‘Alison wants you to be in our play,’ said Joan.
‘No, she wants you to,’ said Alison.
At dinner-time a dog got into the playground. It was large and friendly. It ran around and joined in various games. About thirty children tried to help the dinner ladies to catch it. About a dozen said they knew the dog and where it lived. They volunteered to take it home. Roy and Eric sat on the dustbins and watched the chase. ‘Just think,’ said Roy. ‘That could be you.’
When home-time came, the children going on the school camp were given a letter and a list. The letter was about a meeting for the parents. The list was all the things the children needed to take with them. Eric and Roy read theirs on the way to the swimming baths.
Roy said, ‘It says here, “Four pairs of socks”. Who needs four pairs of socks?’
“ ‘Comfortable walking boots”,’ said Eric.
‘ “Stamped-addressed postcard”,’ said Roy.
‘ “Pocket-money”,’ said Eric. ‘Hey, look at this: “No more than £1”!’
They were in the High Street now. The wool shop where Mrs Banks had a part-time job was close by. Friday was one of her days.
‘A pound? I need more than that,’ said Roy.
‘It’s in a field, y’know. You can’t spend money in a field.’
They had reached the baths and were climbing the front steps.
‘There’ll be shops,’ said Roy. ‘I want to buy presents.’
Eric and Roy paid their money and got changed. The cubicles were in a row along the side of the bath. There was a similar row on the other side for girls and women. Each cubicle had a bench seat, two wall-hooks and a sliding plastic curtain, like a shower curtain. Eric and Roy put their clothes in the metal baskets and handed them in. They were given rubber rings with numbers on them to wear round their wrists. They washed their feet in the footbath.
Eric stepped up to the pool and dived straight in. Roy stood on the side for a while, winding himself up. Eric was the better swimmer; he had his grade two. Roy didn’t have grade one yet. He’d only learnt to swim since Easter.
‘What’s it like?’ said Roy.
‘Boiling!’ said Eric. ‘Come on in!’
Roy swung his arms a couple of times, jumped in and began to swim across the bath. His eyes were shut. He moved through the water like a thrashing machine. He seemed to be swimming for his life.
Roy reached Eric and opened his eyes. ‘This is great!’ he said.
After that the two boys spent their time playing games, most of which seemed to involve jumping in, climbing up the steps and jumping in again. Roy shouted, ‘Bombs away!’ and ‘Geronimo!’. Eric swung into the water on an imaginary rope and made Tarzan calls. The attendant told them to keep the noise down. Later, Eric showed Roy how to stand on his hands. He tried it, but the water went up his nose. Roy challenged Eric to a race. Eric may have been the better swimmer, but Roy – over short distances – was faster. Eventually, after about forty minutes, the attendant wrote some numbers on a board and blew his whistle. The numbers included Roy’s and Eric’s. It was time to leave.
Roy and Eric went to the clothes store and collected their baskets. They found a pair of unoccupied cubicles. They began to get changed. Eric stood with his wet trunks round his ankles and dried himself. The towel was rough and had a freshly laundered smell. It reminded him of sitting on his dad’s knee when he was small, having his hair dried. On the other side of the partition Roy was singing.
Eric reached for his T-shirt … and then it happened. There was a sudden itch between his shoulders, a curious tingling in his hands and feet, a shrinking feeling in every part of him (except his ears), and a sensation in his stomach like going over a hump-back bridge in a car. At last, in hardly more than fifteen seconds, the transformation was complete. Eric, the boy, had disappeared; Eric, the dog, had arrived.
8
Exit Eric
When Roy saw a dog’s head poke under the partition, he stopped singing. When the dog joined him in the cubicle and he could see it was a Norfolk terrier, he said, ‘A dog! I don’t believe it! Eric – is that you?’
Somehow Eric kept his wits and remembered the code. ‘Woof!’ he said.
Roy, for his part, was immediately confused. He was scared (a little) and excited (a lot). ‘ “Woof”?’ he said. ‘What’s that, one for yes…?’
‘Woof!’ said Eric.
‘… or one for no?’
‘Woof, woof!’ Eric said.
But already Roy was hardly listening. He couldn’t concentrate on codes. Instead he crouched and peered intently into Eric’s face. ‘Eric? I think I recognize you, Eric. You’ve got the same expression.’
Now Roy was looking under the partition into Eric’s cubicle. He could see a pair of feet in the next-but-one, but Eric’s was empty. His excitement grew. ‘It is you, isn’t it? It’s really happened!’ Then, almost without thinking, he patted his friend’s head and ruffled the fur along his back. ‘Hey, this is great, Eric – it’s brilliant!’ (The truth is, Roy had been waiting for Eric to change ever since he’d known it was possible. He’d even felt irritated at times because it was taking so long. He almost accused Eric of not trying.)
Eric sat on the floor avoiding the puddles and Roy’s wet trunks. He looked up at Roy, who was the picture of a contented swimmer: puckered face, red-rimmed eyes, and – especially in his case – cockatoo hair. He had his underpants on and one sock.
Eric, of course, couldn’t altogether share Roy’s opinion. When the transformation began he’d briefly felt more frantic than the first time. This time he knew what was coming! Now – having recovered somewhat, and being the level-headed boy he was – the thought in his mind was: How do I get out of here? Also, he was beginning to feel concerned about his clothes, his swimming kit, his bag, his watch, and his crisp and lolly money. And the question was: How reliable was Roy?
Eric had a high regard for Roy. He was his best friend; the best best friend he’d ever had. Yes, Roy would stick by him, that wasn’t the problem. The problem was, would he be any use? Roy was never short of ideas, but his brain was like a Catherine wheel; it threw them off in all directions.
Roy, meanwhile, was pulling on his other sock and talking more or less non-stop. ‘How’re you feeling, Eric? What’s it like down there? So much for Jimmy and His Magic Patch, hey?’
When he’d finished dressing, he quickly squeezed his trunks out and rolled them up in his towel. Then he put the towel and trunks in his bag and sat on the bench. Then he said, ‘Right!’ and clapped his hands. Then he leapt up, took his jockey cap from its hook on the wall, and sat down again. Then he said, ‘Right!’ again. Then he put his jockey cap on. Then he took it off. Finally, he put his elbows on his knees, his chin in his cupped hands and stared down at Eric … expectantly.
Eric stared back. ‘Here’s trouble for a start,’ he thought. ‘He’s waiting for me!’ (Roy usually did wait for Eric. He wasn’t the leader exactly, but he did tend to organize things.) Luckily, on this occasion, Roy was beginning to appreciate that something else was needed. ‘Right!’ he said, and clapped his hands. ‘Let’s think!’
Roy then, at great speed, thought of (and talked about) practically everything: Eric’s clothes, kit, watch, money; how to get past the attendants; where to go afterwards. He even remembered the code. In reply, Eric managed a ‘woof or a ‘woof, woof now and then, but to little effect. The trouble was, ‘yes’ and ‘no’ were not much use when the questions were ‘either/or’: Shall we sneak you out or make a run for it? Hide you under a towel or in a bag? Smokey bacon or salt and vinegar? My house or yours?
Eric was a patient boy, and – as it turned out – a patient dog. However, there were limits. At last, when they were still in the cubicle and obviously getting nowhere, Eric gave way to a burst of serious barking; not ‘woof’ or ‘woof, woof’, but ‘WOOF WOOF WOOF WOOF WOOF!’
Roy was suitably startled and his attention caught. He crouched beside his friend. �
��What’s up, Eric? Are you trying to tell me something or –’
‘Grr!’ growled Eric, and startled even himself. He hadn’t thought of growling, it just came out.
Roy clutched at his jockey cap and backed away. ‘Eric? he said. And then, ‘You still there?’
At that moment something else happened. The plastic curtain was pulled aside, light flooded in, and a voice said, ‘What’s all this?’
Eric, it seemed, had caught more than Roy’s attention.
‘What’s all this?’ (It was the attendant, of course.) ‘That your dog?’
Rapidly Eric retreated under the bench, flattened his ears and looked guilty.
‘Er… well,’ said Roy. He looked guilty, too.
‘It’s not allowed, y’know – no dogs!’
Now, obviously, at this point, if the attendant had simply asked Eric to leave, he would have left. In fact, he’d probably have made a more orderly exit than he usually did. After all, he didn’t want any trouble; he had enough as it was. However, the attendant wasn’t to know this. ‘Come here!’ he said, and – brushing Roy aside – he entered the cubicle and made a grab for Eric.
‘I’ll get him for you, Sir!’ said Roy. (The ‘Sir’ was conscious flattery.) ‘He’ll come with me!’
But it was too late; Eric was on the run. First he darted under the partition back into his own cubicle. Then, when the attendant showed up there, he kept going – into the next cubicle, and the next, and the next. Some were occupied, but there was little protest. Eric was in and out so fast he was hardly seen. At the end of the row he emerged, and – on an impulse – ran into the clothes store. This was a mistake. The attendant at his heels yelled, ‘Albert – grab that dog!’ Whereupon a second attendant leapt from a chair, swigged back a mug of tea, and joined the chase.
Roy, meanwhile, was struggling to catch up. He was hampered by the two bags he was carrying.
With some presence of mind, he’d thought to gather up Eric’s things and bring them along.
The chase continued; in and out of the racks of clothes, then out and down a corridor into a part of the baths that Eric had never seen before. It was his extra-bad luck that the attendants were young and fit, and – what was worse – bored. When they could’ve been expected to give up, they didn’t. This was entertainment for them; more fun than clothes baskets, anyway.
The corridor Eric was in had doors leading off to left and right, all of which were shut. Behind him he could hear the pounding feet of the attendants, and behind them – some way behind – Roy: ‘I’m here, Eric – I’m with you!’
Suddenly, up ahead, Eric found more trouble. A woman in a white overall and carrying a pile of towels was coming towards him. Voices behind yelled, ‘Joyce!’ and, ‘Stop that dog!’ Eric skidded to a halt. She was a wide woman and it was a narrow corridor; he didn’t fancy his chances. He barked a couple of times, without conviction. His pursuers closed in.
Then, when all seemed lost, a door opened and a pink man, with a towel round his middle and a paperback book in his hand, stuck his head out. ‘What’s this?’ he said. ‘Can’t a bloke have a quiet bath in here?’
As the attendants tried to pacify the man, Eric saw his opportunity and darted past them, back the way he had come. Along the corridor he met up with Roy. Roy was too breathless to say much, just ‘Eric!’, and – a gasp or two later – ‘Got your bag!’ Then, together – and with the attendants chasing them again – they ran back into the clothes store, out into the foyer, past the ticket kiosk and the crisp and sweet machines, through the glass doors, down the flight of broad steps – to safety.
9
The High Street
Roy, with a swimming bag on each shoulder and a Norfolk terrier at his heel, made his way up the High Street. His earlier feeling of guilt had faded; now, if anything, he was indignant. ‘They had no business doing that!’
‘Woof!’ agreed Eric.
‘You weren’t no trouble.’
‘Woof!’
‘And you’d paid!’
When they were well clear of the baths, Roy stopped, took out his towel and gave his hair a rub. Then he combed his hair using a shop window as a mirror. Then he said, ‘Hey, perhaps that’s it – rubbing! Like Aladdin’s lamp.’
Eric made no reply. He was reading a manhole cover which had caught his attention. ‘DA/W G.P.O. 71/No. 5’ it said, whatever that meant. Around them on the pavement, people were passing; going home from work or school or the shops. The road was crowded with cars and buses and bikes. Overhead the sun was shining and there was a warm breeze. It was about five o’clock.
Roy shouldered his bags and continued up the street. Habit was taking charge: it was the route they usually took. Eric followed. Already he was finding that the role of well-trained dog came naturally to him. Besides, it was safer just behind Roy; less chance of being hit by a pram, for instance, which was a hazard like a tank for a dog his size. Roy glanced back now and then to check where Eric was. When they came to a T-junction and Eric sat quietly at his heel, Roy looked about to see if passers-by were noticing; admiring Eric, admiring him for the talented dog-handler he so obviously was. Roy felt delighted and guilty (again) for being delighted. ‘Poor Eric,’ he thought; and, ‘This is great!’
Roy had other thoughts too, such as, ‘Who’d believe it? It’s like U.F.O.s. I’ve seen U.F.O.s, I’ve seen loads.’ Roy, of course, did believe it. With the evidence of his own eyes, he was long past the stage of needing proof. ‘I thought I believed it before,’ he thought. ‘Now I double believe it.’
Eric, for his part, was thinking about feet, and the immense variety of things worn on them: shoes and sandals, plimsolls and flip-flops, Wellingtons even –on a day like this! Down in the moving forest of legs in which he found himself, feet were all-important. There was the constant risk of being trodden on, the occasional smell of unwashed socks and the swirling dust, which already once or twice had made him sneeze. The dust had the further effect of increasing his thirst. He was always thirsty after swimming, anyway. He thought of the ice lollies he and Roy usually bought on the way home, and wondered if Roy would think of them. Then he thought of his tea (he was hungry, too), and his mum and dad, and Emily, and what was he going to do, and where was he going to go, and things like that.
As it turned out, twenty yards away, across the street in the wool shop, Mrs Banks was thinking of Eric. She had just happened to look out as Roy went by. She waved and tapped the window, but he was too absorbed to see her, and Eric, of course, was too low. Mrs Banks was puzzled. It was Roy, wasn’t it? But where was Eric, and was that two bags Roy was carrying? Also there was the dog that seemed to be following Roy…
Eric, meanwhile, had reached a decision. This street was no place for him; the place for him was the park. It would be quieter there; there’d be the chance to think things out, grass to walk on, and fewer feet.
Roy had stopped to look in a television shop window – there was a tennis match on – and swop his bags over. They were the one snag for him. ‘You should’ve been a Great Dane, Eric,’ he said. ‘You could’ve carried me!’
Eric pranced about for a little while, unable to see the tennis and eager to leave. Finally, he set off on his own. ‘Let him follow for a change,’ he thought.
Immediately, Roy began struggling with his bags. ‘Hang on, Eric – where we going?’
Eric approached the zebra crossing and sat waiting for the traffic to stop. When it did, he took a quick look left and right, cocked his head on one side to listen for traffic, and crossed the road. Roy came running after.
Just then a large woman in a green van put her head out of the passenger-side window and peered at Eric. He heard her say: ‘It’s that dog again!’
‘What dog?’ said the driver.
‘Using the zebra, the one that was writing.’
‘Where is he?’
‘Looked left and right he did.’
‘Where is he?’
The crossing was clear now an
d the van had begun to move away. The woman looked back over her shoulder. ‘He’s gone,’ she said.
And the driver said, ‘Geroff!’
10
The Park
By a quarter past five Eric and Roy were in the park, on the grass, beside the pond, licking ice lollies. Eric’s lolly was laid out on its wrapper so he could reach it. It was his favourite flavour, lemon and lime. Roy, without too much ‘either/or’ this time, had bought the lollies from the ice-cream van at the park gates.
Eric licked the cool, delicious lolly with his rough tongue. It tended to slide around and he was obliged to steady it with his paw. Roy lay on his side crunching his lolly and watching Eric. ‘This is good,’ he thought. (Despite trailing Eric most of the way, he was somehow under the impression that coming to the park was his idea.) Suddenly, Eric’s lolly skidded from its wrapper. He nosed it back, but by now there were bits of grass stuck to it. Eric considered the problem, then looked pointedly at Roy and then at the lolly. He repeated this a couple of times until Roy got the message and removed the grass.
‘Dogs eat grass, y’know,’ said Roy.
When he had finished his lolly, Roy put his jockey cap on Eric to see how he looked. Eric shook it off. Roy got to his feet and began swinging from the branch of a nearby tree. He gazed about. The park was fairly empty. However, on the opposite side of the pond two girls and their dog were playing with a ball. The dog was leaping around and racing back and forth between them. Roy glanced down at his dog and for the first time felt a twinge of discontent. Eric was still sitting there, licking away and looking thoughtful. It was bad enough that he always made his lolly last the longest when he was a boy, but to do it as a dog!
Meanwhile, Eric, being Eric, was beginning to make plans. The thoughts in his mind were: How long will it last this time? When will I change back? And (most worryingly, of course) where? If they stayed in the park he could always hide in the bushes and get dressed there. But what about Roy – and Roy’s tea – and Roy’s mum?
Woof! Page 4