Birdie For Now (11 page)

“What?” she said.

Then she too smelled the smoke and the reek of the bones. She sprang up and all three of them raced to the kitchen.

Julie Fielding yanked the pot off the burner. She switched off the heat and hurled the smoldering potholder into the sink. Dickon turned the tap on. With a sizzle, the fire went out.

“What a mess!” she said, choking.

Birdie was racing around, as though she imagined they had all gotten up for a midnight jollification.

Julie turned to her son.

“Oh, Bird, how lucky that you wakened in time. You saved our lives.”

Dickon's face glowed brighter than a Christmas tree.

“I didn't wake up,” he said. “I was sound asleep. Birdie woke me. She kept barking, even after I told her to shut
up. I was mad until I smelled smoke. Birdie saved us. Birdie!”

His eyes were fixed on his mother's face. Surely now …

She looked from him to his excited little dog.

“Come with me,” she said and marched into her bedroom. Mystified, he followed. She flipped through the pages of her diary.

“Before you say another word, read this,” she said.

Dickon looked at the page she was thrusting toward him. He did not want to read anything, but he made himself. It took him long moments to make out the words. Then his eyes widened. She had written,
I can't take that dog away from him. He loves her so. I have to let him grow up, just a little. Beginning with that dog … if only she was not named Birdie
.

Dickon gave such a whoop of delight that, next door, Charlie put up her prickles in alarm. He flung his arms around his mother and hugged her until she was breathless.

“We could change her name,” he offered, his eyes shining. “We could call her Wings maybe. But why don't we change mine instead? Why can't she be Birdie from now on and I'll be Dickon?”

There was a long silence. Finally, Julie Fielding reached out and rumpled his sleep-tousled hair.

“I'll try to call you Dickon,” she said. “But it may take a while. Now go back to bed while I clean up.”

Mrs. Nelson dropped by the next afternoon.

“My house might have gone up too,” she said, stroking Birdie's tall ears. “Charlie and I are deeply grateful to you, sweet Birdie.”

“Clever girl!” Dickon told his brave dog.

Then he remembered what Jody had said. Dogs were wonderful, but you had to take proper care of them. Give them exercise. He clipped Birdie's leash onto her collar.

“I'm taking her for a walk, Mum,” he said offhandedly.

As he and Birdie went down the steps, he waited for his mother to warn him of every possible danger or to insist on coming with him. When she said nothing, he half-turned to stare.

“I'm so glad you're keeping the dog,” Mrs. Nelson was saying. “She's not only brave, she's sweet.”

“Well, she's here to stay – until I get a smoke alarm up anyway,” Dickon's mother said.

Dickon's face paled before he saw that she was laughing.

“It's a joke, Dickon,” she said.

He laughed too. Then, head high, he walked along the sidewalk, his dog heeling just as he had taught her. He was at the corner, looking both ways, when he took in what his mother had just said.

His dog would be Birdie forever. But he was no longer Birdie for now. His mother had done it.

She had called him Dickon.

Jean Little is the well-known author of over thirty books for children including
Little by Little
,
Different Dragons
,
Willow and Twig
and
Hey World, Here I Am
. Each pet in every one of her stories is based on a real animal.

She lives in Guelph, Ontario, her home for almost sixty years, in a big white house with her sister; her eleven-year-old great-niece and six-year-old great-nephew; her Seeing Eye dog, Pippa; her Papillon, Toby; two cats; two rabbits; and two African Gray parrots named Henry and Jazz. Until recently she had a hedgehog named Sally, just like Charlie in
Birdie for Now
.