I look forward to my visits to Mrs Perkins, who is a well-known local poet. She is now well over 80 and, although in reasonably good health, she is not as mobile as she once was and was very happy to accept my offer to take her dog Sylvia for a walk every morning.
Mrs Perkins is a late riser so I let myself in at about 9 o’clock to be greeted enthusiastically by Sylvia, her not-so-young weimaraner, who looks forward to being taken out bright and early. Being named after Sylvia Plath does not seem to have gone to her head.
The usual arrangement is that Mrs Perkins leaves notes on her kitchen blackboard if there is anything she needs, such as some simple shopping that can be done in town and for which she will pay me later. The dog walk can easily take us through the open-air market on certain days of the week, and so having Sylvia with me is not a problem on these occasions.
Last Friday was one such day, and Mrs Perkins had written “New lead” on her blackboard. We had talked about Sylvia’s dog lead some weeks previously, because it was getting a bit tatty and would need to be replaced at some time. Mrs Perkins clearly thought that that time had arrived.
There is a stall on the market that sells bits and pieces for dogs and other pets, so that was where we headed. The stallholder was delighted to show me a range of dog leads so I chose one that looked OK.
“How heavy is your dog?” The stallholder asked.
“I don’t know”, I said. “Does that matter?”
“It certainly does”, said the stallholder. “That lead is only suitable for dogs under 50 kilos. If your dog weighs more, you’ll need a heavy-duty lead.”
“I don’t know how much she weighs. She’s not my dog” I said.
This delay was a nuisance. It was starting to rain and I had no intention of spending any longer getting wet than was absolutely necessary. I could see that Sylvia was not too happy about the situation either. On the other hand I needed a new lead for her and it had to be the right one.
“You’ll have to get the dog weighed”, said the stallholder.
“How do I do that?” I asked.
“You take her to the vet’s place and put her on their scales. There’s no charge.”
“So where’s the vet’s place?”
The stallholder gave me directions. The vet’s surgery was more than a mile away and it was now beginning to rain more heavily. I did not fancy walking more than two miles in the rain just so that I could come back to where I was to buy a new dog lead. But I could see no alternative.
“Your dog’s going to get wet”, said the stallholder.
That was obvious, as was the fact that Sylvia was starting to shiver. Being short-haired and fine-boned she simply hated getting rained on. She did have quite a nice waterproof dog jacket, but course I had forgotten to put it on her before we left Mrs Perkins’s house.
“I’ve got a lovely dog jacket here”, said the stallholder. “It would fit your dog perfectly”.
I could see that it would. “How much?” I asked.
“Only £34.99”, said the stallholder.
“How much?” I said again, two octaves higher.
“You said this wasn’t your dog”, said the stallholder. “It would be terrible if she caught pneumonia because you couldn’t see your way to buying a lovely waterproof dog jacket. What would her owner have to say?”
So I bought the jacket, put it on Sylvia, and set off into the rain. We had only gone about a hundred yards when the rain stopped completely, the sun came out and Sylvia gave me a look that said: “please take this ridiculous thing off me before I boil”. So I did.
When we reached the vet’s getting Sylvia weighed was no trouble at all.
“Is she under 50 kilograms?” I asked the veterinary nurse.
“Of course she is”, the nurse laughed back at me. “Do you know what a 50 kilogram dog looks like? Your dog’s less than half that weight”.
When we got back to the market I told the stallholder that Sylvia only weighed 23 kilograms.
“Yes”, he said, “that’s what I thought, but it’s best to be on the safe side”.
A rough translation of that might be: “I know a right mug when I see one and a short sharp shower of rain gives me the perfect opportunity to sell not only a dog lead but a totally unnecessary overpriced dog jacket.”
Mrs Perkins had asked me to get a new dog lead, not a second dog jacket, so this was a cost I would have to take on myself. But at least I did have the lead, and I was sure that she would be very happy with that.
When we got back to the house Mrs Perkins was up and about.
“I’ve got the dog lead” I said, absolutely certain that Mrs Perkins would approve of my purchase.
But that was not her reaction at all.
“Dog lead?” she said. “I didn’t say anything about a dog lead.”
“But you wrote ‘New lead’ on the blackboard”, I said.
“Oh dear”, said Mrs Perkins. “That wasn’t what I meant at all.”
“It wasn’t?”
“No. You see, I have always written my poems with a propelling pencil. I’m finding it all a bit too fiddly these days, so that was why I left my pencil on the kitchen table and wrote what I did on the blackboard. I wanted you to help me by fitting it with a new lead”.
© John Welford
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