Soldier at the Door(36)
Her parents had already learned the hard way that silence from a toddler was never a good thing.
After Mahrree had cleaned up the mess—Jaytsy helpfully pointed out sections of the kitchen her mother had missed and saying, “Ewwww! Ucky”—Mahrree heard Peto fussing. He had learned at that moment how to roll continuously. Although Mahrree had left Peto securely in his napping blankets, he was now in the study, stuck underneath a chair.
While Mahrree rescued and comforted her startled son, Jaytsy announced another “Ewww!” and lead Mahrree to a new spot in the gathering room she ‘accidentally’ left. Mahrree realized then that she was out of clean washing cloths and trudged out to the washing rack in the back yard, with both children in her arms to prevent any new developments, to find something dirty to mop up the latest spill.
That’s when she decided it was time for her daily break.
Someone had told her that quitting her teaching job, shortly before Jaytsy was born, would leave her with too much time on her hands and no purpose. She was still waiting—and looking forward—to that day.
As Mahrree sat soaking up the last of the sunny weather before the dreariness of the Raining Season showed up, she congratulated herself on getting out. It had been her goal to spend some time outside with her children each day, even if it was for a few minutes. It gave her time to reflect and chuckle about what had her life meant now.
Every day held some kind of surprise, usually good, occasionally revolting. And not all of them derived from the children.
She glanced over at the black blob resting under a twiggy bush and grumbled. That was one of the worst.
Three moons ago Perrin came home, a little later than usual, with a large item in his arms wrapped in an old army blanket. Through the wavy glass she couldn’t quite tell what it was, but when she opened the back door for him she gasped.
“No!”
“Ah, Mahrree . . . give it a chance!” He pulled back part of the blanket and immediately Mahrree recoiled.
“What is that?!”
He chuckled. “What do you think it is?”
“Perrin—a bear cub?! Are you insane? How can the children—”
“It’s not a bear cub—it’s a puppy!”
“That’s a, a, a puppy?!” she stammered. Already its head was as large as hers. She looked at the black muzzle that was remarkably bear-like, the dark droopy eyes, and the black floppy ears—
Bears didn’t have floppy ears.
But puppies were supposed to be small, the size of a cat at most, and not so large so that her burly husband strained under the weight of it.
He set the ‘puppy’ on the ground and finished unwrapping it to reveal a completely black animal with ragged fur. It looked up at Mahrree with the most forlorn eyes she had ever seen.
She decided that was one conniving creature.
“Look at his paws. See how large they are?” Perrin said eagerly. “That means he has to grow into them, so he’s still only a puppy!”
Mahrree swallowed. The paws were as large as her hands. “Where did this come from?”
Perrin shrugged. “Well, Private Zenos found him along the canal all alone and filthy. Looks pretty sad, doesn’t he? We washed him up, dried him with the blanket here, and I think all he needs is some love and food, right boy?” He bent over and scratched the creature behind the ears.
It looked up at him with dripping eyes.
Mahrree’s upper lip curled. “And to think I liked Private Zenos. Thanks for nothing, Messenger! Are we supposed to keep it?”
Perrin beamed. “He’ll be a great watch dog! I’m going to name him Barker. Now you and the children will always be safe. Any Guarder passing our garden will think twice about coming in when he sees an animal like that!”
“Now I’m thinking twice about staying here with an animal like that,” she murmured.
“He’ll grow on you,” Perrin assured her as he petted the beast that trembled nervously in his new surroundings.
“Uh-huh,” Mahrree said dubiously. “He’ll grow on me, over me, around me . . .”
Perrin squatted down by the animal masquerading as a dog. “Look at that face, Mahrree. How can you send it back out in the cold?”
“It was hot enough today to cook bacon on the cobblestones!”
Perrin scrunched up his face to look remarkably like the animal, his dark eyes nearly as pitiful and pleading.
Mahrree exhaled. “You train it, clean up after it, and don’t make me touch it.”
“You won’t regret this!” Perrin grinned as he kissed her.
In the past season she regretted the thing every day. Especially when Jaytsy began to discover some of its droppings that Perrin hadn’t yet cleaned up. At least all it ever did was sleep and eat whatever Peto flung on the floor, licking the wood with such fastidiousness that he would soon create a groove around Peto’s baby chair.