Dear Hound

by Murphy, Jill

  Three other people rang with sightings of the poster dog, but all of them said that he had run off into the bushes and no one got anywhere near catching him.

  Jenny and Rita visited the animal rescue homes every week, with dwindling hope. The posters began to fade.

  One morning, two men were out walking their old lurcher and stopped to look at a ragged poster flapping on a tree. ‘Wow!’ said Stan. ‘Look at that, Bert. Do you think it’s still out here somewhere? A young deerhound, king of the hounds – just think what we could do with one of those when we go out lamping, especially as old Lightning here’s a bit past it.’

  Lightning raised one ear and dropped it again.

  ‘Sorry, old man,’ continued Stan, scratching the top of his head affectionately. ‘You were the best in your day.’

  They stopped and read the poster right through. ‘It’s been up for several weeks,’ said Bert. ‘His name’s Alfie. They probably found him ages ago.’

  ‘Wouldn’t hurt to keep an eye out, though, would it?’ said Stan. ‘Just in case.’

  Charlie wouldn’t give up. He still hung over the front gate every day before he went to school, sending out his magic thought waves. His mum could hardly bear to watch him. It was difficult to keep believing that such a nervous, comfort-loving dog could survive for so long out on the wild winter heath all by himself – but, of course, he wasn’t all by himself.

  Back at the foxes’ den, Alfie and the foxes had settled into a routine. Despite all their attempts to persuade him, Alfie refused point-blank to hunt, so while his friends were out pursuing rabbits he sneaked off to raid the café bins at first light and have a rummage at The Gondola in the early hours when the restaurant was closed and everyone was in bed. Sometimes the foxes went with him, but he was less terrified now and often went alone, easily tracing the route from their den, creeping along with much careful stopping and starting just as they had taught him. Sadly, he often went on a night when Charlie and his mum had been there, sometimes with Jenny and Rita, keeping one of their vigils, but neither Alfie nor his band of faithful searchers realized that they had missed each other by hours.

  ‘My collar’s getting really tight,’ said Alfie one evening as they all lay outside the den waiting for complete darkness so they could set off on their various food-collecting missions.

  ‘Let’s have a look, then,’ said Sunset.

  Alfie sat up and stretched his neck.

  ‘You’re right, my lad,’ said Fixit, peering up at the young dog. He was growing really tall and although he was quite thin the collar had become so tight that it was cutting into his neck. ‘We’d better get this off, or it’ll strangle you. Lie down, so I can reach it – goodness me, you’re getting so huge!’

  Fixit levered his lower jaw under the collar, clamped his upper jaw on top and began chewing at the leather. It was hard work and after a while he gave up and Sunset took over. They both worked patiently, taking it in turns as they tried to bite through the tough leather. Finally, on Fixit’s fourth attempt, the collar fell off. Alfie shook his head from side to side.

  ‘Thank you so much,’ he said politely. ‘That feels much better.’

  ‘What shall we do with it?’ asked Sunset, prodding the broken collar with her paw.

  ‘I’ll take it into my bush, if you don’t mind,’ said Alfie, ‘as a sort of souvenir of who I was – just in case I forget.’

  Weeks turned into months. All the leaves came off the trees in the late autumn gales. Alfie hated the storms and cowered under his bush, trying to remember the beanbag in the kitchen with Florence snuggled up next to him and, best of all, Charlie sneaking him on to his own bed for the night and stroking his ears and singing to him.

  It all seemed so long ago and far away, and now the café was closing for the winter. The only place with food would be The Gondola’s bins, which were sometimes too well closed to get them open without making a lot of noise, so Alfie often went hungry.

  One morning Fixit and Sunset came and prodded Alfie awake, which was unusual as the foxes usually slept during the day, especially in the early morning.

  ‘What’s up?’ asked Alfie.

  ‘Well,’ said Sunset excitedly. ‘We went past the café early this morning and guess what – there’s a poster of you stuck up on the notice board by the tables. It was half hidden behind a tree, but now all the leaves are off you can see it clearly.’

  ‘Are you sure it’s me?’ asked Alfie.

  ‘Quite sure,’ said Fixit. ‘It’s got a big picture of you wearing your red collar, sitting on a sofa. The sofa’s green and it’s got big orange flowers on it.’

  ‘That’s it!’ barked Alfie. ‘That’s definitely our sofa! It must be me!’

  ‘You look much smarter in the poster than you do now,’ said Sunset, ‘but it’s definitely you. Why don’t you go and sit next to your picture when there are some people there? The café always shuts for the winter, so this weekend might be your last chance.’

  ‘What a good idea,’ said Fixit.

  They chose a Saturday afternoon. By a quirk of fate, Charlie and his mum had gone there for lunch to say goodbye to Rosemary and Ken before they closed for the season. Charlie was very glum. He could tell that the grown-ups were losing interest and although his mum still came out with him and checked the usual places from time to time, she was beginning to say things like ‘we can’t keep this up forever’ and ‘perhaps some nice kind person’s taken him home’. She didn’t even want to have dinner at The Gondola, even though the friendly waiters always gave them a discount because they came there so often.

  Only twenty minutes after Charlie and his mum had left the café, the two foxes and Alfie slunk silently into the bushes that came right up to the fence surrounding the tables and chairs. A family of two little girls, a baby in a pram and their mum and dad were just settling themselves at a table, which was conveniently right next to the poster of Alfie. They were all warmly dressed and had decided to sit outside. The dad went inside to order their food, then one of the girls asked for something else, so the mum nipped inside, keeping an eye on the children through the big plate-glass window while she relayed the change of order to her husband.

  ‘Now!’ said Fixit. ‘Just go and sit next to the poster and someone will come and rescue you.’

  ‘Do you really think so?’ asked Alfie.

  ‘Absolutely,’ said Sunset. ‘Go on, dear. I’m so glad you’ll get home to your people at long last.’

  Alfie hesitated. ‘I’ll miss you,’ he mumbled.

  ‘Just go,’ said Fixit. ‘It’s for the best.’

  So Alfie went. The little gate was closed, but he leapt over it easily, sidled up to the poster and sat down next to it looking hopefully at the children.

  For various reasons, everything went completely wrong. For a start, after all this time, Alfie didn’t look anything like the tidy, brushed young dog with a smart red collar that was on the poster. His face fur was slick and greasy from all the bin-rooting and his body fur had grown much longer and was intertwined with bits of brambles and leaves. He was encrusted with slabs of dried mud from where he lay each night in his muddy nest under the bush and his ears, described on the poster as ‘one black and one grey and furry’, had both grown as scruffy as each other and looked exactly the same. Worst of all, he had no collar.

  Adding to the horror of his unkempt appearance, Alfie unfortunately decided to smile. The trouble with a deerhound smile is that it looks exactly the same as a deerhound snarl. The two little girls sat mesmerized with terror, as what seemed to be the big, bad wolf from a fairytale sprang over the fence, sat down right next to their table and bared its teeth at them. Just as they began to scream, their parents came rushing to their aid, hurling a packet of sandwiches and shouting furiously.

  ‘Get away!’ yelled the dad. ‘Don’t you touch my girls!’

  Alfie waved a paw, trying to look charming, before he realized that everyone was raving at him, so he ran for it and leapt bac
k over the gate. The dad threw another pack of sandwiches which Alfie, with astonishing presence of mind, caught in mid-air and carried off into the undergrowth where he vanished in seconds.

  Rosemary came rushing out of the café. ‘Hang on a moment,’ she said to the distraught parents, who were cuddling their weeping daughters – even the baby had woken up and was now screaming its head off, ‘I think it was the dog from this poster. Perhaps it was scrounging for food.’

  ‘Well, it looked vicious to me,’ said the mum crossly.

  ‘So sorry,’ said Rosemary. ‘I’ll get you some more sandwiches to replace the ones he pinched.’

  She ran inside and told Ken. ‘It was definitely him,’ she said. ‘I just can’t believe it after all this time – but it was a huge, grey dog – a bit rough-looking, but then he’s been wild for two and a half months, so he won’t be looking like an entrant for Crufts.’

  ‘I expect the lad and his mum are still on the heath,’ said Ken. ‘I’ll ring them on their mobile and tell them what’s happened.’

  As soon as they heard the news, Charlie and his mum raced back to the café. They hunted around the whole area, calling and calling. It started to rain, lightly at first, followed by a spectacular cloudburst. Charlie didn’t even notice. He carried on pushing his way into the bushes as far as he could, shouting for his dog. ‘Alfie, ALFIE!’ he yelled. ‘Come on! Cheesy weesy! Pleease come out, Alfie! It’s me! ALFIE!’

  Ken and Rosemary insisted that they sat down for a cup of tea and a rest. Charlie and his mum looked as if someone had been pouring buckets of water over them.

  ‘It’s just not fair!’ said Charlie. ‘If we’d only come for our lunch later, we would’ve got him. Now he’ll be scared after everyone shouted at him.’

  ‘The little girls were scared because he snarled at them,’ explained Ken.

  ‘He wasn’t snarling!’ said Charlie. ‘He was smiling at them. He’s always smiling. He was right next to his poster – he was trying to tell them who he was.’

  ‘Are we sure it was him?’ asked Charlie’s mum.

  ‘He really did fit the bill,’ said Rosemary. ‘A huge, grey, scruffy dog – didn’t have a collar, though.’

  ‘Perhaps it was hidden under his fur,’ insisted Charlie. ‘I know it was him. We can’t just leave him, Mum.’

  ‘OK,’ said his mum. ‘Let’s go home and change then come back to The Gondola for our dinner and stake out the bins at the back. Lorenzo said there’s definitely been bin-raiding activity going on. If it really was him here today, he might try the Gondola later on tonight.

  Back at the den, Alfie had curled up under his bush, which was dripping unpleasantly with rainwater. He was shaking with cold and Sunset had wedged herself in, trying to comfort him.

  ‘I think it was the smile that did it,’ she said. ‘People are so stupid. They don’t know the difference between a smile and a snarl. Your boy would know.’

  ‘But he doesn’t know where I am,’ whimpered Alfie. ‘They’re never going to find me. I’m lost forever – the Hell Hound of Hawkland Heath. I might just as well start learning to hunt. No one cares what I do; no one’s ever going to pat me again.’

  He began to yelp, then stopped because he was now foxy enough to know he ought to keep quiet. ‘Where’s Fixit?’

  ‘He nipped back to pick up the first pack of sandwiches they threw,’ said Sunset. ‘They went over your head and into the bushes – a whole pack – too good to waste.’

  The undergrowth rustled and Fixit appeared beside them with the sandwiches. He had been running fast and sat down panting. ‘Good news, Alf!’ he said. ‘Really good news.’

  Alfie curved his ears in Fixit’s direction. ‘I’m listening,’ he said.

  When Fixit had sneaked back to retrieve the sandwiches from a dense tangle of brambles, Charlie and his mum had emerged from the café and stopped to say goodbye to Ken and Rosemary. Fixit had stayed utterly still and waited, and while he waited, he overhead their conversation.

  ‘It must have been your Alfie at The Gondola,’ Ken was saying. ‘There can’t be two deerhounds lost on the heath. Good luck tonight. I really hope you manage to catch him.’

  ‘It’s worth a try,’ said Charlie’s mum.

  ‘What time are you going?’ asked Rosemary. ‘Ken and I might join you. We close here at four. We could celebrate our last weekend of the season.’

  ‘That would be great,’ said Charlie’s mum. ‘We’ll go at seven. See you there.’

  Fixit excitedly relayed all this to Alfie. ‘They were definitely your people!’ he barked. ‘A lady with straight brown hair and a young boy. They’ll be at The Gondola tonight at seven! All you have to do is go and stand outside the window. They won’t go mad if you smile at them – they know you. They’re looking for you.’

  ‘I can’t tell the time,’ said Alfie. ‘How will I know when they’re there?’

  ‘Have they got a car?’ asked Sunset.

  ‘Yes!’ said Alfie. ‘A red one with a lift-up door at the back. They can put the back seats down to fit me in.’

  ‘Well, there you are, then,’ said Fixit. ‘You’ll see it parked outside, and you’ll know they’re in there. Anyway, I’m really good at judging what time it is – I’ve got a sort of feel for it, so we can set off when I feel it’s the right time and you can check the cars to make sure – OK?’

  Gradually, Alfie began to perk up. He allowed himself to imagine pressing his furry face against the window. He imagined Charlie seeing him and shouting for joy and rushing outside and crushing him in his arms and Charlie’s mum jumping up and down, and Alfie doing his sea-lion yelps of mad delight. It would be such a relief to be home again – dinners out of a tin, the warm squashy beanbag – he wouldn’t even mind a good bath and a brushing session. Thank goodness he’d kept his promise to Florence.

  They shared the two packs of sandwiches as soon as night fell. The two foxes always shared as much as they could, especially as they could see that Alfie was very thin.

  ‘It’s time,’ said Fixit, a while after nightfall. ‘They’ll be there by now. It’s round about seven. I can feel it in my bones. You’ll be safe to go and check for their car.’

  ‘We’ll come with you to the edge of the wood,’ said Sunset.

  At the edge of the woodland, with the pond-clearing spread out in front of them, Fixit and Sunset said goodbye to their unlikely lodger.

  ‘Thank you for taking care of me,’ said Alfie. ‘Thank you for being my friends.’

  ‘Don’t mention it,’ said Fixit kindly. ‘You’ve turned into a really ace honorary fox. Been a pleasure having you in our team.’

  Sunset stepped forward and leaned her head on Alfie’s side. He bent his long neck and rested his head on top of hers.

  ‘Goodbye, then,’ said Alfie, stepping on to the grass.

  He turned to tell them to keep safe, but they had already vanished into the rustling undergrowth.

  Alfie looked around cautiously so that he could check all the usual things. There was no train arriving, no kitchen porter coming out, no owner taking a dog for a walk. In fact, there was no one at all, everything was quiet. He set off cautiously towards the alley at the side of The Gondola; only a few paces and he’d see them on the other side of the glass, their faces full of utter happiness when they saw him, their own dog, safe at last.

  Alfie stopped at the mouth of the alleyway. At the other end he could see part of a parked car. It was red and looked just like his people’s car. Alfie’s heart lurched with relief – they were there! He could also see that the streetlights were much stronger at the far end of the alley. All his fox-learned caution came into play. He raised his front paw, almost in slow motion, lowered his head and raised his ears in Extreme Listening Mode. There was no sound at all; it seemed safe.

  Alfie set off down the alley, heart pounding, one step – then stop; two skittering steps – then stop. Halfway down, feeling hemmed in by the two buildings which made up the side walls of the
alleyway, Alfie stopped altogether to have another listen.

  Suddenly, a man turned into the alleyway from the street entrance. With truly dreadful timing it was Stan, who had been to the corner shop for a tin of dog food for Lightning’s dinner.

  Stan stopped, his arms by his sides, not moving at all. Alfie didn’t move either. They both stood looking at each other, like a standoff scene in a cowboy film.

  Very slowly, Stan put his hand into his pocket and brought out the tin of dog food. Very slowly, he pulled the ring on top of the can and peeled back the lid.

  A marvellous waft of tripe sailed through the air into Alfie’s famished nostrils. Tripe! His all-time favourite, even more wonderful than cheese.

  ‘Hey there, Alfie,’ called Stan, in a low, gentle voice. ‘Hey, Alfie. Here’s some dinner for you. Here, Alfie.’

  ‘He knows who I am!’ thought Alfie. ‘He knows my name and he’s brought my favourite food! Perhaps my boy sent him to get me!’

  Taking great care to move very slowly, Stan bent down and scooped the tripe out of the can with his fingers into a heap on the pavement. Then he moved two paces back. ‘There you are, Alfie,’ said Stan in his soft, friendly voice. ‘All for you.’

  It was too much for the poor ravenous creature – smelling the wonderful smell, hearing his own name spoken so kindly. He forgot everything the foxes had taught him, ran up the alley and dived on to the food.

  Immediately, Stan sprang into action. He had a rope-lead in his pocket, which he whipped out and dropped over Alfie’s head. Alfie didn’t even notice at first he was so busy frantically wolfing down every last morsel of the heavenly dog food, but as soon as Stan pulled the rope tight total panic set in. Alfie tried everything, twirling round, standing on his hind legs, trying to jerk the lead out of his captor’s hands, but Stan knew how to handle dogs. He walked forcefully down the alley, back into the pond-clearing, yanking Alfie so hard that he had no choice but to follow; it was either that or be strangled by the tightening lead. At the same time, he carried on talking to Alfie in such a persuasive but firm voice that Alfie couldn’t help wondering if the man really did know him from his old life and had come to help him.