Dog Diaries #12

by Kate Klimo

  DOG DIARIES

  #1: GINGER

  A puppy-mill survivor in search of a furever family

  #2: BUDDY

  The first Seeing Eye guide dog

  #3: BARRY

  Legendary rescue dog of the Great Saint Bernard Hospice

  #4: TOGO

  Unsung hero of the 1925 Nome Serum Run

  #5: DASH

  One of two dogs to travel to the New World aboard the Mayflower

  #6: SWEETIE

  George Washington’s “perfect” foxhound

  #7: STUBBY

  One of the greatest dogs in military history

  #8: FALA

  “Assistant” to President Franklin Delano Roosevelt

  #9: SPARKY

  Fire dog veteran of the Great Chicago Fire

  #10: ROLF

  A tripod therapy dog

  #11: TINY TIM

  Canine companion to Charles Dickens, author of A Christmas Carol

  #12: SUSAN

  Matriarch of Queen Elizabeth II’s corgi dynasty

  This is a work of fiction. All incidents and dialogue, and all characters with the exception of some well-known historical and public figures, are a product of the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Where real-life historical or public figures appear, the situations, incidents, and dialogues concerning those persons are fictional and are not intended to depict actual events or to change the fictional nature of the work. In all other respects, any resemblance to persons living or dead is entirely coincidental.

  Text copyright © 2018 by Kate Klimo

  Cover art and interior illustrations copyright © 2018 by Tim Jessell

  Photographs courtesy of Lisa Sheridan/Hulton Royals Collection/Getty Images, this page; Everett Collection Inc./Alamy Stock Photo, this page; PA Images/Alamy Stock Photo, this page, this page, this page; © Jessica Klein, courtesy of Roberta Ludlow, this page

  All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Random House Children’s Books, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York.

  Random House and the colophon are registered trademarks of Penguin Random House LLC.

  Visit us on the Web! rhcbooks.com

  Educators and librarians, for a variety of teaching tools, visit us at RHTeachersLibrarians.com

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Klimo, Kate, author. | Jessell, Tim, illustrator.

  Title: Susan / by Kate Klimo ; illustrated by Tim Jessell.

  Description: First edition. | New York : Random House, [2018] | Series: Dog diaries ; 12 | Summary: “Susan—the corgi presented to Princess Elizabeth on her eighteenth birthday—reveals secrets of life in Buckingham Palace”—Provided by publisher. Includes historical notes and information about the breed.

  Identifiers: LCCN 2016057333 (print) | LCCN 2017028192 (ebook) | ISBN 978-1-5247-1964-7 (trade pbk.) | ISBN 978-1-5247-1965-4 (lib. bdg.) | ISBN 978-1-5247-1966-1 (ebook)

  Subjects: LCSH: Pembroke Welsh corgi—Juvenile fiction. | CYAC: Pembroke Welsh corgi—Fiction. | Dogs—Fiction. | Elizabeth II, Queen of Great Britain, 1926– —Fiction. | Kings, queens, rulers, etc.—Fiction. | England—Fiction.

  Classification: LCC PZ10.3.K686 (ebook) | LCC PZ10.3.K686 Sus 2018 (print) | DDC [Fic]—dc23

  Ebook ISBN 9781524719661

  Random House Children’s Books supports the First Amendment and celebrates the right to read.

  v5.1

  ep

  For Roberta and her boys

  —K.K.

  For Dad, who loves his corgi…except for the shedding

  —T.J.

  Contents

  Cover

  Other Titles

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Chapter 1: Before My Time

  Chapter 2: My Little Lady

  Chapter 3: Prince Charming

  Chapter 4: A Fairy-Tale Wedding

  Chapter 5: Baby Charles

  Chapter 6: A Royal Litter!

  Chapter 7: A Sailor’s Wife

  Chapter 8: Her Royal Majesty

  Chapter 9: Crowns and Clocks

  Chapter 10: My Time Comes

  Appendix

  Ten-year-old Princess Elizabeth and Dookie (“a born sentimentalist”), from the 1936 book Our Princesses and Their Dogs by Michael Chance

  In the kennel where I was born, the story has been passed down from mum to pup for generations. And even though it took place before I was born, I have heard it told so many times that it is written upon my heart.

  Once upon a time, there was a little girl named Thelma. She was nine years old when her dog was accidentally run over by a motorcar. Mind you, this was no ordinary accident. The motorcar happened to be driven by the Duke of York, the man who would one day be king of England. But our Thelma didn’t care a fig about that. All she knew was that she had lost her beloved friend, the light of her life. And her heart was broken.

  The duke, as you can imagine, felt terrible. With deepest sympathies, he wrote to Thelma’s parents and offered to purchase a new dog for the family. Her parents felt Thelma was too grief-stricken to accept another dog. Ever so politely, they turned down the duke’s generous offer and let Thelma know that they had done so. After a few months, when Thelma’s heart had mended, she wrote the duke a letter. She’d take that new dog now, thank you very much, she told him. But the duke, not wanting to go against the parents’ original wishes, declined to make good on his offer.

  There would be no new dog for Thelma at this time. But she soldiered on and eventually grew up to be one of the most famous dog breeders in all of England. At the kennel she founded—known as Rozavel—she raised many a prizewinner. Among them were Alsatians, Scotties, Airedales, chow chows, and Chihuahuas. But her very favorite breed was the corgi. And while she didn’t, strictly speaking, discover corgis, her work did go a long way toward making us famous and getting us officially recognized by the Kennel Club.

  Thelma encountered her first corgi as a young gal on holiday in Wales. From the window of her roadster, she saw one dashing across a field on his short but sturdy legs, expertly herding cattle by nipping at their heels. Welsh farmers had been breeding corgis to herd for hundreds of years. What did we herd? Anything that needed herding: sheep, geese, ducks, horses, cattle, sometimes even the farmers’ wayward children. It was from these same farmers that Thelma purchased the very finest specimens of our kind, with an eye to starting her own line. At Rozavel, she set about breeding two types of corgis: the Pembroke Welsh corgi (smaller and with a naturally bobbed tail) and the Cardigan Welsh corgi (bigger than the Pembroke and with a long tail).

  So successful was she in her efforts in the 1930s that her Pem stud, Red Dragon, became quite the dog-about-town. Thelma sold one of his excellent pups to a member of the royal family, Viscount Weymouth. Now, the viscount’s children happened to be playmates with the young princesses Elizabeth and Margaret Rose—the daughters of the very same Duke of York who had crossed paths with Thelma as a child! The young princesses were so smitten with the viscount’s corgi that they begged their father for one of their own. In short order, the duke summoned Thelma to his residence. She came bearing three charming Pembroke Welsh corgi pups, from which the children were to pick one.

  Did Thelma let on to the duke that she was the same little girl whose dog he had run over all those years ago? Like a mysterious stranger in a fairy tale, she chose to keep her identity a secret. After all, that had been a lifetime ago. In this lifetime, breeding superb dogs and finding outstanding homes for them were what interested her.

  Naturally, the princesses wanted to keep all three of the pups. But that was not going to happen. Not even princesses get to have everything they wish fo
r. So after much snuggling and soul-searching and royal dithering, they chose Rozavel Golden Eagle. The way I heard it, Golden Eagle became so stuck-up and full of himself from being the pet of princesses that the staff took to calling him “the Duke.” The girls, delighted with the nickname, dubbed him Dookie. Three years later, Dookie was joined by a second corgi from Thelma’s kennel, Lady Jane. Lady Jane and Elizabeth—known as Lilibet to those nearest and dearest—soon became inseparable. The most adorable little book titled Our Princesses and Their Dogs came out just in time for Christmas 1936. It was a picture book full of photographs of Elizabeth and Margaret Rose frolicking with their beloved corgis and other royal dogs.

  The same month of the book’s publication, the Duke of York ascended to the throne of England. When the people of England looked upon the pictures in this book, they saw a family with a keen attachment to and understanding of dogs. They knew that their king was a fine master, a good father, and a gentle man. Thanks in part to dogs, the people of England welcomed with open arms their new king, George VI.

  Three years later, in 1939, a terrible war broke out between England and Germany. Enemy bombs fell throughout the land, destroying property and taking lives. As an example to their subjects, the king and queen chose to remain in London in the royal residence, Buckingham Palace. The princesses were sent off to the country, to Windsor Castle, behind whose stout stone walls they were kept safe. Watching over them were the officers of the Grenadier Guards, whose job it is to protect the royal family—and the royal corgis as well, although by now there was just one. Dookie had died of old age at the start of the war. Fortunately, Thelma found a mate for Lady Jane, and she soon gave birth to Crackers.

  These were trying times for the nation. One bomb fell on Buckingham Palace, destroying the chapel and, very nearly, the royal couple themselves. When the king and queen were not in London, they were traveling by train throughout their battle-torn country. They greeted troops and called upon injured soldiers in hospitals in an effort to buck up morale.

  Meanwhile, back at Windsor Castle, the princesses were snug as two dear little bugs in a rug, for the castle was frightfully well fortified. In addition to being patrolled by the Grenadier Guards and soldiers armed with antiaircraft guns, it was surrounded by barbed wire. The windows were blacked out so that lights in the castle were not visible to enemy aircraft at night. Food and even bathwater were in short supply. The princesses didn’t sleep upstairs in their bedrooms but, instead, deep underground in a bombproof bunker beneath the castle tower. Imagine!

  Did the princesses utter a word of complaint over their plight? Not a bit! There was work to be done. Bandages to roll for the wounded. Teas and luncheons to prepare for the soldiers. That Stiff Upper Lip, for which the British are known the world over, had to be maintained even in, and perhaps especially in, trying times.

  Lady Jane and Crackers did their parts, too. I daresay no more stalwart corgis ever drew breath. When the princesses missed their parents or flinched at the whistle and scream of an exploding bomb, the corgis were there to offer a warm lick and a furry hug.

  Which makes this next part of the story all the more painful to tell. But tell it I must.

  One day, Lilibet was out walking on the grounds with Jane. Windsor Castle is surrounded by a vast tract of fields and woodlands known as Windsor Great Park. And it was not uncommon for the corgis to run loose without a leash within the safety of the park. But on that unhappy day, from out of nowhere, a park ranger came along in his vehicle. He failed to see the small red dog standing in his path. Jane was killed instantly.

  It is bad enough to run over someone’s pet. But when that pet happens to be the beloved companion of a member of the royal family? Just imagine how the poor lad felt! Mumbling his deepest apologies, he took Jane’s broken body away to prepare it for burial. Meanwhile, Lilibet marched off to the castle and up to her room. You might think that she threw herself down on her bed and wept and wailed for her lost dog. But you would be mistaken.

  Missing not a beat, the princess sat down at her desk and wrote a letter to the young ranger. She urged him not to feel badly for what had happened. She was sure it was not his fault. These things happen, and one must pull up one’s socks and get on with one’s life as best one can. Righty-ho!

  Do you see what was happening here? She, the one who had suffered the loss, was reaching out to comfort the one who had inflicted it.

  Had I been out in the park that day with Lilibet and Lady Jane, would I have been so kind and forgiving? I rather think not. Instead of receiving a letter of forgiveness from me, that ranger would have gotten a sharp nip on the heel! In my experience, most humans need to be kept in line, like so many naughty sheep or cattle.

  But that, as they say, is neither here nor there. What is important about this event, tragic though it may have been, was that it gave rise to Lilibet’s receiving, on the occasion of her eighteenth birthday, a new corgi to replace the one she had lost.

  And that corgi, dear girls and boys, was I.

  I was born during the war, in the year 1944, registered under the name Hickathrift Pippa. A long name for a short dog, you’re thinking. Perhaps that’s why Thelma decided to call me Sue—for short, so to speak. She suggested to Princess Elizabeth, the day she introduced us, that she do the same. But the princess had ideas of her own.

  “We’ll call you Susan,” she whispered in my ear. “You and I are going to get along famously.”

  At only two months of age, I was barely enough to fill her hands. But what hands they were, gentle and sure, like her voice. And in her lovely eyes, sparks danced like fairy lights. She knew me for what I was, which is to say, a little bit enchanted and a little bit wild.

  There is a story told in Wales, and it goes like this: Two little girls were playing in a meadow when they came upon a nest of corgi pups. With their deep red coats and their sharp muzzles and pointed ears, the girls mistook them for abandoned fox kits. They brought the orphaned kits home to show their parents. But the parents said, “Daughters, those aren’t foxes. Those are enchanted dogs visiting from the fairy kingdom. Fairy warriors ride on their backs. They pull the coaches of the fairy princesses. If you look very closely, you will see on their fur the pale imprint of fairy saddles and harnesses.”

  I believe that Lilibet saw in me the faint evidence of the fairy world. And as for me, I had found my own life-size fairy princess in Lilibet. Although I would never grow big enough to pull her royal carriage, I could serve as her loyal companion, her comfort in times of strife, her guardian against all enemies, and her furry champion. She was my little lady. And I, for that matter, was hers.

  In those days, Lilibet and Margaret Rose and their girlfriends belonged to a Girl Guide troop. (The American scouting group was called Girl Scouts.) The war kept the princesses and their troop on their toes. I’d follow Lilibet as she bustled about the enormous castle kitchen. Some days, she baked cookies and scones. Other days, she brewed hearty soups and stews. When the bombs fell on London, refugees swarmed into the countryside, hungry and homeless. Food, as I have already said, was in short supply and what little there was, people obtained with slips of paper called ration coupons. Lilibet and her troop greeted the refugees with food and blankets and kind words. And after she had seen to the needs of her grateful countrymen, she stood at the sink—up to her elbows in suds—and washed the dishes. Surely, no princess of any kingdom had ever worked so hard for her people.

  After chores were done, Lilibet liked to take a turn about the grounds. The castle property was dotted with the loveliest ponds. How I adored to wade and splash about in them. I was a bit of a wild girl in those moments, paddling among the froggies and turtles and funny little ducks that sprinted away from my snapping jaws. I’d drive those ducks out of the pond and herd them back and forth along the bank. This was my idea of utter blissikins!

  Far less blissful were our visits to the stables. It was there that I learned a bitter truth: I was not, after all, Lilibet’s one
and only furry friend. There were others. And these others were horses. Her love of horses was very nearly as great as her love for me. Her jacket pockets stuffed with horse biscuits, she would walk up and down the aisle of the stable and give each beast a treat. Stroking their long silky noses, she called each one by name. Even the mightiest of them bowed low and nickered as they laid their huge noses in her tiny hand and sucked up the biscuits.

  Watch yourself! I warned them.

  What are you on about, you runty little rascal? one of them said, flushing biscuit crumbs from his nostrils.

  Watch you don’t nip her fingertips with those great clunking gnashers of yours.

  You think we can’t tell a finger from a biscuit, do you? If you had eyes in your silly little head, you’d see that our gnashers never touch her fingers. It’s all done with the lips. We horses have very talented lips.

  Is that so? Well, watch this! I turned to Lilibet and let out a sharp little bark.

  “Here you go, Susan!” Lilibet said, breaking off half a biscuit and tossing it to me. I leapt in the air and caught it in my teeth. How do you like that for lightning reflexes? I said to the horse as I crunched up my own treat.

  But, oh, how I dreaded the inevitable moment when she would remove one of these brutes from its stall and lead it out into the stable yard. These horses had absurdly long legs. They were legs that just did not know when to quit. In those days, she favored a particularly long-legged steed named Sir Kay. I paced back and forth as she brushed him and crooned to him and polished him like some great bronze statue. Why couldn’t she ask a groom to handle this chore? She was, after all, a princess. But alas, she actually enjoyed grooming her own mounts. Tacking them up as well. After a great deal of brushing and fussing, she tossed a saddle on his back, buckled a bit and bridle on, and climbed on top of the beast.