But really, what else could it be? What else could those two women have in common?
Perhaps it was time to leave Maple Drive, before the worst happened. I’d believed that Jack and Holly were my friends, that they would take care of me until Daisy, Oliver and the children came home. But now I knew they were just as likely to turn me in as Mrs Templeton was. And probably the guy whose hedgehog food I’d eaten.
I could hide out in another neighbourhood, I supposed. One where no one knew me, or who I belonged to – or that I wasn’t being looked after right now. But then how would I know when my people came home?
The other alternative was waiting in the back garden at number 11, so I’d be right there the moment Jay and the others arrived home. But there was nothing to eat there – I’d spent all of last night looking, and turned up nothing. Even the most seasoned hunter wouldn’t have found a gingerbread man to catch in that garden.
So, stay and wait for my family but starve, or go and hope to find food but risk being alone forever?
This was not a good choice for a dog to have.
I stared across the road at Holly’s house again. Obviously I couldn’t risk sneaking in there again now, especially not while Mrs Templeton was also in residence. But maybe tonight, once Holly was in bed, I might be able to pop through the cat flap for some food? As long as Perdita didn’t give me away.
Oh, who was I kidding? Perdita would be first in the line to send me to the pound.
My gaze travelled to the house next door. Kathleen. The house where I had first tasted gingerbread. Was that really only yesterday? It felt like an age already. And even longer since I’d last eaten.
Kathleen had been kind. Maybe she would let me in again.
It might be my last chance. If I couldn’t get into Kathleen’s house and eat a piece of gingerbread by the time the sun went down, then I’d leave Maple Drive and seek my fortune elsewhere.
I bobbed my head and, decision made, trotted across the road to number 10, where I sat and stared up at the door.
The problem with paws, of course, is that they’re not made for knocking. I could bark, or whine, I supposed, but that might draw undue attention from Holly next door. I didn’t even know if Kathleen was inside, or if she’d gone out.
Suddenly, I heard footsteps behind me, and jumped round to check. Jack! He was still on the pavement, and hadn’t spotted me yet, so I dived into the bush under the windowsill at the front of Kathleen’s house. There, nestled in the relative warmth of the leaves and soil, I hid and watched Jack as he approached Holly’s front door.
One more traitor in my midst. I couldn’t risk running and being seen – plus there was no chance of getting gingerbread from Kathleen if I left now.
I huffed a sign, and hunkered down, resting my snout on my paws.
Seemed there was nothing to do but wait until Kathleen opened her door.
My eyes started to close, itching with tiredness after my restless night in the back garden. Maybe I could risk just a little snooze, before I made a final decision about my destiny.
The buzzing sound that had drawn her out of sleep wouldn’t go away. Daisy blinked in the dark of the bedroom, hemmed in by the heavy curtains around the bed, and finally realised what the noise was.
Her phone.
The ferry!
Fumbling to find the buzzing device on her bedside table, Daisy whacked Oliver on the shoulder until he woke up too. If they were calling to say they had space on the last ferry home, they’d need to get a move on – and quick! The bedside clock told her it was already 6.30. So, 5.30 UK time. And it felt it. Thank God the twins had decided to sleep in, for once.
‘Hello?’ she said, her voice scratchy. ‘I mean, bonjour?’
‘Mrs McCawley.’ Daisy’s spirits sank. She knew that voice. She recognised it from the information desk at the ferry. Henri. ‘This is just a courtesy call to let you know that unfortunately no spaces have become available for you on this morning’s ferry. We do hope that you will travel with us another time, and if we can be of any assistance—’
‘You called me, at six thirty in the morning, to tell me I can’t travel home today?’ she ground out. Surely the man had a personal vendetta.
‘Company policy is to call all passengers on our waiting lists. Successful or not.’ The man’s smarmy voice made Daisy’s skin crawl. ‘Now, would you like me to assist you in booking passage on another occasion? I could put you through to our bookings line …’
‘No,’ Daisy snapped. ‘You can’t. Because it’s six thirty in the morning on Christmas Eve and I don’t believe for a moment that they’re open. You’re just trying to make my life miserable.’
Suddenly, the bedroom door flew open. ‘Mum! Claude’s gone viral!’
‘What?!’ Viral sounded bad. Daisy’s brain immediately leapt to Mrs Templeton’s comments about rabies, until she noticed that Bella was grinning. Her exhausted brain finally caught up. Viral was good. Viral meant more people searching for Claude. She covered the end of her phone with her hand. ‘What’s happening?’
‘I assure you, madam, I am just doing my job,’ Henri said, smugly. Daisy ignored him.
‘The Find Claude campaign is all over social media,’ Bella said, bouncing onto the bottom of the four poster bed with excitement. ‘I mean everywhere! There’s even a piece about him on the BBC website! And people are putting up posters, organising search parties …’
‘That’s incredible!’ Bella’s excitement was infectious, and Daisy found herself grinning back at her daughter and forgetting all about the phone in her hand. At least, until Henri started talking again.
‘Now, about your future travel home—’
‘I don’t know,’ Daisy said, cutting him off with a sudden confidence she hadn’t felt in years. ‘I don’t know how we’re going to get home. But I can tell you one thing – we will. We are going to get home, find Claude and spend our Christmas together as a family.’
‘And will you be doing this via our company?’ Henri asked, apparently unaffected by the warrior spirit that had filled Daisy, as she sat bolt upright in bed.
‘No, Henri. It will not be with your poxy ferry company. There are other ferries. Other ports. Hell, we could even take the Channel Tunnel if we wanted—’ She broke off, staring at Bella, and then at Oliver, who had just about managed to struggle into a seated position.
‘We can take the tunnel,’ she repeated, in a whisper. Bella’s eyes widened, and she nodded furiously.
‘Mrs McCawley?’ Henri said. ‘If I could just take a moment to—’ Daisy hung up on him. She wasn’t wasting another moment on an i
mbecile who didn’t understand that dogs were family too.
She was going home.
‘The Channel Tunnel?’ Oliver asked, his voice heavy with sleep. ‘Is it open today? The car shuttle service, I mean?’
Sometimes, you didn’t need to plan ahead. Sometimes, you didn’t need to be super mum, with checklists and calendars and brilliant time-keeping skills.
Sometimes, you just had to follow your intuition, wherever it led you.
Daisy grinned. ‘Let’s drive to Calais and find out.’
The icicles were still missing, Jack realised, as he approached Holly’s front door. It made the house feel bare, like every other house on the street. As if all of Holly’s personality had been stripped from the place.
He missed the icicles. Hadn’t she said she was going to put them back up? He wondered what had changed.
Glancing back over his shoulder as he waited for Holly to answer his knock, Jack spotted a piece of paper fluttering against the lamppost. With a frown, he moved closer to check it out.
FIND CLAUDE! The headline shouted. Underneath was a photo of a very familiar black and white dog, wearing a Santa between his bat-like ears. Apparently they weren’t the only ones searching for him. Jack clocked the social media page link at the bottom of the poster. He’d have to check that out.
But then the door opened behind him, and he turned back to find Holly in the open doorway.
‘You’re here!’ Holly cried, her eyes bright and her cheeks flushed. Was she baking again? Or drinking mulled wine without him? ‘You won’t believe what we’ve found!’
She dashed back through the hallway, leaving Jack on the doorstep.
‘We?’ he wondered, aloud, as he followed her inside, pulling the door shut behind him. ‘Who is we?’
He got his answer as he stepped into the kitchen. Mrs Templeton sat at the head of the table, and Jack blinked at the strange sight. Was this another Christmas light intervention? Except Holly had seemed excited, not upset.