The dog crouched back against the man’s legs with his shoulders hunched, looking miserable, and Emily gasped. That was so mean!
The man caught her watching, and smiled at her. Emily looked away quickly. She’d almost forgotten Sam, and she turned back to call him.
Sam had got a bit bored waiting, and he thought Emily had forgotten him too. He was creeping very slowly towards her on his bottom, with a “please don’t tell me off!” look on his face.
Emily giggled. He was so funny!
Emily soon stopped thinking about the couple with the pointer, she was too busy concentrating on Sam. At the end of the class Dad was full of praise for them both, and they were all walking happily back to the park gates when Sam turned round and yapped. The pointer was right behind him, and he wanted to say hello.
“Oh, sorry,” Dad said to the man holding him. “Is your dog friendly? Sam hasn’t met that many other dogs yet, he gets a bit excited.”
Emily glared. That wasn’t fair. Sam did like meeting other dogs, but they shouldn’t have been letting their pointer get that close if they didn’t want Sam to talk to him.
“Don’t worry! Bertie’s very friendly,” the man said, smiling.
Emily didn’t think the pointer looked that friendly. He looked as though he was too scared of being told off to do anything. He cowered away from the man, and something about the man’s too-nice voice made Emily shiver. She didn’t trust him.
“Your puppy is gorgeous,” the woman who was with him said. “Is he a pedigree Labrador?”
Dad said that Sam was indeed a pedigree dog, and mentioned the breeder he’d come from. The couple seemed very interested, and asked lots of friendly questions, but Emily still didn’t like them. She tugged at Dad’s hand, hoping to get him to leave, but he ignored her.
“Da-aaad… Can we go?” Emily muttered.
Dad looked down at her in surprise. “Wait a minute, Emily, we’re just chatting.” He frowned at her in a way that said “Behave!” and Emily scowled back. Couldn’t Dad see these weren’t nice people?
The woman crouched down to stroke Sam, and he backed away up against Emily and growled.
“Sam!” Dad sounded shocked, but Emily was glad. She didn’t want them touching him!
The woman smiled. “Don’t worry,” she said. “I probably smell of Bertie, and he doesn’t like it.”
Sam huddled close to Emily, still growling, but faintly so that only she could hear him. The woman didn’t smell of Bertie, she smelled of lots of dogs. Lots of unhappy dogs, and he didn’t want to be anywhere near her. He didn’t want to end up like Bertie.
Dad and Emily set off for home with Sam trotting along, walking to heel, like he’d been taught. Occasionally Emily had to remind him, but not very often.
Dad wasn’t noticing how well Sam was doing though. “Emily, that was very rude just now. You know better than that. What on earth’s the matter with you?”
Emily shrugged. It sounded a bit stupid, now they’d left the strange couple behind. “They just didn’t seem very nice,” she muttered. “I didn’t like them being so interested in Sam.”
“Emily, those people were perfectly nice. Don’t be so silly,” Dad snapped.
“But Sam didn’t like them either!” Emily protested. “Dogs are good at telling what people are really like!”
“Sam just picked up on your bad behaviour,” Dad said sternly. “I don’t want either of you being like that again. Now let’s get home.”
Emily walked along, glaring at the pavement as they turned into their road. Dad was being unfair, she was sure. She knew she was right not to trust them.
Sam looked up at her anxiously, sensing that something was wrong. Then suddenly the fur prickled on the back of his neck, and he looked behind him. His low growl jolted Emily out of her sulk, and she turned to see what Sam had seen.
The couple with the pointer were just walking past the end of Emily’s road, watching them…
Chapter Three
Now that Sam was walking so well on the lead, Mum let Emily take him on their walk to school on Monday morning. She said it wouldn’t be every day, though, she couldn’t cope with Sam and Jack!
They met lots of Emily’s school friends on the way, and they all fussed over Sam.
“He’s so cute!” Emily’s friend Ruby murmured, stroking Sam behind his ears. “You’re so lucky, Emily, my parents would never let me have a dog.”
Emily grinned, and gave Mum a quick, grateful look. She knew she was lucky. Then she stiffened, her heart jumping in surprise. It was those people again! The ones with Bertie! The Watsons, Dad had said they were called. She watched as they walked past on the other side of the road. Bertie looked even more sad than he had on Saturday – his head hung low and his tail drooped.
“What’s the matter, Emily?” Mum asked curiously, watching them too.
“N-nothing…” Emily didn’t want to sound silly, especially not with Ruby there. “I just saw someone from dog-training, that’s all.” She supposed they had every right to walk around the town. Maybe they just happened to live in a street near school, and Emily’s house, and the park… But she still had the strangest feeling that they were watching her. And Sam.
Emily tried not to worry about the man and woman with the pointer. Dad had been so sure she was being silly. But she couldn’t help looking over her shoulder every so often on the walk home from school, and the drive to her ballet class.
She gave Sam an extra-big cuddle that night as they settled down to sleep. Mum had been a bit worried about Sam sleeping on Emily’s bed, but he was really well house-trained now – and he howled if he was left downstairs! Emily was sure she slept much better with Sam curled up on her toes, although Dad had commented that they might need to get her a bigger bed when Sam was a fully-grown dog!
Sam loved sleeping on Emily’s bed, and he was quite certain that his basket was only for daytime naps. There was no way he was going to let Emily sleep without him guarding her.
That night, Sam was snoozing happily when his comfy nest of duvet suddenly wriggled. He opened one eye sleepily, and it wriggled again. This time he sat up and let out an indignant little woof. What was Emily doing? All he could see of her was a huddle of covers. He padded gently further up the bed to investigate.
Emily was muttering and moaning in her sleep, hitting at her pillow with her hands. Anxiously, Sam whined in her ear, trying to wake her up, but she didn’t notice him. Sam looked worriedly at her for a moment. Something was obviously wrong. He stuck his cold wet nose in the hollow under Emily’s chin, knowing that would wake her.
“Oh!” Emily sat up, looking relieved and scared at the same time. She hugged Sam. “Oh, Sam, that was horrible. I was having a really weird dream, about those people we saw in the park.” She shuddered, and Sam licked her sympathetically. He didn’t really understand what she meant, but she was obviously upset.
Emily shook her head, feeling dazed. She couldn’t remember the dream properly, just confused mind-pictures of lots of dogs barking sadly. But she knew it had been horrible, and she didn’t want to remember any more.