33
Grace heardfaint barking sounds coming from somewhere to the northeast of where she was searching for Stanley. She stopped walking and listened harder.
Woof! Woof! Yap! Yap!
“Stanley!” Grace shouted, relief surging through her at the sound of the dog’s bark, distant but recognisable. “Stanley! Come here, boy!”
She heard another volley of barks and turned in the direction she thought they’d come from. Ryan, who had veered off towards the west but was still visible through the trees, heard the barking too and turned in the same direction as Grace.
There were more barks and yips, the tone growing urgent. It wasn’t easy to home in on where they were coming from exactly, and she only hoped she was moving in the right direction.
A few moments later, she heard heavy footsteps in the distance, and a few moments after that, a figure emerged from the trees.
It was Charlie, the man she’d met in the beer garden and who, with his wife, had volunteered to help find Stanley. He was striding towards her with a huge smile on his face… and with Stanley cradled in his arms.
Grace thought her legs would give way beneath her with relief. Breaking into a run, she quickly closed the distance towards Charlie. Behind her, she heard Ryan running, too.
“Stanley!” Grace shouted when she reached Charlie. “Oh, you found him! Thank you!”
Charlie laughed as the dog launched itself out of his arms and into Grace’s, sending her reeling backwards with the force of his little body slamming into hers. As she hugged the dog close, Stanley licked her face frantically, yelping and whimpering all the while. The dog was dirty from the woodland floor, and his damp paws were trailing mucky stains across her clothes, but Grace didn’t care.
All she cared about was that they’d found Stanley.
“I can’t thank you enough,” Grace said to Charlie.
“I was happy to help,” he said, already tapping out a message on his phone to his wife to let her know the search was over. “This little detour into the woods has worked up an appetite, which means I can convince my wife that we’re entitled to a spot of dessert after we finish our pub meal.”
“I’d love to buy your lunch for you, as a thank you,” Grace said as they walked out of the woodland. “It’s the least I can do.”
“Don’t be daft,” Charlie said. “The dog didn’t take long to find.”
They’d reached the edge of the woodland, and when they stepped out from the treeline, they saw Charlie’s wife already waiting beside the beer garden.
“Oh, thank goodness, the little dog is fine!” the woman said, looking happy. “When I saw no sign of him, I decided to loop back here in case he reappeared and we missed the chance to catch him.”
There were more thanks uttered, and when Charlie and his wife continued to refuse Grace’s offer to buy their lunch, they reached a compromise and agreed to a round of drinks instead.After fishing cash from her purse to cover their beverages—and, at Grace’s insistence, their well-deserved desserts, too—Grace said goodbye to the couple and followed Ryan to the other side of the beer garden, where she deposited Stanley on the ground and gave him a thorough checking over in case he’d hurt himself while running around in the woods.
“I think he’s okay,” Grace said, straightening up after completing her brief examination. “He’s scruffy again and a bit dirty and dusty too, but he doesn’t seem to have done himself any injuries.”
“That’s a relief,” Ryan said, and ruffled Stanley’s ears. “You gave us a proper fright there, Stanley.”
“You mustn’t run off, you daft little dog,” Grace said, amused to see a sheepish expression in the dog’s eyes. Scooping him back up into her arms, she cuddled him close, sighing softly as the dog nestled into her. “I thought I’d lost you, Stanley. What would I have done without you?”
Stanley yipped, making her laugh. She put him back down on the ground.
“And what would I have told the dog warden, hmm?” she asked the dog. “He wouldn’t think much of me if I had to confess to losing you after I insisted I was the best person to look after you, and…”
She trailed off with a frown. Ryan gave her a curious look, as if prompting her to continue, but instead she just let out another soft laugh, not quite ready to explain where that particular train of thought was headed.
“Anyway, let’s get back inside the pub,” Grace said. A fresh thought seized her. “Oh! Your poor grandmother! She was soaked in spilled drinks when I dashed out to chase after Stanley. Is she okay?”
“She’s fine,” Ryan assured her. “A bit wet, but nothing worse than that.”
“You should’ve stayed with her instead of running after Stanley and me.”
“She was the one who insisted I come and help you. And I couldn’t leave you on your own, searching for this rascal while in a panic.”
Inside the pub, they found Miriam still sitting at the table and dabbing at her clothes with paper towels. The broken glasses and plates had been cleared up, and a member of staff was now mopping the floor to wash away what remained of the spilled liquids.
