One Dog and His Boy

16 Sprocket Gets a Call

The stable lad lost very little time. As soon as the horses were bedded down for the night, he made his call.

Curzon, of course, was no longer in his office. He often did not return after a long lunch, and Fiona never stayed once he had gone. So it was in Sprocket’s little cubbyhole that the phone rang, and he seized it eagerly.

“MMM here. Milton Sprocket speaking.”

He listened, getting more and more excited, trying to take notes with one hand.

“I’m pretty sure it’s him,” the voice at the other end was saying. “Looks just like the photo. You did say twenty thousand pounds? No funny business?”

“Yes, yes,” said Sprocket eagerly. “Now just tell me exactly where you are. Give me your coordinates.”

But the stable lad had not heard of coordinates.

“Don’t know what they are, mate. We’re in Todcaster with Henry’s Circus. And you better get up here quickly because we’ll be on the move again soon.”

When he put the receiver down, Sprocket was in a state of feverish agitation. It was clear that he had to act straightaway and not wait for Curzon’s instructions. What’s more, it seemed that the boy had not been kidnapped as everyone thought, but had run away. Children did run away to join the circus, Sprocket knew, and that meant he would not want to be recaptured and taken home. And this, in turn, meant some serious disguises while the boy was being stalked and cornered and brought back. The van would have to be disguised too – probably best to put on the greengrocer poem. They’d like the idea of fresh vegetables up in the north.

Sprocket hurried to the cabinet and opened the top drawer. He was a fair man and tried hard not to have any favourites among his moustaches, but there was one that he did love particularly. It was a rich nut-brown colour and wonderfully bushy, and it settled against his upper lip like the softest fur. He put it on and immediately felt ready for a great adventure. Then he packed up a couple of wigs, an ear trumpet and some pimples and boils, but not the scars – you couldn’t have everything. At the last minute he added the bottle of blood but left the one labelled saliva – there would be places up there where one could spit if necessary.

Running backwards and forwards, Sprocket loaded the van, putting in the new sat nav, the infrared heat-sensing device, the binoculars with night vision… The little packet containing Hal’s toothbrush and his handkerchiefs went in the secret compartment behind the driving seat. And of course he had a case ready packed with pyjamas and a change of underclothes. Sprocket’s mother had always been careful to see that her son understood the importance of being fresh and clean not just on top but all the way through.

He was removing the board which said, Have you lost it or misplaced it? In a jiffy we will trace it, and sliding in the one which said, When your appetite’s on edge, We will bring you fruit and veg, when he remembered that he had not left a message for Curzon. So he went back into the cubbyhole and sent a coded message from his computer to Curzon’s computer upstairs, telling him where he had gone.

Then he eased the van out of the garage and set off for the motorway. As he passed a row of shops he saw a big notice in one of the windows in which a light still burned.

Easy Pets, it said. Pedigree Dogs to Rent.

Sprocket drove on without a second glance. He was not fond of dogs.

The light should not have been burning at Easy Pets so late. Kayley had been due home an hour ago. She still had flu and should have been in bed. But one of the dogs, the mastiff who had eaten her mistress’s finger by mistake, was running a temperature. Her nose was dry and she was off her food and Kayley sat with her, wondering whether to call out the vet so late. The Carkers never came to the dogs after hours.

She was feeling wretched. She went on missing the dogs in Room A more than she would have thought possible, and she was terribly worried about Pippa. The police had been back asking a lot more questions and she felt that it was only a matter of time before they found out that it was Pippa who had been in the building on Sunday night.

She was putting on her coat when Queen Tilly started up again. The Mexican hairless was disgusted. She was a dog who in a way was born disgusted, but since her roommates had disappeared, life at Easy Pets had become impossible. The five dogs who had replaced Otto and Francine and the others were simply not fit to associate with a Mexican hairless who had belonged to an heiress and eaten off silver plates. There was an Airedale who suffered from hairballs, a dachshund who dribbled, and some others that it was better not to think about. So she twitched and screeched and yelped and grumbled, till Kayley came to her in the compound and put another cushion in her padded sleeping basket and gave her a drink of milk.

When she got home at last, Kayley was so exhausted she could hardly put one foot in front of the other. But one of the twins was stuck with his homework and needed help, and Grandfather had to be wheeled out to the shop. Nothing could convince him that he wasn’t going to buy back the family farm with his winning lottery ticket.

Mrs O’Brian was still out, working late for Mrs Naryan. For a moment Kayley wondered whether to go and fetch her. The Naryans were always so friendly and welcoming, and the warm house with its wonderful silks and perfumes seemed very tempting on this miserable night. Once when it was raining badly, Mrs Naryan had sent her mother home in her husband’s silver Rolls-Royce, a car so silent and so beautiful that it was hard to believe that it was just an ordinary machine and not something out of a dream.

But she was too tired to go anywhere. When she had finished her chores, Kayley picked up the phone meaning to ring Pippa – she had an emergency number for the school camp and perhaps it was best to warn her. But then she thought better of it. It seemed cruel to spoil Pippa’s holiday, and she put the phone down again and climbed wearily into her bed, and tried to sleep.

At MMM the phone rang, and rang, and rang again as Donald tried desperately to get news of his son, while upstairs, Albina, wearing no make-up for the first time in her adult life, wept over the beige carpet which had arrived that afternoon to replace the blue one in Hal’s room.