The Spuddy Read Online Free PDF Page A

he’s put down anyway.’ She put her hands on her hips and looked hard at Andy. ‘If you go tempting him to hang round here you’ll upset the neighbours and I won’t stand for that. Anyway,’ she went on, ‘the more you tempt him the more likely it’s you yourself will be the death of him. Aye, you, Andy,’ she stressed, seeing his look of consternation. ‘The woman that’s moving in to the house was here taking a cup of tea with me earlier this morning and she canna abide dogs at any price, she was telling me. She’s that nervous of them, she says, and if the Spuddy still comes round now that she’s moved in her husband’s going to complain to the police.’ She gathered up the tablecloth. ‘Aye, and then something will have to be done about getting rid of him.’ She went to the back door, shook the crumbs from the cloth and coming back in said less severely: ‘The best thing you can do for that dog, Andy, is to keep away from him and make sure he keeps away from you.’ Out of the corner of his eye Andy saw Uncle Ben nodding sad confirmation.
    Dejectedly tucking the bowl under his anorak Andy went out into the street but the moment he saw the Spuddy again his dejection became resolution. The Spuddy and he were going to be friends and somehow friends must contrive to look after each other. It wouldn’t be easy – that much he knew – but if only he could keep the Spuddy fed and unharmed until his father came on leave he was certain his father would find some way of ensuring that Andy could keep the dog. Sadness descended on him as he wished, as so often before, that he could correspond with his father; that he could read and write like other children of his age and thus be able to both send and receive letters. But when his father was at sea their communication with each other was limited to picture postcards with lots of X’s printed clearly on the back which his father posted whenever he was in port. In reply Andy could only add more X’s together with a painstakingly printed ‘ANDY‘ to his mother’s letters and sometimes give her one of his drawings to enclose.
    Shaking off his despondency Andy approached the Spuddy and showing him the feeding bowl tried to entice the dog to follow him but the Spuddy, used to verbal invitations and instructions, was reluctant until Andy’s explicit gestures, aided by a renewal of invective from the red-haired woman persuaded him to accompany the boy. Before leaving the house Andy had checked the money in his pocket and money being something his mother had ensured he was familiar with he reckoned he had enough to be able to buy at least two and perhaps three days food for the Spuddy, and today being a Wednesday it was only three days before he was due for another week’s pocket money from the sum his father had left for that purpose.
    Pausing outside the butcher’s he looked in at the window but he thought the butcher looked harassed and loath to risk adding to his harassment by trying to convey by signs what he wished to purchase he chose instead to go to the general store where it was relatively easy for him to point to a tin of dog meat and a tin opener, hand over the requisite money and skip away. If he was aware of the mystified shopkeeper coming to the doorway to observe him further Andy gave no sign and together he and the Spuddy raced towards a promising looking huddle of sheds which he had noticed earlier in the morning. Here Andy felt sure he would be able to find a quiet corner where he could stand guard whilst the Spuddy ate his meal. The sheds, he discovered, were situated within the kipper yard itself, a place where it was obvious the Spuddy was completely at home. It was in fact the Spuddy who led Andy to where two small and patently disused sheds abutted to form a reasonably secluded spot and, watched closely by the Spuddy, Andy set the feeding bowl on the