The Barker's Dozen - Reminiscences of an Early Police Dog

by Robert Warr

  In my opinion, a fleeing villain just makes a chase both safer and more fun. For a start, you know that they won’t attack you and you can decide how you are going to tackle them. It was therefore in a happily confident mood that I took off after the fugitive. A Springer is not the world’s fastest dog but over a hundred yards we can outrun a man, every time.

  Unfortunately, young Gordon showed a total lack of sportsmanship. The blighter had a bicycle resting against a nearby gas lamp. He grabbed it and tried to mount it on the run. Twice he hopped up and failed to mount. I had closed the gap to three yards by the time his third attempt left him mounted and peddling. Over the next fifty yards, he was widening the gap and I knew that he could escape me. It was time to call for assistance.

  Quickly I barked an explanation of Gordon’s crime and my need for help. I must admit I was relieved when I heard first one, then several other dogs take up the call. With the hue-and-cry successfully raised, I put my head down and concentrated on running with only the occasional bark to keep everyone informed of my progress.

  I was barely holding my own at this point. The harder I ran the quicker the cook’s boy peddled. It was a matter of stamina, dog against man. I was starting to despair of ever running Gordon down when I heard the sound of hooves and wheels behind me, and faintly the sound of my master’s voice telling the driver to follow the barking. The knowledge that help was at hand gave me a reserve of strength and my running became easier.

  We kept our relative position for about a mile or so with Gordon turning, seemingly at random, down side streets in a desperate attempt to throw me off his trail. It didn’t matter where he turned, as even when I had lost sight of him some helpful animal- cats as well as dogs, I was gratified to note- put me back on his trail.

  I was starting to tire and watched despairingly as the cook’s lad, slowly and inexorably, opened his lead. I had lost and the fugitive was going to escape. I was desperately trying to find another reserve of stamina when I became aware of someone running by my side. I stole a quick glance and saw a greyhound loping easily by my shoulder.

  ‘Heard you needed a paw, guv. Wouldn’t normally help a peeler but some amateurs give all us crooks a bad name.’ He looked at me. ‘I’ll get ‘im orf the bike. After that, it’s up to you.’

  The greyhound accelerated from his easy lope to full speed in a couple of strides. Swiftly he closed the gap and, with a sudden bound, leapt and hit the fugitive in the thigh before springing away.

  The bicycle swerved, wobbled and then toppled, spilling the cook’s boy into the gutter where I think he belonged. He had managed to pull himself to his feet and pick up his machine before I arrived. The front wheel had buckled in the crash and I could see that it was no use to him.

  ‘Damn you!’ he screamed and hurled the wreckage into my path. I checked, took a shorter pace, gathered myself and sprang, teeth bared, at my quarry. I barrelled into him and he staggered back, ending up against a wall.

  With a deep growl, I moved slowly towards him, hoping that he would turn to run and thus give me an easy target. It rapidly became apparent that he was just not going to co-operate with me. Rather than fleeing, the ill-bred pup reached into his coat and produced a knife. I got the feeling that it just wasn’t my day.

  He lunged at me, slashing with his knife and I found myself backing away. It occurred to me that if I could keep him interested for long enough, my master would come to my aid. In retrospect, I realised that human justice had much to commend it.

  I was watching the knife and listening to the sounds of the growler approaching when I heard a familiar voice.

  ‘Hello again, young fellow; you do seem to have an exciting time of it. I don’t want to ruin your fun but do you need some slight assistance with this young gentleman?’

  With that, Henry emerged from the fog.

  ‘Well met,’ I replied, adding a tail wag to show my sincerity. ‘Please feel free to join in.’

  ‘Please correct me if you have a better plan,’ Henry said after a moment’s thought. ‘It occurs to me that we can minimise the chance of anyone being hurt if we co-ordinate our actions. To that end, I am going to bark twice. On the second bark, by which time our friend should be watching me, I will charge him down. I would be quite grateful if you could get a strong grip on his knife wrist before he manages to stab me.’

  I agreed with this plan: it was simple, straightforward and would probably work. In any case, I wanted to deal with this particular villain before my master arrived.

  Henry barked for the first time. A bark loaded with menace. The cook’s lad turned towards Henry and waved the knife threateningly.

  Henry barked again and we threw ourselves forward. For an instant the lad froze. For one vital, beautiful moment, he just stood there watching Henry charge. I seized my opportunity and his wrist in that same split second.

  The next moment the side of my head slammed into the cobbles as the cook’s lad collapsed backwards as Henry hit him. Instinctively I tightened my bite as my vision blurred.

  When full consciousness returned I was lying on the ground with the young villain’s wrist firmly in my teeth. The cook’s lad was lying flat on his back with Henry standing on his chest, barking gleefully. The lad seemed to have been winded by Henry but even so, he was managing to gasp out some vile imprecations. Suddenly, with a strength born of despair, he started bucking his body while trying to reach his knife with his left hand.

  ‘Be still, lad,’ Henry cautioned him, clearly and in English. ‘I am not going to let you up. Lie quietly and I won’t be forced to hurt you. I am a gentle soul and not inclined to violent behaviour. Indeed, I believe, in common with an ancient philosopher, that violence is the last resort of the incompetent. In your case, however, I am inclined to make an exception and show you how competent my teeth can be.’

  With a despairing shriek young Gordon collapsed into a dead faint; he was still lying very docilely when my master arrived.

  We handed the miscreant over to Inspector Moore before calling in to put Mrs Baker’s mind at rest.

  -----

  Snuffles finished his tale and stretched out on the mat.

  ‘What happened next?’ I asked.

  ‘We went home and had supper,’ Snuffles answered, deliberately taking my question literally. ‘I can’t recall what it was, but I don’t believe that it would be of interest to you anyway.’

  ‘No, I meant what happened to the cook’s lad? It would be cruel not to finish the story properly’

  ‘I would much rather talk about you,’ Snuffles said with a growl in his voice. ‘You dare to prattle on about cruelty, but last night you allowed yourself to get beastly drunk, and, I am ashamed to say, behaved with monstrous rudeness towards Miss Fraser.’

  The events of the previous night rose unbidden in my memory and my first thought was to leave the house at once.

  ‘You are not going to run,’ the dog continued, with iron in his voice. ‘You are going to walk with me into the maze, where the young lady is pretending to write. If you do not tender a sincere and handsome apology for your oafish behaviour I will refuse to converse with you again.’

  ‘You can’t mean that, Snuffles,’ I exclaimed despairingly.

  ‘Woof,’ he replied intractably.

  An Apology

  An extract from the journal of Miss Isobel Fraser, written for her sister, Lucy, in Boston.

  THE footsteps did indeed belong to someone who wanted to talk to me: the one person at Arlesford whom I least wanted to see. You can surely imagine my feelings when I glanced up to see James Thompson entering my little haven of peace. Initially I considered gathering my possessions and returning to the house, but realised that since he had stopped exactly in the arbour’s entrance I would be forced either to speak to him or to push past him.

  My quick glance had shown me that he was accompanied by Snuffles, though why such a well-bred dog should accompany such a brute as James escaped me. The presence of the dog reassured m
e and I decided to ignore the boor until he departed.

  James coughed, and I pretended to write. He coughed again, and I twisted slightly on my seat so that the back of my head was towards him. There was silence for several minutes; I know, because I was counting the seconds.

  A touch on my knee startled me and I glanced down with some apprehension, but was relieved to see that the dog had come over and had put his head on my leg. Gratefully I fondled his ears; by concentrating on the dog I could legitimately ignore the man.

  After a while, I heard James shift and thought that he was leaving. At that moment, a small querulous bark from Snuffles informed me that I had stopped stroking him. Unfortunately, the dog’s bark seemed to stiffen James’ resolution because he took a pace towards me.

  ‘Miss Fraser, I want to apologise,’ he said.

  I ignored him. Surely even the most stupid of men would give up after a while.

  ‘Miss Fraser. Please look at me,’ he said again. ‘I am not leaving this spot until you let me apologise.’

  There was a certain note of determination in his voice that led me to believe that he would stand there all day. His closer position brought the unmistakable scent of whisky. Even though it was still only morning, the brute had already been drinking. In frustration, I dug my fingers into the dog’s coat, eliciting a yelp. I lent my head down and apologised to the noble animal.

  ‘Miss Fraser, since you will not listen to my apology, I have no option but to imitate your good example. I find that I must explain myself to Snuffles. Once I have finished here, I intend to leave Arlesford and return immediately to London, as my presence seems to be causing you some distress.’

  I almost looked at him then, but checked my natural instinct. He intended to explain his behaviour to a dog. This was almost as silly as the arguments we had as children, when we would address our dolls rather than each other- you remember them? Of course, they were always variations of ‘Molly, you go tell Lucy that she cannot play with us.’ Was the man absolutely mad, I wondered?

  ‘Snuffles,’ he began, in a voice that sounded both sincere and embarrassed, ‘last night I was a complete and utter fool. I allowed a minor disappointment to cloud my good sense and rather than cheering myself up by participating in the ball, I started to drink.

  ‘If all I had done was to get quietly inebriated before falling asleep in some quiet corner, at worst I would have embarrassed only myself. I was stupid, though, and as soon as I finished one drink I immediately started another. Unwisely I remember mixing my drinks, hoping to find a happy state of intoxication; unfortunately, all I did was make myself beastly drunk.

  ‘I was upset because Lady Victoria, to whom I had become somewhat attached, failed to come down to Arlesford this weekend. I was insulted and began to think that she had deliberately mocked me. It seemed to me then that everyone in the room was party to this joke and that any laughter was directed at me.

  ‘When Aunt Mary brought Miss Fraser over, I thought that she was patronising me, and, feeling deeply wounded, I wanted to hurt someone else. Unfortunately, my victim was my American cousin, a young lady who has never done me any harm.

  ‘A drunkard has no sense and I said some truly horrid things to Miss Fraser, things that I knew to be untrue even as the bile poured from my mouth. The only thing that mattered was hurting someone else, and it seemed to be more satisfying that my target was someone charming.

  ‘What happened last night was totally my fault. I let my own self-doubts fuel a drinking spree and then indulged in a public tantrum worthy of a five-year-old. I have embarrassed myself in front of most of society and will no doubt be reminded of my folly for years to come. It is no more than I deserve.

  ‘My only regret, and it is one that I hold sincerely, is that I publicly humiliated someone who deserved only my friendship- a person whom I was pleased to know.’

  With that he turned and I heard him moving away. I glanced up and for some unaccountable reason found my vision blurred.

  ‘James, please don’t go,’ I said, much to my own surprise. ‘I would like a few moments of your time.’

  He returned to the arbour and, at my invitation sat at the other end of the bench. Snuffles sat a few feet away and looked at the two of us, almost as if he was a chaperone sent by my aunt.

  For a short while, there was an uncomfortable silence, and then James began talking in a quiet voice about the maze. Apparently, his great-grandfather, a noted naval officer, had designed it at the same time as he rebuilt the house. The family’s recent fortunes are founded on the prize money gained by the great-grandfather and there are references to his naval actions, in the form of engraved flagstones, at various parts of the maze. Each of the arbours is named after one of the Rear Admiral’s ships, a representation of which is carved into an octagonal flagstone set into the grass; James pointed out the picture of HMS Sprite, the cutter which had been his great-grandfather’s first command.

  From a conversation about the maze it was easy to come round to him. The Thompsons have a tradition of military service and James had always assumed that he would follow his father and brother into the Army. As he has always enjoyed building things, James had decided to join the Royal Engineers, a decision that was met with some disbelief in a family with a strong cavalry tradition. He held true to his choice and in due course was commissioned.

  He recounted how pleased he had been to be sent to a unit at Gibraltar, which is Britain’s great natural fortress at the mouth of the Mediterranean. The main feature of Gibraltar is apparently a massive outcrop of stone called the ‘rock’. This landmark is honeycombed with tunnels that serve gun positions, magazines and other military necessities.

  James had been given the task of enlarging one of the batteries to take modern guns; apparently it had been cut for Napoleonic cannon and was far too small. The easiest way to complete the task was to use several small charges to blast out the rock walls. The very last charge went wrong and exploded prematurely, trapping James and killing his Sergeant.

  The injury left James crippled and he resigned his commission as he felt he could no longer perform his duties properly. He now holds the position of an Inspector of Her Majesty’s Coastal Fortifications and, I think, bitterly regrets the loss of his chosen career.

  Having spoken to James, I am of the opinion that he is very self-conscious about his injury and feels that it has disfigured him in some way. It is true that he walks relatively slowly and has to rest quite often but I later gathered from the General that he is gradually improving.

  Lucy, I was wrong. James was drunk and acted in a monstrous fashion towards me. He is not a brute, however, but a charming man who has undoubtedly endured many disappointments and reverses.

  The Case of the Unseen Witness

  ‘HERE you are at last,’ said Snuffles. ‘I perceive that rather than having a sensible amount of sleep, you spent the better part of last night drinking in a rather disreputable gaming club with a man called Palmer.’

  It was bad enough to be chided for my lateness by my uncle’s dog without him accurately stating the cause of my sloth. Snuffles had been delighting in showing off his powers of deduction ever since my uncle and I had discussed the merits of one of Conan Doyle’s stories in the Strand magazine. Although we dismissed the powers of Holmes as a neat plot device, Snuffles later claimed that they were ‘elementary’.

  ‘What type of tale are you telling me today?’ I asked while settling into a chair, ‘a good murder or a daring theft?’

  ‘Today,’ said Snuffles, after some consideration, ‘I am going to tell you about a young man who is serving a life sentence in solitary confinement, and how he figured in one of your uncle’s cases.’

  Snuffles settled himself more comfortably and began.

  -----

  My master had been invited to spend Friday to Monday with his old school friend Peter Harys at Stroon Castle. Peter was hosting a party to celebrate his brother John's coming of age and, although the bulk of the
guests were his brother’s friends, he had invited a few of his own to provide adult conversation. We duly arrived at Stroon Castle one Friday afternoon and, having changed, my master went downstairs to meet the rest of the party, already gathered for pre-dinner drinks.

  Your uncle’s entry caused a brief lull in the conversation as people turned to look at the famous detective. The conversation then returned to its previous level. However, I did catch more than one reference to some of my master’s more famous cases.

  Peter escorted us around the gathering, which consisted of the people staying for the whole weekend; the rest of the guests would arrive the following night for the ball. We were introduced to people whom my master did not know although fortunately there were several old friends.

  One small group caught my attention. There was a young man of about twenty sitting in a wheeled chair. He sat there ignoring the people around him while repeatedly nodding his head. Sitting on his right hand was a striking lady in her late forties. Behind the chair sat another woman who, from her dress, was the young man’s nurse.

  ‘That’s my Aunt Sophie, Lady Gough,’ said Peter as we approached. ‘I do not believe that you have ever met her or her son David.’

  Checking to ensure that we were out of earshot, my master asked what was wrong with the lad.

  Speaking in a quiet voice Peter continued. ‘Something apparently went wrong when David was born, and although he has grown physically, his mind never developed. It is a great shame because my aunt is one of the most pleasant women you could hope to meet.’

  My master was introduced to Lady Gough and they started to discuss the Maygrove tragedy. While I sat and listened to them, I felt a hand on my ear. I turned in that direction and looked straight into David’s face. I was instantly struck by the intelligence and suffering in his eyes. He spoke to me, and although I heard a meaningless collection of sounds, I knew from his body language that he had said something like ‘good boy.’ I wagged my tail and licked his hand in response and was gratified to see a smile light up his eyes.