‘Hey,’ said Jay. ‘There’s no need for name-calling.’
Liam waved an arm. ‘You could have called him off sooner.’
‘By running off he thought you were playing with him,’ said Jay.
‘He won’t hurt you,’ added Nora, feeling that Liam was overreacting.
‘I wasn’t prepared to take the risk. Can you not tie him up somewhere? Or put him in the car?’
‘No, butyoucould sit in the car if you like,’ said Jay, searching for his car keys. The mood was getting more confrontational.
‘Let’s try and enjoy the walk to wherever Dixie is taking us,’ said Nora, trying to distract the two men, who were now glaring at each other. Jay clipped the lead back on to Bruce’s harness.
‘I don’t know why he’s here anyway,’ said Liam.
‘I’m friends with Nora and Dixie and a regular member of the Crafting and Cocktails club. Why areyouhere?’ snapped Jay. Nora hadn’t seen him like this. The last thing she needed was for her friend and her boyfriend to not get on– that was always a recipe for disaster. She didn’t want to ever be in a situation where she had to choose between them.
‘I meant the dog,’ said Liam. ‘Nora invited me,’ he added, looking about for her hand to hold as if belatedly remembering that was the sort of thing couples usually did.
‘And I’d very much like it if we could all get on,’ said Nora. ‘This is important to Dixie, so let’s try and have a nice time.’ She sounded so much like her mother it was frightening.
When they reached a clearing Ned stood to one side and Dixie waved the others over as she got out her phone and began filming. ‘This is what we wanted to show you.’ She did a bit of a ta-dah.
Nora could see trees but other than that she wasn’t sure what she was meant to be looking at. ‘And what sort of trees are these?’ she asked, keen to show interest.
‘There’s a mix,’ said Ned. ‘Hornbeam, hazel, oak, pine and birch.’
‘But it’s what’s underneath that we’re after.’ Dixie held out a truffle.
Bruce was first there and had a good smell before Dixie passed the truffle to Nora for a closer look. Nora turned it over in her hand while Bruce continued to sniff it. ‘Where did you find it?’
‘Arnold found it and we’ve since discovered a couplemore so we think what we have here is a truffle orchard. Ned’s gran seems to remember her husband planning one but she didn’t know anything else about it. Apparently they take years to become established. Do you see that most of the trees are in neat rows apart from a few odd ones that look like they self-seeded?’
Bruce started pulling on the lead. Jay hung on but the dog was off with his nose to the ground. ‘Heel, Bruce.’
But the dog wasn’t listening. Instead, he was busy scratching at the earth trying to dig a hole.
‘Can he damage the tree doing that?’ asked Nora, going to join Jay to see if she could help distract Bruce.
‘Tree roots are pretty tough,’ said Ned.
Dixie didn’t look as relaxed so Nora crouched down to try to flatten the ground that Bruce had dug over and there she discovered some recognizable lumps. ‘There are more truffles,’ she said, unearthing them.
‘Good boy, Bruce,’ said Dixie and the dog barked, his tail wagging.
‘He smelt the one in my hand and then he found more. He’s a sniffer dog,’ said Nora.
‘Truffle hound,’ corrected Liam. ‘Obviously he’s not an actual truffle hound but that’s how they find truffles.’
‘The lady at the rescue said he would be good at scent work. I guess that’s all this is,’ said Jay.
‘Probably a fluke,’ said Liam with a dismissive shrug.
‘Let’s see,’ said Jay, taking a mud-covered truffle from Nora and unclipping Bruce’s lead. ‘Bruce, sit, please.’ The dog did as he was asked. Jay held the truffle underhis nose. ‘Find,’ he said, unsure what the command for truffle-hunting might be. Bruce carried on sniffing the truffle. ‘Fetch?’ Bruce still didn’t move. ‘Get me more of these, please,’ said Jay, sounding exasperated, and Bruce bounded off with his tail wagging and his nose down. He only went as far as the next tree before stopping and scratching frantically at the ground.
Dixie’s mouth made a perfect O shape. ‘See, he knows where they are.’
Nora went to where Bruce was digging and he was right, there were more truffles. As soon as she took over unearthing them, Bruce went back to searching.
