well, they’re not going to stop Charlie, are they?’ I said.

  Charlie stood up and held his arm out. We shook hands. It was the first time we’d shaken hands since the day we had met – perhaps it was a gesture of solidarity as much as a greeting.

  ‘You two will want to talk, so I won’t hang about,’ said Charlie.

  ‘Charlie’s only been here a few minutes,’ said Dorothy.

  ‘I’ve got Ivor the Terrible in the van,’ Charlie said, ‘And he ain’t had his walk yet. And he ain’t had a chance to chase anybody today either.’ He put a brown paper bag on Dorothy’s bedside cabinet. ‘Nearly forgot – I brought you some grapes.’

  My eyes met Dorothy’s. ‘Stay and share them with me,’ she said to Charlie.

  Just then a nurse appeared with some equipment. ‘Time to check your blood pressure, Dorothy,’ she said.

  As we weren’t supposed to be there I thought Charlie and I ought to disappear for a couple of minutes. Out of Dorothy’s hearing Charlie said, ‘She looks bright enough, doesn’t she?’ I took this to be his way of prompting me into telling him how she was.

  ‘It frightened the life out of me, Charlie,’ I said.

  ‘Course it did.’

  ‘But it’s not like before. She was in hospital for over two months last year.’

  Charlie pursed his lips.

  ‘And she’s coming out tomorrow. It’s all to do with the op she had – apparently it’s something that can happen. Something gets stuck together. Anyway, they’re sure they’ve dealt with the problem.’

  Charlie patted me on the arm. ‘Well that’s good.’ There was a moment’s pause, then he said, ‘I envy you two.’

  The nurse had finished taking Dorothy’s blood pressure.

  ‘You’ll give me a shout if you want help, walking dogs, or anything?’

  ‘Thanks, Charlie. But at this moment we’re dogless. While Dorothy’s been in here I’ve homed Lottie and Larry and Bo.’

  ‘That’ll help her feel better. Three in one week – you’re getting good at it.’

  In truth, I’d been lucky. Mr and Mrs Burton, with whom we had homed our first orphan, Monty, had decided they would like a second dog so now Monty had a playmate, Lottie, our Lurcher cross, to help him run off all that energy. And their newly married son, Paul, who we knew from when the family lived in our village, adopted our brown Lab cross, Larry.

  ‘That Bo – you know what he was like when he came in – would you believe I homed him in Fosfen village shop?’ I said. ‘And there is nothing he loves more than meeting all the customers – so they can admire him and make a fuss of him.’

  Charlie put a hand on my shoulder. ‘You’ve done well.’ Then he paused. ‘Let’s just hope one of the customers ain’t that fella that pushed him under the bus.’ Another pause. ‘Only joking. I’ll just go and say cheerio to Dorothy.’

  ‘I’m off then,’ he said to her. He took her hand, gave her a peck on the cheek and said, ‘You get better. There’s all them doggies out there waiting for you to rescue them.’
He gave me a wave and strode off.

  Dorothy watched him go. I sat down on the bed beside her. ‘Has he never married?’ she asked.

  I shook my head. ‘The topic’s never come up.’

  ‘He’s a lovely man.’

  ‘His dog thinks so,’ I said. ‘Although I don’t suppose the yobs agree.’

  Dorothy’s bed was at the far end of the ward and the next three beds along were all empty, so it wasn’t too noisy for us to talk.

  ‘Dorothy, what Charlie said about getting better so you can—’

  ‘—rescue doggies. It always makes me smile when he says “doggies”. He even calls the police dogs “doggies”.’

  ‘Yes. Dorothy, you don’t need me to tell you what tomorrow is, do you?’

  She gave a little wriggle. ‘We’ve two anniversaries tomorrow,’ she said. ‘One’s my wedding anniversary and the other one is—’

  ‘It’s that other one I want to talk to you about,’ I said.

  ‘What’s there to talk about?’

  ‘Whether we’re going on with it. It’s not just the bills…’ ‘We’ve coped with the dogs we’ve had so far,’ said Dorothy in an encouraging tone of voice. ‘You have, you mean.’

  ‘Well. you’re a much better dog handler than you were a year ago.’

  That made me laugh. ‘Very tactful,’ I said.

  She sighed. ‘But some of the people we deal with.’ Her voice trailed off.

  ‘It’s the people I’ve been thinking about,’ I said.

  ‘Like that chap who chucked his dog out of the car. And after you’d given him a lead and a collar and told him about the training classes and—’

  ‘Yeah… he fooled me completely. But Roxy’s OK now. Dorothy, it’s something else I’ve been thinking about.’

  I went on to tell her about the caretaker and what he had said at the end of the talk I gave to the Ladies’ Circle. It would come back into my head repeatedly: ‘If you’ve got all this time to give to doing things for animals, why don’t you spend your time doing things for people instead? They’re more important than animals.’ I had never told Dorothy what he’d said.