by Katy Lilley
Maisie watched the dog do his business, praised him, and then whilst he sniffed about, never more than a yard or so from her, she rang Bryony.
‘Hi, what’s up?’
‘This and that. First off where local does puppy pads and puppy food?’
‘Eh?’ Bryony said in a puzzled voice. ‘Why?’
‘I’ll come to that in a minute. Do my landlords allow dogs in Daps Cottage?’
‘Well as Mop is a regular visitor, you know the answer to that.’
One hurdle crossed. ‘Good. Next question, do you know of anyone with an Old English Sheepdog that’s had puppies, ah, say six to eight weeks ago and one was a runt?’
‘Nope.’ Bryony sounded puzzled. ‘Do you want one? Of course, it would be okay. Is someone selling one?’
Damn. She’d hoped Bryony would be able to help. Maisie hastened to explain. As ever she needed a wee and would have to ring off before she had an accident. The baby might not be much more than pea-sized but it was playing havoc with her bladder.
‘No. It seems someone had given one away. To me. A right cutie but a right mystery. If you and detective Dario have a minute or so, could you come and have a wee look? And go via Mrs Cherry’s for me and get what I might need. I’m clueless and the poor thing has nothing except a name, not even a collar. Talk about an orphan in a storm. Except there’s no storm and he’s Barney and I’m…’ She sighed. ‘Anyway, can you? I’ll leave the door unlocked. I’m off to the loo.’
‘Dash then. On our way.’
That was the great thing about good friends, they did what was needed and asked questions later. In less than an hour, during which Maisie managed the toilet break, ate a slice of toast and didn’t throw up, and with some misgiving gave the puppy some porridge, which stayed down, Bryony turned up carrying a large box and a cage.
Maisie got up and removed Barns—she’d shortened Barney without thinking—from her foot which he seemed to have decided was his preferred sleeping place and took the box from her. Bryony immediately picked the pup up and cuddled him. He licked her face and made snuffly puppy noises.
‘Well, aren’t you the cutesy then?’ she cooed. ‘How could anyone not want you?’ She narrowed her eyes at Maisie. ‘You do, don’t you?’
Maisie sighed. ‘So it seems. Will it be okay with a baby?’
‘Well duh, look at Mop.’
‘Point taken. Of course, he’s adopted me.’ Barns woofed and both women laughed.
‘Who’s a clever boy then,’ Bryony cooed and rolled her eyes. ‘Puppies, kittens and kids. Sucker I am, and they know it.’
‘True. What I want to know though is why me, why now, and what type of person could do this? I mean look at him, he’s tiny. He was tied up with string, no water, no food, and nothing comfy to sit on. What if I hadn’t been here? He might have died.’
Bryony opened the back door and put Barns down on the grass. He promptly, shook himself and whined. ‘Stop dramatizing. Let me see the note.’
Maisie handed it over and patted Barns as he weed over a weed. ‘Who’s a good boy then. Now if only you’d carry on like this.’
‘In your dreams,’ Bryony assured Maisie with a grin. ‘Lots of accidents and puddles to cope with first.’ Bryony tapped the note on her hand. ‘I think they, whoever they are, knew fine well you were here, and you’d take him. You know curtains closed, you turning lights off and probably on.’
‘I set automatic switches to do that anyway,’ Maisie objected. ‘That can’t be it.’
‘Whatever, I still reckon they knew you were here. I asked Dario how he thought they’d get in to tie him up, and he said either via the carport roof, or from the top road and over three fields. Probably the latter, as the carport is in full view of the village and let’s face it, the roof isn’t designed for people to clamber all over it. Crows, starlings and cats yes. People no. Right, now that’s settled, I’ve bought everything you could possibly need, the cage is Mop’s but we now have a guard thing so he can’t get into the main bit of the car and don’t use it, and the vet says pop down at three for him to give Barney a check-up.’
‘Do you ever draw breath?’
Bryony grinned. ‘When necessary.’
Maisie blinked and sifted through everything Bryony had imparted. ‘Barns. I like it better.’
‘Eh? Okay, sorry, Barns. For now, give him some of that puppy food and water. I’ve got some puppy pads, and a collar and lead. You are now sorted.’ She paused dramatically. ‘Mum.’
Maisie wasn’t sure she was ready to be a mum, even if it was to a dog. She’d hope for those few months ahead to get used to it. However, she didn’t comment. ‘Cup of tea?’
‘Nope, ta.’ Bryony shook her head. ‘Best get back. Dario’s in charge and Theo is grizzly. Teeth are a sod. Hurt to come in, hurt when you hurt them and hurt to come out.’
‘Handy for eating though.’
‘True, and in Theo’s case biting. She got a sharp no from me when she tried it on when she was feeding. Bloody sore. I’ve warned her. Bite my boob and the milk supply is cut off.’
‘Ouch.’ Maisie winced, then laughed. ‘That sounds fair enough.’
‘You’ll learn. And on that note, I’m off. Good luck and tell me what the vet says.’ Bryony left as swiftly as she’d come.
Maisie stared at the closed door and then at Barns. Boob biting was not to the forefront of her worries at that moment. ‘So, mate, let’s get ground rules sorted. No peeing or pooing except on designated areas. Top of the garden or I suppose in the back porch on the puppy pad. We need house rules.’
Barns yawned. He seemed singularly unimpressed by her diktat. ‘Yeah, yeah,’ Maisie muttered as she put his food in a bowl and debated what she’d have to eat. ‘I wonder when I can take you out. I bet Mop will love you. A mini Mop.’ She hoped he would anyway. Maisie had half earmarked Bryony as mum mark two for the times she wouldn’t be around. Like any car journey being anathema.
She was right about that. Thinking negative and hoping she’d be wrong, Maisie put the cage Bryony had lent her in the boot of the car with a blanket and a puppy pad and gave thanks she’d gone for a hatchback. Barns took one look at the car, plonked his butt on the pavement and howled.
Maisie stared at him. ‘It’s only for a few minutes and you’ve got to go. It’s for your benefit.’ She scooped him up, put him in the cage and shut the door.
Barns shivered, peed and pooed and didn’t stop howling. Maisie wished for ear plugs—and a nose plug— and drove down the hill to the vets. This mum to a puppy lark was no easy ride. God help her when she was mum to a human as well. If the dog was going to be like this on every journey, she would be a raving nut case before long.
Definitely need a Barns sitter for when I go away.
The minute she got Barns out of the car, he stopped shivering, shook himself and stood patiently as Maisie locked the car.
‘You, dog, are a fraud. Now why couldn’t you be like this all the way here?’ Maisie walked into the vets with a perfectly behaved puppy on a lead and gave her—and the dog’s name to the receptionist. She took a seat as bidden and glanced idly at the notices on a cork board. Nothing about Old English Sheepdog pups for sale or free to a good home.
The mystery thickened. Okay, there were more vets than this one in the area, but somehow, as this was nearest, Maisie had hoped to find some information, and she’d bet they shared information just as teachers and schools did.
‘Barns MacLean?’ A green coated lady stood in the doorway that led to the back of the building. Presumably the consulting rooms. Maisie stared at her, uncomprehending.
The woman smiled. ‘Is this Barns? I’m Daisy Russell, the vet.’
‘What? Oh yes, sorry. You threw me with the MacLean bit.” Maisie stood up and Barns obediently followed her as they were ushered into a consulting room. ‘I’m not really used to having a dog yet.’
‘We tend to add the owner’s name as well as the pets,’ Daisy explained as she shut the door b
ehind them. ‘Especially helpful when there’s a run on names. Last year every second pet was named after a character in a popular TV series, a few years before it was Woody. You don’t really want to say, Woody with an ingrowing toenail, or Woody the rabbit from wherever. So Woody, surname of owner worked best for us. Can you put Barns up on the table please? Bryony said it’s a general look over, to see if he’s ready for second shots, and reassurance needed. Had him long?’
That summed things up nicely. ‘About six hours give or take.’ Maisie handed the letter over, and Daisy’s eyebrows rose until they were hidden by her fringe. ‘Well, that’s some letter. No idea who?’
‘Not a clue. I thought you might.’
Daisy gave Barns a thorough check. ‘Not heard anything, though I’ll ask around. Okay then, he’s older than you thought. Around ten weeks, so I’ll give him his second shots. Bit small and underweight, but that will soon sort itself out now he’s got you.’ She peered at Maisie. ‘He does have you, doesn’t he?’
Maisie nodded. ‘So it seems.’
Daisy smiled. ‘Excellent. I’d like to see him in a month, just a check-up, if that’s okay. I don’t foresee any problems.’ She gave Barns the inoculations needed. Barns didn’t murmur or wriggle. ‘What a good boy.’
Only car journeys to upset him then. She mentioned that to the vet.
‘Associates it with being abandoned, at a guess,’ Daisy said in a matter of fact way. ‘Once he accepts that you’re not going to leave him tied up and go away for ever, he’ll be fine. It’ll just take time. Think how you’d feel if you went through what we think he did.’
Maisie nodded—the vet had a point—thanked her, and went to pay her debts, which were considerably more once she’d purchased some more so-called essentials. ‘You, dog, are an expense I didn’t expect,’ she said as they walked back to the car and she put his new expensive bed in the boot. ‘I’ll be on bread and scrape at this rate.’
‘What’s bread and scrape?’
‘Argh, you startled me.’ Maisie looked up into the blue eyes of Cam. Damn, she wasn’t ready to see him yet. Not until she knew more about her pregnancy. ‘It’s bread and the brown jelly like stuff out of dripping. According to my mum it’s a great treat. I hate it.’
‘Sounds like heart attack material. Hello Maisie, are we on speaking terms?’
‘Well of course we are, why?’
‘I detected a certain degree of frost the other day,’ he answered in a dry manner. ‘Wasn’t sure what our situation was.’
‘That was embarrassment not frost,’ Maisie said embarrassed all over again, and determined to keep things light. ‘I mean I never expected to see you here.’
’And wished you hadn’t?’
‘Don’t put words into my mouth. You’re wrong, but hell, I mean heck, you’re the vicar. Do vicars do that sort of thing?’
‘This one does. Did.’
‘True, but I guess you don’t want it broadcast to all and sundry?’
‘Fair comment. I’m not sure that the lovely Mrs Soole would understand.’
‘Not the way I think Call Me Dave behaves.’
‘Call me Dave?’ Cam asked in a puzzled voice.
‘Ah yes, sorry, you wouldn’t know about that.’ Gah, why was she now having a gossip with him? Hadn’t she decided to keep well away until she knew more? Too late now, say it and say farewell. ‘Before Lottie and Gibb got together, she lived in one of those places at Sea Spray and he was the salesman sorting it,’ Maisie expanded. ‘He kept saying ‘Call me Dave’ and behaving in an oily, smarmy way. She and most of us, to be honest, can’t stand him. Gibb was all for shoving his braces down his throat at one point. Then there were rumours about someone catching Dave out on the town and Faye wasn’t best pleased, as you can guess, and things calmed down for a while. Anyhow to sum up my ramblings, no doubt about it she’d go to town. Faye and us apart, as I’m now apparently mum and person to this mutt here, I’m wondering how fast my mad money will disappear.’ And if I’ll be able to afford everything I need for my…our…my…baby.
‘He’s cute, and worth your mad money surely?’
‘Perhaps, but until early this morning I had no idea I was to be a dog’s mum.’ She explained the circumstances. ‘So here I am with a lighter purse and a pup who thinks my feet are his bed and my car is a toilet. I’m guessing he’s not a fan of motorised travel.’
‘Poor thing. I reckon you’ll need to buy some new trainers.’ He glanced at her battered trainers where one big toe peeked through the canvas. ‘If that’s his fault.’
Maisie blushed as she waggled her foot. ‘Yeah, darn it. This is the result of one puppy when I went for a shower. He howled, then there was silence. I thought he’d gone to sleep. Boy was I wrong. Luckily, they’re old, but I swore loudly and fluently. Barns sat and stared as if I’d gone mad then yawned and went to sleep on it. I guess his thought process was if he couldn’t sleep on my foot, it was the next best thing. Mind you, the shoe cupboard is going to have a lock on it as soon as I buy one. It’s got a chair in front of it for now.’
Cam laughed. ‘Good luck there and in finding out where he came from. Have you looked for clues? Channelled your inner Sherlock and gone over your garden with a fine toothcomb? You might find a cap, or a glove stuck to the branch of a tree, or a footprint in the mud, size 16 boots with a distinctive sole pattern. You know where only one person for miles around wears that size and those particular boots.’
‘And he or she was three hundred miles away, and had a bus full of footie supporters to back him up?’ She sniggered, forgetting her vow of chat and go. ‘That’d be my luck, but it’s an idea.’ Why on earth hadn’t she checked the garden out? Not enough time. ‘I will find my magnifying glass and do it as soon as I get home.’
‘Great, let me know what you find. Wish I could help but, sorry, I’ve got to dash and meet Di, my sister, off the London train, and if I don’t get a move on I’ll be late. Let me know if you fancy a pizza anytime.’ He sketched a wave as he left.
In a thoughtful mood, Maisie put Barns—howling again—into the car. How could she let him know when she didn’t have his phone number? Maybe that was a good thing? After all, she wasn’t going to pop to the vicarage and leave a post it note. Barns yowled and she gave him a quick rub. ‘It’s only for ten minutes, dog. Get over it.’
Chapter Nine
Once they got back to Daps Cottage, Maisie left a snoozing Barns in his new bed, shut the back door just in case he was a second Mop—who could get out of any tiny gap—and put on the wellies Bryony had delivered as part of a moving in present. Bryony had guessed rightly that Wellington boots didn’t figure in Maisie’s wardrobe.
Maisie headed up the garden—without a magnifying glass but with her phone so she could photograph anything unusual—and was struck by the simplicity, and beauty of her surroundings all over again. Daps Cottage bordered onto fields that the farmer was leaving fallow that year and the edges were full of wildflowers in the right season. At the moment the leaves were changing, and it was definitely the season of mists and mellow fruitfulness.
She could hear at least three different types of birds chirruping and made a mental note to find a video or recording of birds and their songs. It would just be her luck to be asked something about that sort of stuff and have to profess to be clueless. Maisie acknowledged she knew how crows and seagulls sounded and not much else. Then she heard the tapping of a woodpecker and chuckled. She knew that one as well.
Nothing had been disturbed along her boundary. No broken branches or twigs, no footprints anywhere. Not that she’d thought there would be footprints, there had been no rain in the area and the ground was bone dry, but even the fallen leaves hadn’t been disturbed. Maisie peered over the hedge to see if there were any clues on the other side.
Not a one.
Unless whoever it was swooped over the hedge using one of those jet packs or parachuted into her garden, they didn’t come that way.
So how o
n earth did they get to her back door? On one side of the house was the craft shop and the fence between the properties was high and topped with spikes to deter pigeons. It also would work to deter intruders. The gate that Dario had installed when for a short time the craft shop had stored excess stock in what was then Iris Cottage, was equally topped and had a very complicated lock on it.
The other side of Daps Cottage bordered a smallholding, which raised geese. Noisy creatures. No one but no one would be able to come via there without causing the geese to set up such a cacophony even Bryony would hear it half a mile away.
Maisie was stumped. She strolled back down the garden, picked a few straggly roses, and made a mental note to ask someone just how you went about deadheading the bushes. Wasn’t that supposed to increase new shoots? Maybe she needed to add a gardening book to her next shop? ‘Gardening for idiots’ or ‘How not to kill your flowers off’.
She got as far as the back door, then had a thought. What if they’d jemmied the garden gate? Managed to unlock it and come in that way? Put ladders over the gate and climbed over? Sent a child to crawl over the roof of the carport and not fall through because they weighed so little?
Now she was in the realms of writing mystery stories. All scenarios that would be pulled up for being too far-fetched. It was still worth checking the gate though.
She checked.
Nothing untoward. The gate was still locked, and she had to use her key to open it. The lock didn’t appear tampered with, no boot prints were anywhere to be seen, and as far as she could tell, the carport was unsullied.
Back to square one.
Maisie went indoors to an ecstatic welcome from Barns, who immediately dashed outside to do his business, and got a dog treat as reward, which he promptly buried under a cushion on the settee and took out at regular intervals, to check she hadn’t tampered with it. How could you tell a puppy you wouldn’t touch his food with a barge pole without upsetting him?
For goodness sake, what next? Asking his opinion about what to wear? Apologising for having to go to school and leave him? Maisie MacLean, you’re losing it. That made her smile. What was she losing and why? Was that what pregnancy did to you?