Woof!

by Allen Ahlberg

  ‘Yes. I mean, I bet a Martian’d think a boiled egg was strange.’

  ‘He might not,’ said Roy. ‘He might look like one.’

  A rush of players went by and Eric missed this last remark (or chose to ignore it). ‘Or a safety-pin!’ he said. ‘Or a blade of grass!’

  ‘He’d think you changing into a dog was stranger,’ Roy said.

  During assembly Roy asked Eric if a Martian would think Mr Blocker was strange. Later, in the classroom, he rolled his trouser leg up to show Eric how strange knees were, and got a fierce look from Mrs Jessop. After that there were distractions. Mrs Jessop was in an energetic mood. There was a fire drill at ten o’clock, and more mass football at playtime, into which Eric and Roy (not to mention Mr Hodge and Mr Moody) got drawn. There was a meeting for school-camp children at lunch-time, and in the afternoon a talk for the third years from a man who wrote children’s books.

  Eric, however, found time to think about things even if he didn’t manage to discuss them with Roy. It still seemed to him that strangeness was a strange business. On the way home, as he passed Russell’s sweet shop (without looking in), he said, ‘I’ve been thinking.’

  ‘Me, too,’ said Roy.

  ‘What if strange things happened all the time.’

  ‘That’d be very strange,’ said Roy.

  ‘No, it wouldn’t, that’s the point, it’d be normal. It’d be like if everybody had two heads; nobody’d think twice about it.’

  ‘They’d all think twice if they had two heads,’ said Roy. He was balancing along the wall outside the Old People’s Home. Eric jumped up and followed him. They watched a police car going down Joining’s Bank.

  Roy said, ‘I’ve got a better idea. Perhaps every time you turn into a dog, somewhere in the universe some poor dog is turning into you!’

  Eric considered this for a moment. It wasn’t bad.

  Roy said, ‘Like a sort of jigsaw, maybe, with a picture on both sides – and your bit just gets turned over now and then.’

  ‘And it’s got a dog on the back,’ said Eric.

  ‘Yes!’

  Roy dropped off the wall. Eric followed. They stepped aside to let a woman with a wide pushchair (with twins and shopping in it) go by. Eric kicked a cigarette packet into the gutter. ‘Who’s doing the turning, though?’ he said.

  20

  Little Lucy

  For the next few days, Eric and Roy continued to swop ideas. They made notes and, in Roy’s case, tracings to put in the Dog File. They argued about wasting Eric’s file paper. (Roy had a habit of starting again, if he made the least mistake.) They argued about which was the best theory. Eric had added ‘THE POTION THEORY’ (at Roy’s insistence) and ‘THE JIGSAW THEORY’ to the list.

  Then on Friday something happened. Eric and his family were having their tea in the kitchen when there was a knock at the door and his gran came in. ‘Oh, having your tea, are you?’ She had an excited, but also rather sheepish look on her face. She was carrying a cardboard box which she placed on the floor.

  ‘Hello, Gran!’ said Eric.

  And his dad said, ‘What’ve you got there?’

  Emily, meanwhile, had immediately left the table and gone over to the box.

  Eric’s gran made no reply, but put a finger to her lips. To Emily she said, ‘You have a look!’ Whereupon Emily pulled back the folded top of the box (it was a Walker’s crisp box) and peeped inside. As she did so, a small, rather anxious-looking brown-and-white puppy peeped out. ‘A dog!’ Emily turned and beamed a dazzling smile at her mum and dad. ‘A little dog!’

  ‘Before you say anything/ said Eric’s gran, ‘you don’t have to keep it. It can stop with me, if you like. Emily can come round. It’ll be hers, but I’ll look after it.’

  But, of course, once the puppy had licked a few hands, had a little bark, and generally shown his pleasure in their company, they did keep him. Mr Banks complained about grandparents spoiling children, and promised to get his own back on Emily when she had hers. Mrs Banks said she might have preferred an older, slower dog. But for all that, by the end of the evening the puppy was well on the way to becoming an established member of the family.

  In the days that followed, Mr Banks bought him a collar and lead, and Mrs Banks bought him a basket. Roy – as soon as he heard the news – bought him a rubber bone. (Actually, he’d got it already, with another dog in mind.) Eric took him, and Emily, for frequent walks in the park. And Emily christened him. As a matter of fact, she christened him twice: ‘Lucy Banks’ to begin with, and ‘Monty’ following some persuasion from the others.

  On the Wednesday after school, Eric and Roy were sitting on Eric’s back step watching Emily in her sandpit. Monty was temporarily asleep in the kitchen; his little belly bulging like a grape from recent eating.

  ‘Look at her,’ said Roy. ‘You’d think she was being paid!’

  Emily was digging vigorously, and bustling about with buckets and jelly moulds. At that moment Monty came clambering over them. He galloped across the grass and flopped into the sandpit. Emily at once abandoned her. digging, wiped her sandy hands on the lawn and gave him a hug.

  ‘She’s really mad about dogs, your sister is,’ said Roy. He smiled. ‘Hey, I just thought – it could be her, y’know.’

  ‘What could?’ Eric was flicking at nearby flower heads with the puppy’s lead.

  ‘Emily!’ said Roy, and he laughed. ‘It could be her thought waves that’s causing it. She’d rather have a dog than a brother!’

  Eric laughed, too. He gave Roy a shove and stood up. ‘Come on, Emily – time for a walk!’

  And Roy said, ‘That’s it all right: The Power of Wishing?

  Half an hour later Eric and Roy sat on a bench in the park. Emily, with Monty on a lead, was running round them in ever widening circles. A short way off a game of cricket was in progress. The players included Philip Dobson and his friends again, and Kenny Biggs, and Hopper. As usual, there was as much quarrelling as cricket. All the players were umpires, of course, but Hopper was the chief of the umpires. His decisions were, at times, eccentric. Now and then he appeared to tackle an opposing batsman from his position at short square leg.

  But on this occasion, Eric and Roy were less interested in cricket and more interested in Emily. She was some distance away by now, standing still and looking back at them. She seemed quite tiny and insignificant (Monty was pretty well invisible) against the broad spread of the park pitches with the tall poplars behind.

  Roy, however, was not deceived. ‘Look at her,’ he said, and shaded his eyes with his hand. ‘The brains behind the whole thing!’

  21

  Then This Happened

  Whether Emily was the brains behind the whole thing or not, isn’t known. What is known is that from the time she got her dog, Eric never changed again, or at least he hasn’t so far.

  In Roy’s opinion this was a very telling point. (‘She gets her dog – you stop changing – it proves it!’) But he was uncertain and confused, too. After all, in the beginning he’d only said it was Emily for a joke. Also, he actually preferred other, more macabre theories; and besides, his hopes were that Eric would change again.

  Eric, for his part, didn’t dismiss THE EMILY THEORY; he rather liked it, in fact. However, it was the idea that strange things simply happened once in a while, which most convinced him at the time, and still does. In his opinion – especially as he grew older – in this world a bit of abnormality was probably normal.

  But, of course, for the first couple of weeks Eric still expected to change. He even hid spare clothes in the garage just in case. (Mrs Banks discovered them two days later and wondered what was up.) Roy, too, had high hopes, especially of the school camp. (‘That’s the place, Eric – the woods!’) But the camp came and went without incident; and Eric’s cousin Marion returned to her paper-round, and the school term ended, and the holidays began.

  After that Eric and Roy became fourth years in Mr Hodge’s class. On the first day of te
rm some of his previous class came back for a visit. They looked half-proud, half-embarrassed in their new school clothes: dresses and blazers, ties and scarves. Hopper – tattooless, but with his tie in his pocket – was among them.

  As the months went by, Roy continued, from habit, to keep an eye on his friend. Then, in the new year, a new girl arrived in the class and Roy kept an eye on her instead. During this period both boys could feel their memories of the ‘dog days’ fading. They made strenuous efforts to hang on to them, as people often do with a good dream. But time kept passing, and fresh dramas arrived (a burglary at the scout hut; a ghost at the school camp) to push the old ones out.

  Now it’s nearly three years later. Eric hasn’t changed into a dog again, but other changes have occurred. His cousin Marion is engaged. Emily is six and soon to be a Brownie. Eric has grown five inches and become less in awe of his mum’s detective work. Roy (slightly the older of the two) has turned into a teenager. He combs his hair a dozen times a day, and has lately taken Joan Spooner to the pictures.

  But even now, occasionally, something happens which … take last week, for instance. Eric had gone on a visit with his combined studies group (Roy was in a different group) to the Bell Street R.S.P.C.A. dogs’ home. Here he’d seen the vets at work, and the kennelmaids … and various dogs. One in particular caught his attention. It was sitting a little apart from the others in its pen, was noticeably calm and had some of the features of a Norfolk terrier.

  Eric crouched in front of it and ran his fingers over the wire mesh. ‘Here, boy!’ he said. Then – almost without thinking (but with a quick look over his shoulder) – he added, ‘Are you a boy? Bark once for “yes”; twice for “no”.’

  The dog put its head on one side and pricked an ear. It allowed the top of its head to be scratched. ‘Woof!’ it said.