‘I could ring,’ I said. ‘If Doodle had arrived home without you your mum would tell me, wouldn’t she?’ I didn’t want to volunteer, but it was all my fault.
‘There’s no point,’ said Jonno. ‘If Doodle arrived home on his own, Bee’s mum would be worried and ring Bee straight away.’
Bee checked her mobile. ‘No missed calls.’
No one had any other ideas – well, not to do with the dog anyway.
‘Is there any grub in the biscuit tin?’ asked Copper Pie (he’s always hungry), as Fifty came back in clutching a big pile of paper.
‘Nope,’ said Fifty. ‘But you can come up to the house. Mum saw the poster on the printer. She wants to talk to us.’
I was quite pleased. Having a grown-up in the know made it seem more likely Doodle would be found. We walked up the garden and in the kitchen door. Fifty’s mum was sitting at the table – with no music on, which was unusual. Bee dumped all the rubbish she’d found in the kitchen bin.
‘So, Tribe is busy these days,’ she said as we filed in. ‘Not content with stealing my daughter, you’ve also managed to lose Bee’s dog.’ She was joking but none of us laughed. She made us sound horrible. When we formed Tribe we decided we’d be loyal and fair, and not a gang that didn’t like other kids and were mean and stuff. I felt really bad. Everything we’d done before had turned out fine, but this time we’d really messed up. I’d really messed up. I waited to hear what else she was going to say. And while I waited I wondered whether, if we didn’t find Doodle, could we still be Tribe? If we never saw Doodle again, could Bee still be my friend?
Doodle’s Army
Half an hour later we were back on the streets, posters and drawing pins in our hands. But there weren’t five of us any more. There were ten. Fifty’s mum said we needed help, so that’s what we got (or she got to be exact). She rang Fifty’s dad and he came straight home from his post round rather than going to the gym. She wanted to ask Bee’s mum and dad, but we begged her not to say anything until we’d had one more really good look for Doodle. She agreed, a bit reluctantly. Fifty’s dad rang Copper Pie’s dad on the way home and he came straight round with Charlie (and luckily agreed that Bee’s mum didn’t need to know just yet). (Nobody suggested we ring my mum – she’d have shopped us to Bee’s mum immediately. And no one really knows Jonno’s parents yet.) So, there were the five Tribers, Fifty’s mum and dad and Rose, Copper Pie’s dad and Charlie. We were Doodle’s army.
At the end of the road we split up into three teams. I went with Copper Pie, his dad and Charlie – because Charlie asked me too. (He likes me because I’m the only one who makes marble runs for him to play with.) Every team had a route and a batch of posters. Doodle couldn’t hide from all of us. No way.
The Invisible Dog
We left Fifty’s house at half-past three. We started off walking really fast and chatting and laughing and stuff, but by the time we’d been up and down street after street we got slower and talked less and the only one of us with any enthusiasm was Charlie who said, ‘There’s Doodle’ every time he saw a dog, a cat, a woodpigeon, a wheelie bin or a garden gnome. He also said it every time he saw a hedge or a bush and dived under to have a look. At first it was funny, then it got irritating and by the time we got back to Fifty’s we all hated him. (And I’m never making a marble run for him ever again.) We kept in contact with the other groups on the way round. No one had good news. My feet were hurting and I wanted to go home. I was thirsty too.
POINTLESS OR IMPORTANT OR WEIRD TRIBERS’ FACTS (AND ONE LIE)
KEENER: If you feel thirsty you’re already getting dehydrated.
JONNO: In a lifetime, the average person eats 70 spiders while they’re asleep.
COPPER PIE: David Beckham, Cristiano Ronaldo and Copper Pie all wore the number 7 shirt at Man Utd. (This is not a fact. This is a daydream.)
FIFTY: Most breakfast cereals contain more sugar than doughnuts.
BEE: An area of rainforest the size of a football-pitch is destroyed every second.
Before we all went off to our own homes we had a Tribe-plus-friends debrief in the road outside Fifty’s. Fifty’s dad was in charge, with Copper Pie’s dad chipping in. It went like this.
Fifty’s dad: It’s six o’clock. Time to get some food inside us, I think. Try not to worry, Bee. We’re a nation of dog lovers – someone will find Doodle.
C.P.’s dad: Too right.
Fifty’s dad: The day’s not over yet. A dog on the loose will be more noticeable in the evening. He may get brought back at any time.
C.P.’s dad: Right again.
Fifty’s dad: Go home, Bee. Whoever finds him will read his tag and call.
Charlie: Five free free six one nuffing seven.
Fifty’s dad: What did he say?
C.P.’s dad: Ignore him, he’s a pest. Aren’t you Charlie?
(Charlie nodded, smiling. He never realises he’s being insulted.)
Charlie: Number five free free six one nuffing seven.
Bee: That’s my phone number. How come you know it, Charlie?
(Charlie put his hand in his pocket. He pulled out a blue dog tag. It looked a lot like Doodle’s blue dog tag.)
C.P.’s dad: Where did you get that?
Charlie: In the bush.
Fifty’s dad: What bush?
The rest of the conversation consisted of the dads demanding Charlie identify which bush and Charlie shaking his head. (He is only three.)
It had all got worse. Doodle had lost his tag, so even if he was found no one would know where he lived. The only hope was that the posters of the sheeprabbitchicken worked, or Doodle smelt his way back home.
Bee’s ringtone blared out of her pocket. ‘Oh no, it’s Mum!’ she said.
‘You’ve got to answer it,’ said Jonno. ‘But you don’t have to tell.’
Bee’s mum wanted her home for tea. Bee looked terrified. She went even paler and her eyes looked too large for her face. She asked Jonno to go with her. And that was the end of Doodle’s army. Bee and Jonno went off together. Everyone else drifted away.
What a terrible day, a kidnap and a lost dog. If only I’d stayed with the Tribers instead of going husky-boarding. I’d have made Fifty take Rose back straightaway and I wouldn’t have lost the dog. Everything was my fault.
Flat On My Face
I lay in bed, wide awake. It was like someone was still screening short films onto the back of my eye, films about Doodle. Doodle drowned. Doodle in pieces. Doodle run over. Doodle in a bin liner. I abandoned bed and tried my hammock, and that must have worked because I had a dream about being on a sailing boat. There was a wave coming and it turned the boat over and I landed flat on my face on my bedroom carpet, with a bit of Lego pressed into my cheek. Not a great way to start the day.
I checked my phone straight away, hoping for a message from Bee with a smiley face at the end. Nope. No messages from anyone. It was 7.14 a. m. What to do?
I got back in my hammock and swayed for a bit. Usually I like being on my own, but that morning, swinging from side to side worrying about Doodle, I didn’t like it at all. I even thought about going to get the evil Flo up. Thankfully Mum came in.
‘You’re up early,’ she said.
I grunted. Why do mums say stuff you already know?
‘I spoke to Bee’s mum last night,’ she said.
I grunted again. This time it was because I was scared about what was coming next.
‘She was quite upset.’
I could work that out for myself. I grunted again.
‘I’m not working today, so I said we’d join the search party this morning.’
That deserved more than a grunt. I said, ‘OK.’
‘Bee’s mum said they were going out for another look last night. Poor things, scouring the streets in the dark.’ Mum sighed.
I grunted again. It’s much easier than using words when you don’t know what to say.
‘I’m going to wake Amy. She asked me to make sure she was
up to help. So, breakfast and then we’ll be off.’ Mum headed for the door. ‘Flo’s ready, and she’s clutching her loudspeaker!’
I smiled. I wasn’t on my own. My family was helping. I needed to get up and get going, like Mum said.
By 7.45 a. m. we were fed and teeth-cleaned. We walked over to Bee’s with Flo talking all the way through her loudspeaker. Luckily the batteries were dead.
‘Will they buy another dog if they can’t find Doodle?’
‘Do dogs eat birds?’
‘Does anything eat dogs?’
‘Do dogs get toothache?’
‘If they get another dog, will that be called Doodle too?’
Mum did all the answering. Amy was sleepwalking – it was early for her, but she was coming, which was amazing. First nice thing I could ever remember her doing. I walked behind, practising positive thinking. Fifty’s mum says if you can picture what you want in your head, you’re more likely to get it. It’s nonsense of course, but I did it anyway. I made images of Doodle racing along, his ears flying out behind him. Doodle jumping up at Bee. Doodle dragging me at high speed on Marco’s board. In a way it worked. Doodle was so real in my head, he couldn’t possibly be dead.
It was quiet, as though the whole world was on school holiday. Maybe everyone had taken Friday off like my mum? We didn’t see one single other person until a car slowed down by the side of us, a police car, and a familiar head leant out. It was Sergeant Farrow.
‘Hello again,’ he said.
Mum gave me a funny look. Not surprising – policemen don’t usually speak to me. She didn’t know about the kidnap, so she probably thought I’d been caught spraying graffiti. (She probably didn’t. I mean, this is Keener speaking.)
‘Hi,’ I said.
‘Nice morning for a walk,’ he said, and drove off, leaving me with a nosy mum. I told her all about it. It’s not as though I’d done anything wrong.
‘Would you come and kidnap me if I was sad?’ asked Flo.
Not in a million years, I thought. ‘Maybe,’ I said.
Copper Pie and Jonno were waiting outside Bee’s.
‘Shall we go in?’ said Mum.
‘There’s no answer,’ said Jonno.
‘Bee’s dad’s car’s not there,’ said Copper Pie.
‘He’ll be at work,’ said Mum. She walked up to the door and knocked three times. (The bell doesn’t work.) Nothing. We looked at each other in the way people do when no one knows what’s going on.
‘There’s Fifty,’ said Jonno. Flo gave him a wave.
‘Where’s Bee?’ he said.
‘No idea,’ said Jonno. ‘It’s weird because last night she asked me to come over this morning.’
‘Same,’ said Fifty.
‘Let’s try the kitchen door,’ I said. That’s the way Bee always goes in. Mum hung behind – I think she thought it was rude going round the back. Fifty stayed talking to Flo. Copper Pie rapped on the back door, really hard. We waited. Still nothing.
‘Shall we call her?’ said Jonno. Good idea. He got his phone out. Held it to his ear for a while.
‘Hello,’ said Jonno. ‘Bee?’
The person at the other end must have spoken.
‘We’re outside.’
The person at the other end must have spoken again.
‘OK,’ said Jonno, and ended the call. ‘She’s coming to let us in,’ he said. ‘She was asleep.’
Bee came to the back door wrapped in a brown, fluffy dressing gown that went all the way to her feet. She looked like a brown bear.
‘Sorry,’ she said, rubbing her eyes. ‘We stayed up really late. We were looking for Doodle everywhere. It was after midnight when we got back.’
Bee’s mum appeared. She looked like a bear too, a bigger black one, but with red eyes.
‘Oh, the Tribers.’ She put her hand on Bee’s shoulder. ‘Your lovely friends. Thank you. Thank you.’ She looked like she was going to cry. ‘We’ve overslept.’
It was a bit awkward standing outside the door with Bee and her mum talking to us in their dressing gowns, all upset and teary-looking.
‘Shall we come back later?’ said Jonno. ‘We’ll look for Doodle on our own . . . and come back later.’ Well done. Jonno.
Bee looked at her mum. ‘OK, thanks.’ She shut the door. We walked back round to the front and told Mum.
‘I expect they’re exhausted,’ she said. ‘Never mind. We can search without them – go to the park and a few other places. You never know.’ Mum used a cheery voice but I didn’t feel very cheery. Bee’s family had looked all last night. We’d looked all day. The chances of finding Doodle were zero.
‘OK,’ said Jonno.
‘Same,’ said Fifty.
‘Why do you always say “same”?’ asked Flo, through the loudspeaker. She didn’t care that it didn’t work.
‘Because I always agree with the other Tribers.’ Fifty smiled and put out his fist. Copper Pie, Jonno and I made fists too and we all banged knuckles in the Tribe fist of friendship, but didn’t feel as good as normal.
Mum and Amy and Flo and Fifty headed off. I dawdled behind with Jonno and Copper Pie in silence. I heard a car coming. We were about to cross over the road, so I checked behind and saw it was a police car. Mum always says if you see a police car you should step right over to the far side of the pavement or onto the grass if there is any. She says policemen race around and kill more pedestrians than they save. (That probably isn’t true.) She also says you should never stand on the hard shoulder of the motorway – you should climb up the bank, or whatever’s there, or a lorry will mow you down. (I’m not sure how useful that information is to an eleven-year-old who can’t drive for another six years.)
‘Police car,’ I shouted, to warn the others. Everyone stopped. Mum took her own advice and pressed her back against a garden wall, leaving her two daughters to be flattened (only joking). We all watched the car drive, incredibly slowly, towards us.
‘Must be a learner,’ said Copper Pie.
I would have laughed but I was too busy staring at the driver, and the passenger, and what looked like a third head between the two people in the front seat. The sun was in my eyes making it difficult to work out what was face and what was shadow. I squinted to see if that helped. It did. The police car drew up by my side. I didn’t wait for the police to get out. I grabbed the handle and flung open the back door.
Doodle’s Sleepover
Doodle leapt out of the car. He bypassed me even though I was the closest, and jumped all over Jonno (his best friend after Bee). Jonno pretty much jumped all over Doodle too.
The passenger door opened and out stepped our favourite policeman ever, the nice one from the day before, the one and only Sergeant Farrow.
‘Hello again,’ he said.
‘Hello,’ I said. ‘You’ve got Bee’s dog.’
‘Bright boy,’ he said. ‘Nearly as bright as your kidnapper friend over there.’ He nodded at Fifty. Fifty waved back. (There was something about Sergeant Farrow that reminded me of Copper Pie’s neighbour, Big Jim. He jokes about things, rather than being serious like most adults.)
Mum came over. ‘Hello, I understand you’ve met my son and his friends.’
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I was lucky enough to run into them yesterday. A small matter of a missing person.’ He raised his eyebrows. Good job I’d told Mum.
‘I heard,’ she said. ‘I hope it didn’t cause too much trouble.’
‘Actually, the boys gave me a cake so I decided to let them off.’ He winked at me. Mum talked to him for a few minutes. Gradually everyone gathered round, waiting for her to ask the question that we all wanted the answer to. (Doodle stayed right by Jonno’s side, as though he didn’t want to get lost again.) In the end, it was Flo who butted in. Typical.
‘Where did you find Doodle, please?’ she said, through the loudspeaker of course.
‘He came with our breakfast,’ said Sergeant Farrow, grinning. ‘Not long after we saw you, in fact.’
/> ‘Really?’ said Flo, eyes popping out of her head. I think she thought Doodle had served the policeman a full English wearing an apron.
‘Sort of,’ he said.
‘Please tell us,’ said Jonno.
Sergeant Farrow could see we were all desperate to hear the full story. ‘You know the café with the tattoo parlour at the back?’
We all nodded. There aren’t many cafés where you can get a cappuccino and a scorpion down your neck at the same time.
‘Well, we go there for our bacon butties. But this morning, Toni, the owner, had a surprise for us. Doodle turned up last night as he was closing. There was no tag on him, but Toni recognised him, said he belonged to a girl with a long, black fringe and a boy with frizzy hair and glasses. So he locked him up in the back with a tasty meal and a bowl of water.’
‘Like a sleepover,’ said Flo.
‘Exactly like a sleepover.’ He really was a nice policeman.
‘When we turned up this morning Toni handed him over. And of course we knew exactly who he was talking about.’
TONI’S DESCRIPTIONS OF THE TRIBERS
Frizzy-haired boy with glasses, clever-looking – Jonno.
Little boy with curly black hair, needs more food – Fifty.
Bossy girl with the long, black fringe in her eyes – Bee.
Quiet one, blond, likes bacon sandwiches – Keener.
Ginger nut who eats double everything – Copper Pie.
It was time to tell Bee. Time to tell Bee the fantastic news.
Tribe Breakfast at Bee’s
We shouted ‘thank you’ a hundred times and ran back to Bee’s. Jonno held Doodle’s tag-less collar which made him lopsided so he got a bit left behind. Copper Pie hammered on Bee’s front door. I rang the bell, even though it doesn’t work. Fifty yelled through the letterbox.
Bee’s mum shouted, ‘I’m coming,’ a bit crossly, and opened the door just as Jonno caught up with us. He let go of the collar and Doodle flew through the door. I can’t properly describe what happened next. Bee came charging down the stairs and threw her arms round Doodle and there were tears all down her face and all down her mum’s. Jonno pressed his face into Doodle’s fur. The relief was amazing. My face started to ache because of the non-stop smiling. I wasn’t a dog-murderer. I was just Keener again.
Labradoodle on the Loose Page 4