Happy

Well, there was a happy ending to the story of the beloved lost ball.

We had a dreary walk this morning. I took a tennis ball, and threw it, but Roger Poopy ignored it, loftily, looking pointedly in the other direction so that I had to trudge after it myself. I made this mistake a couple of times before returning the ball to my pocket and concentrating instead on avoiding the puddles, whilst Roger Poopy followed miserably behind, all of his excitement in life evaporated into the lashing rain.

I gave him the tennis ball when we got home, but he was not interested, and left it on the stairs. I picked it up and put it in the Outdoors box then, because it very nearly proved fatal when I was bringing the washing basket down.

Then this afternoon a miracle happened.

I was just putting everything away and starting to get ready for work when the doorbell rang.

We had not ordered anything, and the postman had been and gone, so I assumed that it would either be the police or the bailiffs, everybody else uses the back door.

As it turned out it was neither.

It was a youth in a delivery van, rain dripping off his glasses, with a parcel.

“Are you Roger Poopy?” he asked.

Explanations were just too complicated, so I agreed that I was, and he handed me the parcel which was, indeed, to my surprise, addressed to Roger Poopy.

Roger Poopy was at my side at the time, having rushed about barking when the doorbell rang, and was, of course, determined not to be left out of any police-or-bailiff related adventure. He was most surprised to hear his name being bandied about by a strange delivery man, and his eyes were wide with curiosity.

I told him that the parcel was for him. He does not get very much mail, and so obviously did not have the first idea what I was talking about.

I opened it for him as well, because he has only got paws.

Inside was a brand new ball, the identical twin, apart from the tooth marks, of the lost one.

I had barely unwrapped it when he snatched it out of my hand in astonished joy.

I was completely puzzled, and looked all over the wrapping for some clues as to his benefactor, until in the end I discovered a little note which said:

Love from Pepper.

I laughed and laughed.

Then I told him that it was from Pepper, and immediately wished that I hadn’t, because although Roger Poopy’s command of English is quite remarkably good, it is not good enough to distinguish between: ‘the ball is from Pepper’ and: ‘Pepper is in the kitchen’, and he immediately started barking excitedly, and bounced off down the stairs in case.

Of course Pepper was not in the kitchen, which was disappointing, but he still had the ball, which was something of a consolation, and he was so thrilled about it that really he didn’t mind.

Of course we had to go out straight away then.

Roger Poopy held the ball tightly in his teeth and would not surrender it. In the end I wrenched it away from him in order to hold it under the lights so that it would glow in the dark once we got outside. It was dark by then, and I really did not want another lost-ball misfortune.

When we got into the Library Gardens he would not let me have the ball at all, and it became abundantly clear that he considered that my neglect was responsible for the loss of the last ball. He growled and gripped it with his teeth, and then stopped abruptly when he realised that he would have to let go of it if I was to be able to throw it for him.

He thought about this for some time.

Then he had a brilliant idea, and with the ball still held tightly in his mouth, ran up to me as if waiting for me to throw it. Then he turned away and rushed across the grass as if I had thrown it, and he was running after it. Once he had reached the far side, ball still between his teeth, he turned round and rushed back.

He did this three or four times, for all the world as if I was throwing the ball for him, but without needing to relinquish it into my neglectful care. Eventually he tired, and we came home again.

He showed the ball to Mark when he came in, but would not let me even look at it. I felt mildly aggrieved at being thus blamed for a negligence that really was not my fault, until I remembered that Roger Poopy is a dog, and nobody actually cares what he thinks.

If Pepper is reading this, thank you very much indeed. You have made a little dog very, very happy.