Obey your master. I promised Rose I wouldn’t run away. This is premeditated disobedience.’
She leans closer to my ear. ‘But you’re helping Rose solve the case. There are exceptions to every rule, Mr Monty.’
Betty just doesn’t get it. Leaving Duckdown Cottage without Rose’s permission is like Mutiny on the Bounty, Spartacus and Rebel Without a Cause all rolled up into one mega-pic of rebelliousness. It’s all very well squeezing through the hedge, lapping up the left-overs of someone’s lunch and then hopping back into the garden again. It’s a whole other thing to travel far from home.
Betty scampers back down my leg and stands in front of me.
‘You’re not serious about these what-did-you-call-’em? Commandy things?’
‘I am, Betty. The Commandments were laid down by our founding fathers, way back when the wolf nation first agreed to work alongside big’uns. They’re our laws and are centuries old and every dog in the world is taught them as a pup. It’s because of these laws that we have such a special relationship with people.’
‘Yeah, but there’s got to be a rule about keeping your master safe, surely?’
‘That’s number three: defend your master.’
‘What’s number one then?’
‘Love your master.’
‘Exactly!’ Betty jumps up and down with excitement. ‘So you did your very best to defend him. But now you need to demonstrate how much you love him and break the dis-obeying rule so you can hunt down his killer. You see where I’m coming from?’
I shake my head. ‘If I run away to find this man, I risk being ostracised by my kind. Do you understand what that means?’
‘Oh yes, only too well.’
Betty slumps against my leg like a deflated balloon and stares into space. Her moods go up and down very fast. I wait. Nothing happens, so I nudge her gently with my nose. No response.
‘Are you an outcast, Betty?’
She looks sideways at me and sighs. ‘Nah. Course not.’ But she doesn’t sound convincing.
Suddenly she jumps up and points a paw at the moon shining in through the kitchen window. I’m so surprised I rear up and bark.
‘But you’re not going to break any commandy things, Mr Monty, because Rose won’t even know you’ve left the house. We’ve got all night, you see. This Larry bloke is bound to be a local, so you’ll be back before she wakes up. So no harm done.’
I know what she’s proposing isn’t right but I’ll never find Paddy’s killer if I never leave the cottage.
‘Look. At least let’s find out where he lives before we make any decisions?’ Betty urges. ‘What harm can that do?’
I nod.
I position my front paws on a narrow hall table, my hind legs on the floor. A phone, notepad, mug of pens and a brick-thick copy of a phone directory lies, dusty and unused, on top. With my nose I push The White Pages until a corner of it hovers beyond the table top. Tiny bits of dust rain down on Betty and she sneezes, and again, and again. I take the big book in my mouth, careful to apply just enough pressure to keep it there, but not enough to tear the cover. It sure is heavy! As usual my mouth is full of slobber and there is a moment when I feel the directory slip, but I tilt my head just in time to stop it falling. Relieved, I quietly place it on the worn carpet.
‘Allow me,’ the rat says, spying the drool-coated cover. She slides on her belly across its surface, her fur like a cloth, wiping up the mess. ‘Who needs Sainsbury’s wipes when you’ve got me?’
She chuckles like raindrops on a tin roof.
I stare down at a well-chewed directory that’s three years out of date. And it’s not just the top right hand corner that’s missing.
‘I thought you said you’d only nibbled a corner?’
‘Okay, so it’s a little bit more than that.’
I give the book a shove with my nose and it falls open at the E section.
‘Can you turn the pages? My paws are too big.’
‘No problem, governor.’
Digging her front claws into the carpet, she kicks out her back legs, flipping the pages at lightning speed.
‘Tell me when to stop. I can’t read.’
‘Slow down,’ I say.
‘How’d you learn reading then? The Professor teach you?’
‘Yes, but don’t tell anyone, Betty. Do you know what happens to animals that do anything out of the ordinary? They put them in cages and experiment on them. Betty, you’ve got to promise me you’ll keep this to yourself.’
‘I promise, on my pups’ lives.’ Betty is panting. ‘This is like a bleeding workout, this is.’
She passes the Ls.
‘Paddy was interested in how animals communicate, especially bees. He was a professor of bees, you see.’
‘Didn’t know they had such a thing.’ She’s slowing down.
‘Paddy saw I was a fast learner, so he started teaching me the English language. I’m not talking about sounds and tones or basic commands. I mean letters of the alphabet.’
Betty stops kicking the pages and stares up at me, jaw open, her minuscule sharp teeth on display. I bet they could inflict a nasty nip. ‘Bleeding Nora! Are you for real?’
‘I got lucky; I had a brilliant teacher. But I get in a muddle when there are too many words, and Mr Google baffles me.’
‘Who’s Mr Google?’
‘A very clever man who lives inside a computer,’ I say. ‘Can you keep going, Betty? We’re nearly there.’
She turns round and kicks the pages again. She reaches the Ns.
‘Stop!’
I follow the columns of names, addresses and phone numbers:
A Nice
Benjamin Nice
Mrs CE Nice
Then nothing. Just teeth marks and a circular hole.
‘Oops,’ she says. ‘Did I eat Larry Nice?’
‘Oh dear.’
‘I never thought I was actually going to need to use it.’
Betty looks sheepish, if it’s possible for a rat to look sheepish.
I sit and consider our situation. ‘I guess we’re going to have to use Rose’s laptop, but I’m a klutz with the keyboard. I’m going to need some help.’
‘Don’t look at me,’ says Betty. ‘I can’t spell and I wouldn’t know one end of a computer from another. There wasn’t much call for reading in them tunnels.’
‘Then we need Dante. He’s really fast with a keyboard.’
‘Dante!’ Betty laughs. ‘Jeez, he must fancy himself with a name like that.’
‘Well, he is a magpie.’
Betty jumps back as if she’s touched hot metal. ‘Magpie! What you doing being friendly with those devils? They’re nasty buggers.’
‘Dante’s all right. He can be a bit snappy sometimes and he thinks he’s a bit of an intellectual, but he’s