by Nigel Smith
“He’s just a little boy, you moron!” yelled Mum. “You ARE daft and useless.”
Told you, thought Nat.
By now there was quite a crowd gathering on the pavement to watch what was going on. The neighbours knew there was always something fun to watch at Nat’s house. A lot of them preferred it to the telly. Nat and the Dog got back in the van and hid.
“But he’s brilliant with his hands,” said Dad cheerfully. “Who do you think fixed our washing machine last month?”
In the van, Nat cringed. Even she knew Dad had just made a massive mistake. Mum grabbed the nearest object from the pile of junk that had been chucked out of the van. It happened to be a rude garden gnome that Dad once thought was funny. Now he just thought it looked heavy and sharp. She advanced on Dad dangerously. He smartly backed off, towards the small crowd, who were really getting their money’s worth today.
“You said you got an engineer out,” she said quietly. Nat got worried. Most people get louder as they get angrier, but not Mum. She started off loud, then got quieter. She was deadly quiet now.
“Be fair, love, he did a great job, and he was much cheaper than a real engineer. You can pay him in Mars bars and Pringles.”
Dad had also discovered that if you gave Darius enough fizzy orange pop he worked twice as quickly, but interestingly, Mum got even madder when he told her that.
Nat watched through her fingers as the rude gnome went whistling past Dad’s left ear and took out Mister Sponge who was peeping over the privet. He went down like a sack of bricks, but whatever he shouted was lost as the van roared to life, sounding louder and healthier than ever. Darius, face covered in oil, gave them a thumbs up and a huge smile from the driver’s seat.
“Darius, right, get out of that seat, shut the bonnet, get in the back, quick,” shouted Dad, slamming the door. “Bye, love, sorry, have to dash, love you, gotta catch the ferry, bye!” And they were off, scattering the neighbours as they went.
By the time they got to the kennels, the Dog had licked all the oil off Darius and Dad noticed he had a lot of texts from Mum on his mobile. He wouldn’t let Nat see them, but she did manage to glimpse a few of the words. One or two were completely new to her. She made a mental note to ask Darius about them when Dad wasn’t listening.
They were now in the leafy bit of town where the kennels were. It was the bit of town that pretended to be countryside, even though there was now a massive busy road going right through it, and a kebab shop and off-licence on almost every corner.
Soon they turned down a driveway with a big sign saying ‘Pawlty Towers’. Mournful howling resounded from behind large dark hedges. The woman who came to meet them at the front gate was middle-aged and built like a huge Saint Bernard dog. Nat sniggered when she said her name was Bernadette. The lady shot her a stern glance.
Bernadette wore a quilted green jacket and horse-riding trousers, even though Nat couldn’t see a horse anywhere. She took one look at Nat’s miserable dog – who was being carried out of the van, bundled up in the bed sheets like a pile of wet washing – and turned up her nose.
“Well, we usually only take pedigrees,” she said. “On the phone you said he was a pedigree.” Nat looked at Dad. Here we go again, she thought. Dad would say anything to try and get his own way.
“Did I?” he remarked innocently. “I think I said there was some pedigree IN him. Would you not call him a pedigree then?”
“No, this is what we in the dog business call a mutt,” said Bernadette. She was going to say a lot more but just then Dad hoisted the Dog higher and she suddenly got an eyeful of the shorts. “Oh my goodness,” she muttered. “Oh dear me.” She went red and quickly turned round. “Yes, well, there is one space. I’ll lead the way. DO NOT walk in front of me.”
As they trudged up the gravel path, past the cages full of dogs, all now barking like mad, Nat whispered to Darius: “Right, remember what we planned.” Darius looked blank. “The plan,” said Nat. “My plan to rescue the Dog. The plan I planned. It’s all planned. I told you the—”
“Nah, I’ve got a better plan, Buttface,” interrupted Darius, hopping over cracks in the pavement.
Nat fumed. “You have NOT got a plan!” she hissed. “You never have a plan. You just do the first thing that comes into your head. That’s why you get on with Dad. He’s the same. A big chimp, like you.”
She did an impression of Dad crossed with a monkey: “Oh look, a banana, think I’ll eat it. Oh no, now here’s a coconut, yum yum, ooh and now there’s a tyre, I’ll swing on that. Now, what was I doing with that banana? No idea, because I’m a chimp, ooh ooh.”
“Is that girl all right in the head?” said Bernadette. “Can you get her to stop making animal noises? She’s upsetting the dogs.”
“Just do the plan, chimpy,” said Nat. “MY plan.”
Nat’s plan was really complicated. She’d not had a lot of time to think about it. If she’d have had MORE time maybe she’d have made it simpler, but either way, this was Nat’s plan:
They get to the kennel door.
Darius pretends to have a terrible sudden illness, involving general agonised thrashing about and foaming at the mouth (Darius liked this bit).
While everyone’s looking after Darius, Nat steals the keys to the kennels.
Nat finds a dog that looks just like her dog, and frees it.
Nat gives Darius a secret signal to stop thrashing/foaming.
They give the lookalike dog to the kennel lady, who locks it up.
They hide Nat’s dog under the blanket and escape with him back to the car.
But when they got to the cage, Darius refused to pretend to be ill, no matter how hard Nat pinched him. The kennel lady unlocked the door. The Dog whimpered and jumped into Darius’s arms. Still Darius just stood there. Finally, in desperation, Nat threw herself on the ground and began shouting:
“Oh the pain, the pain. It’s at the very least rabies. Help.”
To her fury, everyone ignored her. Dad was filling out a form and Bernadette had already decided Nat was a silly little thing and best ignored. It was hopeless. Nat really DID feel like thrashing about, but in frustration. This is all Bagley’s fault, she thought. He’s ruined my perfect plan.
Then Darius did something strange. He threw the keys to the Atomic Dustbin on the path just behind Dad. “You’ve dropped the keys,” he said.
“Thanks,” said Dad, bending right over to pick them up. Bernadette made a strangled sort of being-sick noise and turned her back to them, sharpish.
At that moment, Darius shoved the Dog’s empty bed sheets into the cage and thrust the actual Dog at Nat, whispering: “Hide him.”
Inside the cage all you could see was the bundle of washing. As far as anyone could tell, the Dog could still have been wrapped up in it. He wasn’t, of course; because by now Nat was stuffing him under the table in the van and giving him one of Dad’s socks to chew quietly.
By the time Dad had straightened up again and Bernadette had opened her eyes, she had had quite enough of this weird family and quickly finished off the paperwork, locking the cage door without really looking and shooing them all off her property.
Nat was in the back of the van when Dad and Darius returned. “Sorry, love,” said Dad. “It’s for the best.”
Nat nodded. Under the table, covered in tea towels, was the Dog. He probably nodded too.
Nat didn’t speak to Darius again until it was dark and they were nearly at the ferry terminal. “Anyway, well done. My plan was better, though …” she finally muttered.
Darius didn’t say anything because he was trying to stretch a bogey longer than anyone had ever stretched a bogey before. The Dog didn’t say anything because he was rather hoping to eat the bogey.
“You just got lucky,” Nat went on. “Even my dad’s plans are better than yours and he’s a moron.”
At that moment Dad slammed on the handbrake. He turned round. “Probably should have thought of this before,” he said, wit
h a sort of laugh, “but, um, you HAVE got your passport with you, haven’t you, Darius?”
Darius’s face was blank. His bogey snapped and slapped on the table.
“Told you so,” said Nat.
hey were sitting in the queue of cars and vans and lorries to get on the next ferry. It was now properly dark and the ferry terminal, lit by huge white lamps, looked misty and spooky. Men and women in high-visibility jackets walked around on the concrete, acting fierce. Dad had just borrowed Nat’s phone to call Darius’s brother, Oswald, as his didn’t seem to be working. Nat thought Dad should be in a massive panic but he just looked mildly confused. Like he always did.
“So, according to Oswald,” Dad said, “you’ve never even HAD a passport. Oswald said something about not believing in them. He thinks people should be able to go where and do whatever they want and everyone else can go and get, er –” Dad paused – “get lost, was the general idea. At least I think that’s what he said, because there was some kind of explosion taking place nearby.”
“That’ll be the Grannies,” said Darius.
“Why, do their songs sound like explosions?” asked Nat.
“No,” said Darius, “they just like blowing things up.”
“Right,” said Dad. “Anyway, I asked how you’d have got into Norway with them without a passport. He said you just fitted nicely inside a big amplifier.”
“Yeah, I do,” said Darius.
“Interesting.” Dad paused for a few seconds, sucking on a mint. “So I suppose you could fit inside a …” Dad looked around for something to hide Darius in.
“Dad, you can’t!” shouted Nat, realising with horror what Dad was thinking of doing. “We have to go back NOW. Smuggling a dog is one thing, but smuggling people is really bad. I saw a documentary on it. On Blue Peter.”
“Smuggling a dog?” said Dad. “What dog?”
Nat put her hand over her mouth, but it was too late. Then the Dog, who’d been quiet long enough, gave a short bark as if to say, “THIS dog, stupid.”
“Blooming heck, love, you’ll get us shot,” said Dad mildly. “There’s all sorts of laws about taking dogs out of the country.”
“Dogs AND PEOPLE!” shouted Nat, attracting the attention of one of the men in the yellow jackets, who glanced over at the van. She lowered her voice. “We’ll all go to prison and I don’t care what Nan says, I don’t think prisons are very nice.”
Bad News Nan always said that when she got REALLY old, instead of going into a cheapo old people’s home, she was going to rob a post office and with a bit of luck she’d get sent to prison. She said the food was better in the nick, there were bigger TVs and the people inside were more interesting. She also said she couldn’t lose because if she got away with the post office hold-up then she’d be rich enough to afford a nice old people’s home with huge TVs and endless Hobnobs.
This made Nat very nervous every time she went to the post office with her. She’d always try and sneak a look inside Nan’s handbag just in case she was hiding a black balaclava and some kind of offensive weapon. Luckily, up till now, the only offensive thing Nat had found in Nan’s handbag were her teeth.
“Well, let’s be sensible,” said Dad. These words always terrified Nat. Dad’s version of sensible was NOT anyone else’s. “It takes weeks to get a passport, and it would involve loads of important paperwork that we’d need to find at Darius’s house, and I don’t think Oswald is a paperwork kind of person.”
“That’s true,” said Darius. “He’s more of a setting-fire-to-paperwork kind of person.”
Nat knew this to be true. Oswald liked setting fire to Darius’s school books, for instance.
“So,” said Dad, “given I’ve paid for these ferry tickets now, the sensible thing to do is carry on.”
“That’s not sensible, Dad,” she yelled, “that’s ILLEGAL AND WRONG!”
But Dad had already disappeared into the back of the van and was rummaging through the junk. He eventually reappeared with a great big picnic basket.
“Oh right,” said Nat, “let’s all have a ham sandwich and a pork pie. That’ll make it better.” Dad ignored her and started chucking out all the crockery. When it was empty, he eyed up Darius. “In you get, lad,” he said. “It’s literally the only option.”
“It literally is not the only option, Dad,” argued Nat, as Darius clambered in. “It’s literally the most terrible of all the options you could choose.”
“Except swimming across the channel,” said Darius from inside the hamper. “That’s a more terrible option.”
“Don’t give him ideas,” said Nat, watching Dad’s face as he thought about it.
“Can you squeeze the Dog in with you?” asked Dad, chucking it at Darius regardless.
“Just about,” said Darius.
And with that, Dad got back in the driver’s seat. The ferry had begun to load and cars were moving. “Just don’t make a noise,” Dad shouted over the noise of the engine.
“OK, but the Dog’s breath really smells,” said Darius.
Nat broke into a proper cold sweat when they drove up to the customs window and Dad handed over their two passports. You’ve really done it this time, Dad, she thought. Visiting your dad in prison was embarrassing, but being in prison WITH him was something else.
It seemed to take forever for the bored border guard to flick through the passports.
“Bum hole?” he said eventually, with the first smile he’d cracked all year. “Is this a wind-up?”
Nat went red. It didn’t matter how many times she heard it …
“It’s pronounced bew-mow-lay, actually,” said Dad. “It’s old and French. There are the Paris Bumolés, the Lille Bumolés, and I think there are some Nice Bumolés down south.”
“France is full of Bumolés, is it?” sniggered the border guard. “I thought so.”
Finally, after he’d finished laughing, their van was waved on to the ferry.
“That’s another big fat stress wrinkle in my forehead you’ve given me, Dad,” complained Nat when they were safely parked inside the hold of the massive ship. “By the time I’m eighteen I’ll look like a bulldog chewing a hot chip.”
There was a snort of laughter from the picnic basket and Nat nearly had a heart attack. “SHUT UP, DARIUS!” she shouted. Really really loudly.
“Shush!” said Dad.
There was a gargling, choking sound from the basket. “Stop messing,” said Nat, who was getting more and more nervous.
“I can’t help it, the Dog’s dropped one,” said Darius in a voice that sounded like he was being strangled by a sweaty sock. This was terrible news. The Dog’s guffs were legendary. He could clear a large room in seconds. Nat could only imagine what it must have been like in a tiny space. She started to giggle.
“Well, don’t let it out,” she said. “It’s bound to smell horrible.”
“It does!” said Darius, gasping for breath. “It’s doing something weird to me. I’m starting to see things. Lemme out the basket.”
“Soon,” said Dad, watching all the passengers getting out of their cars. “We have to wait until the coast is clear.” He sniffed. “Oh no, that is bad,” he added. “We’re even getting it out here.”
“I’m going to be sick!” said Darius.
“Put your head between your knees,” spluttered Nat, who couldn’t stop giggling.
“It IS between my knees; how do you think I fit in the picnic basket?”
“Is everything all right?” said a voice suddenly. It was a member of the ship’s crew, poking his nose in at the van window. “Everyone else has gone upstairs. You’ll have missed the fish and chips at the cafeteria by now. Very popular is the fish and chips. Everything else is French muck.”
The man peered into the van. He sniffed the air. “I dunno what’s on your picnic menu tonight,” he said, pulling a face, “but if I were you, I’d stick to crisps.”
Dad laughed a pretend laugh. Even Nat could tell it was the kind of laugh
that massively guilty people do when they’re hiding something. The man looked at them both.
“You have to get out, we’re locking this cargo dock in five minutes.”
“No problem,” said Dad, not moving. “Bye.”
But the man wasn’t going anywhere. “And why do you keep shouting about a picnic basket?”
“Er – because we’re very proud of it,” said Dad. “We got it at a pound shop.”
“How much was it?” said the crafty man, who was called Mick and had been trained to be suspicious. It had earned him his nickname.
“A tenner,” said Dad without thinking, falling into the trap.
Nat put her head in her hands. A tenner? she thought. From a POUND SHOP? Oh, Dad, we’re doomed …
“Ha! Oh really?” said Suspicious Mick happily. “I’m not sure about that. Not sure one little bit. Something’s not right about this story. I think I want a look at this famous picnic basket.”
There was nothing they could do. Their epic journey was over before it had even begun. Dad opened the slidy van door and Suspicious Mick took hold of the basket lid. He wafted the air, which was still smelling grim. “If you’ve got egg sandwiches in there, they’re off,” he said.
This is it, thought Nat. I wonder if they have a prison cell on the ship or if they still make you walk the plank. Oh well, as long as I get to see Dad go overboard first. Hope there’re sharks …
Suspicious Mick lifted the lid.
“I can explain …” began Dad.
The basket was empty.
“Oh. No, I can’t,” said Dad.
ooking on the bright side …” said Dad, as he and Nat ran around the deck of the crowded ship looking for the missing Darius and the Dog, “he could always get a job in a circus. You know, escaping from things. You can get on telly doing that.”
“There’s no bright side if he’s escaped right off this ferry and we never see him again,” said Nat angrily, peeking under a lifeboat cover. “And that’s not really a proper job anyway. You told me that joining a circus is NOT a proper job.”