Bedtime Without Dog
Bath was done. Teeth were done. The story was read, and the lamp was low. Nell climbed into bed and reached out one hand for Dog.
Dog was a small grey dog with one floppy ear. He smelled of Nell. He slept where Nell slept, every night, since always. But her hand found only blanket.
Nell sat up. She looked left. She looked right. She looked under the pillow, which is a good place for small dogs.
Dog was not there. Nell called out, “Mama, Mama! Dog is gone!”
Mama came in and looked too. Under the pillow. Under the bed. Behind the door.
Dog was not there.
“Then we will find him,” said Mama, and she held out her hand. “A dog cannot get far on four little cloth legs.”
The Great Downstairs Search
They looked in the kitchen first. Not in the cupboard. Not under the table. Not in the fruit bowl, where nobody had ever found a dog, but you have to be sure.
Dog was not there. They looked in the sitting room. Nell lifted every cushion, one by one by one. Mama looked in the toy basket, right to the bottom.
Nell peeped behind the curtain, where the cold window lives. Dog was not there. In the hall, they walked past the high shelf. On the shelf sat Mama’s old rabbit, soft and grey and patched, from when Mama was small.
Rabbit watched them go by with his kind old eyes.
“Where, oh where, is Dog?” said Nell. Mama said,
“Upstairs. Somewhere up there is a dog who needs finding.”
The Great Upstairs Search
They looked in the bathroom. The bath was empty. The towels were only towels. Dog was not there.
They looked in the washing basket, all the way down. Socks and socks and one pyjama top. Dog was not there. They went back to Nell’s room and looked again, in case Dog had come home by himself.
The bed lay quiet. The pillow lay flat. Dog was not there, and now there was nowhere left, and Nell’s lip began to wobble.
“Maybe Dog is lost for ever,” she said, very small.
Mama crouched down. She tucked Nell’s hair behind her ear, just where a floppy ear would go.
“There is one room we have not tried,” said Mama, soft as slippers. “Come and see. But we must be quiet as moths, because the baby took so long to settle tonight.”
And Nell remembered: Gus had cried and cried at bath time. Gus had cried and cried at story time. And then, somehow, Gus had stopped.
The Last Room
The baby’s room was dark and warm and full of slow little breaths. There in his cot lay Gus, fast asleep at last, with his cheeks round and his fists curled. And under one small arm, held tight, tight, tight — one floppy ear sticking up like a flag — was Dog. Nell whispered, “Dog! There he is!”
And she reached out her hand. Then she stopped. Gus was holding on just as Nell held on. Gus was deep in a Dog kind of sleep.
If Dog came out from under that arm, the crying would come back, and Dog was clearly very busy. Nell stroked the floppy ear, once, gently, goodnight.
“Dog is doing his job,” she whispered. Mama whispered back,
“He is. He is being somebody’s Dog tonight. And I know just the fellow to do his job in your bed.”
She lifted old Rabbit down from the hall shelf and put him in Nell’s arms. Rabbit was soft and grey and patched, and he smelled a little of Mama, as Dog smelled a little of Nell.
“He did this job for me when I was small,” said Mama. “He still remembers how.”
Nell climbed into bed with Rabbit. The lamp went out. Down the hall, Gus held Dog, and Dog held still, which is how toy dogs hug. In Nell’s bed, Rabbit settled into the warm spot by her chin, like he had never been on a shelf at all.
The house went quiet. Everyone had someone. And everyone, everyone slept.