Ain't Nothing but a Pound Dog

by Jeannie Wycherley

  Clarissa looked up at the ceiling, her mouth and eyes a round ‘o’ of disbelief. When she looked back at Toby, he could see how troubled she appeared. “Are you sure of that? Of everything you’ve just told me?”

  “Yes.” Toby swallowed. “It’s imprinted on my brain. I’ve been dreaming about it ever since.”

  Clarissa made a sound like all the air had come out of her lungs. She reached for Toby, and without complaining about how wet and soapy he was, she gripped him around the neck and hugged him hard. “You poor, brave boy,” she said. “Thank you for being there for him.”

  Toby sensed her rising emotion. “Why do you want to know all this? Is it because you’re going to print it in your newspaper? Isn’t it all a little bit late?”

  Clarissa shook her head and released her grip on the dog’s neck. “No, not for my newspaper, not at all.”

  “Then why?”

  Toby watched as tears sprung into Clarissa’s eyes and her lower lip quivered. “Because Old Joe, as you like to call him, was my grandfather.”

  They snuggled up on the sofa together, Toby wrapped in an ancient dog towel and Clarissa in Old Joe’s bathrobe. Toby lay with his head on Clarissa’s knees. He had never expected to feel quite this content again, not with Old Joe gone. But Clarissa was The Next Best Thing as far as he was concerned.

  “Why have I never seen you before?” Toby asked her now.

  Clarissa had been lost in her thoughts, but now she reached for him and stroked his head. “It’s a long story.”

  “I’ve got the time if you have.”

  Clarissa hesitated. “And it’s complex. I don’t know all the ins-and-outs of it all, which is what brought me here in the first place.”

  “I generally find starting at the beginning leads to the maximum amount of listener understanding,” Toby said.

  “Has anyone ever mentioned to you that you’re a bit of a smartarse?” Clarissa laughed, teasing some knotted bits of his fur out with her nails. She’d dried him off and had wanted to brush him, but he’d conveniently forgotten where the grooming brushes were stored.

  She took a moment, then plunged in. “I had a normal childhood, or so I thought, until I was eight years old. I came home from school one day to an empty house. I waited and waited, assuming my Mum had popped out to the shops and would soon come home and make me my tea, but that didn’t happen. And neither did my Dad come home from work when he should have done.” Clarissa’s hand paused what it was doing.

  Toby lifted his head to remind her to carry on.

  “I waited until the sun went down. The house was cold and dark, and I was hungry. I was about to go and knock on my neighbour’s door and ask her what I should do, when a woman turned up at my door.”

  Clarissa hesitated. When she resumed, her voice had turned hard. “She claimed to be my Auntie, but I’d never seen her before that day, and she bore no resemblance to my parents.” Clarissa scratched Toby’s ears and he turned his soft brown eyes on her. “From what you’ve told me about The Pointy Woman, I’m beginning to wonder whether it’s the same person.”

  Toby sat upright in excitement. “But that’s… that’s brilliant. Don’t you see?”

  “No.” Clarissa shook her head, her voice flat.

  “Because if she’s your Auntie and you know who she is, we can shop her to the police. I can identify her if I see her again.”

  “No,” Clarissa repeated. “I told you it was more complex than that.”

  Clarissa patted her knees and a slightly disgruntled Toby lay back down.

  “Buckle up my friend. I’m not sure what you’re going to make of this.”

  “You can call me Aunt Miranda,” the woman had said, opening the rear door of the black saloon that waited for them on the pavement outside Clarissa’s house.

  Clarissa had packed an overnight bag with a few changes of clothes and personal items, grabbed her school satchel, coat and hat, and followed the stranger outside. What else could she do? She was eight years old, a good and obedient child, and suddenly alone in the world. Nothing had prepared her for this.

  They drove through the darkness for around ninety minutes. Initially cruising along the motorway, several junctions down they’d turned off somewhere. Sparkling lights told Clarissa she was close to a big town, but then they’d driven onto a smaller road, heading deeper and deeper into the countryside. Once or twice Clarissa leaned forward to ask the woman for news about her parents, but the answers she received were monosyllabic. The driver refrained from speaking entirely, his eyes trained on the road ahead.

  Clarissa’s stomach rolled with a combination of travel sickness and fear. Had she done something wrong? Were her parents punishing her?

  Lost and alone, tears began to roll down her cheeks. She hiccoughed quietly to herself. Aunt Miranda evidently had acute hearing. She turned her head sharply. “Stop that!” she snapped. “You need to grow up now. You can’t be a baby anymore.”

  Shocked, Clarissa jammed her fist into her mouth and bit down on it. The physical pain went some way to easing her emotional distress. She turned her face to look outside the window, but the lights of the town had all but disappeared now and there was nothing to see except the shadowy outlines of trees and more trees. The narrow roads wound deep into the forest. Overwhelmed by nausea, Clarissa lay her cheek against the cool glass and closed her eyes, conjuring pictures of her mother and father, calling out for them in the silence of her own mind.

  Eventually the car pulled up.

  Clarissa jolted out of a doze, her arms and legs were cold, her neck stiff. To her left stood a large country house, probably Georgian judging by the façade. Many of the windows burned with a cheerful yellow glow. ‘It looks like a small version of Chatsworth,’ Clarissa noted. She’d visited while on holiday with her parents over the summer. ‘Who lives here?’ she wondered, but not out loud; she wouldn’t have dared. ‘They must have a lot of money.’

  Aunt Miranda jerked open the car door and sighed in exasperation as Clarissa struggled to unclip her seatbelt. Once Clarissa had battled free, Aunt Miranda took her by the upper arm and yanked her out of the car, dragging her up a flight of stone steps to the grand entrance. The chunky wooden doors stood ajar as though expecting the small party.

  “Do hurry,” Aunt Miranda tutted. “I have to get back to London tonight.”

  They paused inside a vast foyer with a marble floor and multiple doors lining each wall. An imposing staircase curved up to the next level. Aunt Miranda motioned Clarissa to take a seat on a velvet lined bench and stalked across to one of the closed doors. Without bothering to knock, she flung it open and entered the room.

  “Catesby!” she shouted.

  “Miranda?” The voice of an unseen woman replied, evidently startled.

  “You say my name like you weren’t expecting me, but quite clearly that cannot be the case. I sent word this afternoon, did I not?” Without waiting for a response, Aunt Miranda carried on. “I have the girl.”

  “She’s here?”

  “Where else would she be? The parents are gone. She’s your charge now. I don’t want to know anything more about her. See to her education.”

  “All of it?” The quavering voice of Catesby drifted out into the foyer. “She’s so young.”

  “All of it.”

  “College? University?”

  Aunt Miranda sounded irritated. “If absolutely necessary.”

  “And her coven?”

  “If she demonstrates she is biddable, as soon as she turns seventeen she may join the Coven of the Silver Winds, but any sign of disobedience and I would prefer she is kept away from them. A lesser sisterhood perhaps.”

  “As you wish.”

  “Perfect.” Aunt Miranda’s heels clicked across the tiles, heading out of Catesby’s office. “I must be on my way,” she called back. “I have an important meeting to attend at the Ministry of Witches.”

  “Of course. Of course. So good to see you. Always.”

  Au
nt Miranda crossed the foyer quickly. Clarissa looked up as she approached, but the older woman did not so much as glance her way. She simply made for the front door and disappeared outside without pulling it closed behind her.

  Clarissa slumped on her bench. Aunt Miranda hadn’t been much, but temporarily she was all the little girl had left. A cold draught wafted in through the open door and the sound of a car starting up confirmed the woman’s departure. Clarissa lifted a hand to her mouth to prevent herself calling out after her. They’d known each other less than two hours, but the girl understood the woman would have hated any display of neediness.

  She wasn’t a baby anymore. That’s what Aunt Miranda had said. She had to be strong. Like an adult.

  Close by, someone else was clearing their throat.

  Clarissa dragged her gaze away from the vacant space by the front door. A small woman, slightly dumpy, her two-tone hair dark brown and grey, and her eyes a bright happy blue, stood at the foot of the grand staircase. The woman regarded her there, sitting alone on the bench, with an expression something akin to pity. To the little girl, the woman had the appearance of some kind of female monk.

  Clarissa had seen monks at Buckfast Abbey.

  But she’d never seen a female monk before.

  “Good evening,” said the monk. “You must be Clarissa Page?”

  Clarissa nodded. The cat had gotten her tongue for sure. She couldn’t think of anything sensible to say. Emotions swirled around her body like a force five hurricane. She wasn’t entirely sure she could hold back the tears for much longer.

  But she had to. She wasn’t a baby anymore.

  “My name is Grace Catesby. Miss Catesby you should call me. May I call you Clarissa?”

  Clarissa nodded. She went by no other name.

  “Is that all you’ve brought with you?” Catesby nodded at the small pile of Clarissa’s belongings. Clarissa hadn’t brought them in with her, and certainly Aunt Miranda had not, so the little girl wasn’t entirely sure how they had ended up next to the bench. But here they were.

  Clarissa studied her bag and satchel, and finally found her voice. “I left my bear on my bed,” she lamented. “My teddy bear. His name is Joseph. My daddy gave him to me.”

  She wasn’t a baby anymore. She didn’t need her teddy. But water spilled from her eyes, nonetheless.

  “He’s named after my Grandad. I didn’t mean to leave him behind.”

  An enormous sob erupted from Clarissa and echoed around the foyer. The building shook with her anguish.

  “Oh you poor, poor girl.” Catesby took half a dozen steps forward, bent down and wrapped Clarissa up in a tight hug. “You poor, poor love. You’re going to be alright. You’re safe here. I’ll look after you.” She gently rocked Clarissa in her warm embrace, easing the girl’s torrid despair as her slight body was wracked with noisy hiccoughing sobs. “Everything will be alright.”

  Toby nuzzled against Clarissa’s hand as she paused, sensing her distress at the memories.

  “And was it?” he asked. “Alright, I mean?”

  Clarissa sighed deeply. “Well it was, and it wasn’t.” She curled a lock of his hair around her finger. “The very next morning I woke up to find myself cuddling into my teddy, Joseph.” She laughed. “At the time I had no concept of how he came to be there, but of course I know better now.”

  “Your teddy was named after Old Joe,” Toby noted with satisfaction. He’d had a few teddies in his time. Unfortunately none of them had lasted very long. Toby felt a little guilty about that now, but every dog must have his sacrificial cuddlies, surely?

  “Yes. Joseph was my Dad’s Dad.”

  “But you never met him?”

  “I did, but only as a very young girl. It seems to me my parents wanted to keep some distance between themselves and Old Joe.” Clarissa paused, then added, “For years I thought there’d been a falling out, but I remember my Dad talking very fondly about his Dad, and when he tucked me in at night he would read me a story. I can recall that many times he changed the names of the character in the book to Joseph.” She laughed. “And of course, my teddy bear.” Clarissa fondled Toby’s ears. “I still have him in pride of place on my bed. You wouldn’t call a child’s comfort toy after a man you’d fallen out with, would you?”

  Toby, practically purring with all the attention he’d been getting, nodded. “No-one could fall out with Old Joe. He was just the best.”

  “Somebody did.”

  They sat quietly. Each thinking of their own Pointy Woman, and each wondering if she was one and the same person.

  “What brought you here, now?” Toby asked eventually.

  Clarissa shrugged. “That’s the odd thing. I had an anonymous tip-off that my grandfather was alive and living here in Chamberlain Drive. A letter delivered to me at work. It sounded too good to be true. I did a bit of digging and found out I was a few months too late, but I decided to come and have a look anyway.”

  “I see. Who sent the letter?”

  “I have no idea. It just turned up on my desk.”

  Toby thought for a moment. “Just one other thing.” He had no desire to rock the comfortable berth of the proverbial boat, but he needed a few points of clarification.

  “Go on.” Clarissa knew what was coming.

  “You mentioned a coven.”

  “The Coven of the Silver Winds. Yes.”

  “Well, that was Old Joe’s surname. Silverwind.”

  Clarissa nodded, watching the dog on her lap trying to make sense of the information she had provided.

  “It’s a name that members of my coven can choose to take after they have been inducted.”

  “So…” Toby screwed up his face. This was a little difficult to get his head around. “Aunt Miranda wanted you to join a coven and be a witch?”

  “Not quite. I told you it was complicated. What I didn’t know in those early years… was that I was born a witch. Born to a pair of witches. My parents broke away from the coven. They wanted to be completely independent for some reason that I have never been quite able to work out. In the meantime it appears that Old Joe was still involved, so my Dad purposely had to distance himself I think.”

  Toby stared open-mouthed at Clarissa. “But Old Joe wasn’t a witch or a wizard or anything…”

  “Oh, he was. I can assure you of that.” Clarissa pointed down at the floor, at the gold symbols arranged in a circle. “Any evidence you need is right there. That’s a pentagram. At some stage Old Joe held rituals in this room.”

  “I never witnessed anything like that,” Toby said. His head had started to thump.

  “It looks like he’d distanced himself from the coven, just as my folks did.”

  “I’m sure I’d have known if Old Joe was a witch,” Toby insisted.

  “Would you?” Clarissa’s smile warmed him through. “Not if he didn’t want you to.”

  Toby couldn’t quite believe what he was hearing. But the surname? That seemed to be a giveaway. Assuming Clarissa was telling the truth, of course.

  She tilted her head to look at him, then asked, “Were you and Old Joe able to converse with each other like this? In English? Was it him that enabled this? Did he cast a spell on you?”

  Toby’s thoughts tumbled back to the moment The Pointy Woman had levelled her sharp gaze on him. His breath caught in his chest and he shifted, suddenly uncomfortable. “No. We never spoke this way. We communicated in other ways.”

  “Then how—”

  “It was her. The Pointy Woman.” Toby sat up, his hackles rising. “I didn’t realise it at the time. She said, ‘Speak to None but Me,’ and I did speak to her and she understood me. But after that, whenever I spoke… at the kennels and to the policeman who came to take me away… they never understood me. Not even Selma.”

  “Selma?”

  “The nice lady who worked at the kennels.” Toby’s panic subsided as he focused on Selma and her kind and loving heart. He could smile at the thought of her, but remembering his
friends, still trapped there, still waiting for someone to come along and offer them a home, his face fell once more. He hoped they were all okay.

  “So it seems that I can understand you, and The Pointy Woman could understand you, but nobody else has been able to.” Clarissa pondered on this for a moment. “And she said, ‘speak to none other than me’?”

  Toby nodded. “When she said it, I felt something weird happen to me. A tingling in my throat.”

  Clarissa lifted her eyebrows. “Ah! Well that explains it. You know, it sounds like she cast a spell on you. She meant that you literally should speak to nobody else but her, but maybe… just maybe… in the heat of the moment she didn’t cast the spell properly. Or there was some sort of glitch.” Clarissa nodded. “You know, maybe you can speak to all witches.”

  Toby grimaced. “No offence, but I’m not sure I want to.”

  Clarissa laughed, a deep chuckle that reminded Toby of Old Joe.

  “Well, the proof of that particular pudding would be in the eating.”

  Toby pricked his ears up. Pudding? Where?

  “What I mean is, I’ll have to introduce you to some of my friends in the coven at some stage, and then we’ll see.”

  “I’ll look forward to it,” Toby replied, although he doubted he genuinely would.

  Clarissa slipped forwards on the sofa. Only a little light penetrated the boards that covered the windows, but the light that stole through the frosted glass of the front and back doors now dappled the hallway. “It’s getting late. I really should be going, Toby.”

  She sounded reluctant, and suddenly Toby, who’d thought he could survive all alone in the big wide world, was no longer sure he could.

  Or that he wanted to.

  “Alright.”

  “I’d take you with me,” Clarissa told him. “I mean, I’d love to. But I share a flat with a friend and the landlord doesn’t allow pets of any kind.”

  “Don’t worry. I’ll be fine.” Toby tried to sound nonchalant.