Pets in Prospect - Malcolm D. Welshman [34]
As the goose slipped into unconsciousness, she patted the bird’s breast. ‘I reckon there’ll be enough there to feed a regiment come Christmas,’ she said. ‘Far more than you two could manage on your own.’ She gave me one of her doe-eyed looks, her long, dark eyelashes fluttering. If she was fishing for an invitation to Christmas lunch, I chose to ignore it.
When I returned to Willow Wren with the goose, each plucked wing sported a neat row of stitches where the tip had been snipped off and the pimply skin edges sutured together. I carried the basket on to the patch of lawn we’d recently cleared at the back and tipped it on its side. The goose shuffled out with a couple of indignant honks before flapping her wings and, with head stretched forward, skittered down the garden clearly expecting to get airborne. Instead, she plunged straight into the overgrown shrubbery at the end and disappeared from view. There was much crashing about and snapping of twigs before she re-emerged with a necklace of greenery draped round her neck and gave vent to a loud cackle before wobbling back up the lawn, bobbing her head up and down.
Lucy doubled up with laughter. ‘A star turn if ever there was one,’ she gasped, tears streaming down her face.
I agreed. ‘A veritable Gertrude Lawrence.’
The name seemed apt – so Gertie she became.
By carefully re-arranging Lucy’s menagerie, I was able to find a home for Gertie in the potting shed. It proved an ideal shelter where she could be locked up at night to protect her from the local prowler – a fox with a taste for all things feathered. As for feeding her, this turned out to be easier than anticipated. Gertie liked eating grass – I disliked cutting it. So the lawn mower was abandoned in favour of the goose. As the grass grew, so did her girth. Unfortunately, though the lawn was quite big, it did not quell Gertie’s appetite to try pastures new, and we soon discovered Gertie had a knack of escaping that would have done the prisoners of Colditz proud.
The phone rang one Saturday afternoon when I was off duty. I had been in the process of trying to persuade Nelson that the vitamin tablet I was attempting to push down his throat in a lump of cheese was good for his health. I reached for the phone as he swallowed the cheese and spat out the pill. It was Joan Spencer, the postmistress who lived next door. She and her husband, Doug, had introduced themselves when we’d first moved in, presenting us with a welcoming bouquet of sweet peas picked from their garden – a beautifully tended garden, bursting with blooms that put ours to shame.
‘I’m sorry to trouble you,’ she said, her voice full of agitation, ‘but there seems to be a large white duck or something pecking at our pansies.’
Oh Lord. That white something just had to be Gertie. I tore round. And sure enough, there was Gertie on the edge of Mrs Spencer’s patio now trying to decapitate a red plastic gnome. Seeing me advance up the path, she gave a cackle of greeting before turning to waddle into a bank of pink and white petunias. I headed her off but not before a neat row of dwarf marigolds had been trampled under web and a beakful of geraniums had been snatched.
Gertie’s next port of call was the rectory across the other side of the lane. We were not church-goers and had yet to meet the local vicar of St Mary’s church; Gertie made sure we did.
I answered the door to a tall, cadaverous man in a shiny grey suit with a dog collar that hung loosely round his scrawny neck. He had a long, lank head with muddy brown eyes and an upper lip that curled back over his teeth when he spoke. Very equine. I almost expected him to clasp his hands together and say, ‘Let us bray.’
Instead, in a sing-song, reedy voice he said, ‘I’m Reverend James… James Matthews. I do apologise for any intrusion that I might be causing when your time is precious, but have you perchance lost one of your … er … uhm … flock?’ He swayed towards me before rocking back on his heels. ‘It’s just that a goose has taken it upon herself