Adam nodded. “Holiday truce.” He grinned. “Mum and Dad will be pleased. Their quietest holiday ever!”
After the world’s speediest lunch – Adam and Georgia both claimed they weren’t hungry, but Mum refused to believe them – they finally got to go down to the beach for a first explore with Lucky. It was amazing. Because the beach wasn’t really close to the town, there was hardly anybody there – just one family building a sandcastle, and a group of older boys swimming up at one end.
“There’s a bigger beach just a little further along the coast down at Woolbridge, with ice creams and a pier,” Mum explained. “But you aren’t allowed to take dogs on to Woolbridge Beach in the summer.”
“I don’t mind.” Georgia gazed at the brown sand, which was striped with pebbles and framed by the tall, reddish-brown cliffs. “It’s lovely here. Just us and the sea. Do you think we could let Lucky off the lead? He’d have to go all the way back up the path to get lost.”
Dad nodded. “As long as we keep an eye on him.”
Lucky barked excitedly as Georgia unclipped his lead. He wasn’t used to being allowed to run off wherever he liked, and at first he simply raced up and down the sand, barking and jumping and chasing his tail.
Then he spotted an interesting pile of rather smelly seaweed that had been washed up on the tide, and left lying on the beach. Georgia could see a line of it, all the way along the sand – seaweed, and shells, and even a piece of beautiful emerald green sea glass that she slipped into her pocket as a souvenir.
Adam was already splashing about in the sea, but Georgia decided she needed a bit more time in the sun before having a dip in the chilly water. She wondered if it might be a bit cold for Lucky, too. But Sam, their obedience class teacher, had told them spaniels usually loved water.
Lucky started to dig furiously, loving the way the sand spurted up between his paws. It was much quicker to dig here than in the flower beds at home. But it did go everywhere. He stopped mid-hole to shake the sand out of his whiskers, and let out an enormous sneeze. Next he scrabbled a big pile of seaweed into his hole and covered it back over, scooting the sand back through his paws. Then he sat down on it happily, looking very proud of himself.
Georgia watched him, laughing. “Shall we go and see the water now?” she asked him. “Look, Adam’s paddling in it.”
Lucky stood up and followed her down to the water’s edge, where Adam was hopping in and out of the wavelets, whistling through his teeth at how cold it was.
Lucky watched interestedly, his tail wagging. He’d never seen so much water, and it moved! He backed away thoughtfully as the bubbly surf crept towards him, and then followed it back again, fascinated.
“Oh look, Adam, he loves it!” Georgia giggled.
The puppy crouched down, his paws stretched out in front of him, wondering if he could catch this stuff. This time, when the creamy water began to draw back from his paws, he jumped after it, splashing himself and Georgia with freezing cold water.
Georgia laughed, and Lucky shook himself in surprise. He hadn’t expected that to happen. But he liked it!
When the next wave came, he didn’t try to catch the water, he just jumped in and out of it, shaking his soaked ears and whining excitedly. Chasing the waves was almost as much fun as chasing squirrels!
Chapter Four
On that first afternoon of the holiday, Georgia and Adam had been so eager to get down to the beach that they’d hardly taken anything with them. But the next morning, the first real full day in Woolbridge, they took everything. Swimming things, towels, spades, snacks, rugs and Adam’s enormous inflatable alligator. They struggled down the path, laden with all they could possibly need, and Mum and Dad followed them with folding chairs and the picnic.
It was another beautiful sunny day, and Mum insisted on covering them with suncream as soon as they’d set up a base camp next to a large rock. She looked doubtfully at Lucky. “I suppose he’ll be all right. But if he starts to look hot, you must bring him back over here and he can lie down in the shade of the rocks.”
“OK, but he’ll probably just splash in the sea like he did yesterday,” Georgia pointed out. “That’ll keep him nice and cool.”
Lucky was already running up and down the water’s edge, barking excitedly at seagulls, who shrieked back crossly. One of them settled down to float on the greenish water, not very far out, and glared at him.
Lucky splashed into the sea, so it came halfway up his short legs, and barked a challenge. But the seagull only bobbed up and down, and kept on staring. Lucky took a few more steps in, shivering a little as the water came up to his chest.
Georgia had been sitting rubbing suncream into her arms and watching Adam, who was kicking a football around further up the beach. But now she suddenly noticed that Lucky was in the water. She raced down to the edge of the sea, but Dad was there already.
“It’s OK, Georgie. Lots of dogs are good swimmers. We mustn’t let him go out too far, but don’t scare him now. We don’t want him to think the water’s something to be frightened of.”
Georgia frowned. Actually, she thought maybe they did. What if Lucky got swept away by a big wave? And that seagull looked like it wanted puppy for breakfast. It was staring at Lucky evilly with its tiny yellow eyes.
Lucky looked round, pleased to see Georgia so close, and then took another step forward. Strangely though, his paws didn’t seem to find any ground to step on, and all of a sudden he was swimming, doggy-paddling as though he’d been doing it for ever. Rather surprised at himself, he paddled around in a little circle, almost forgetting about the seagull.
“He’s swimming! He’s swimming!” Georgia yelled. “Lucky can swim! Dad, look!”
The seagull flapped its powerful wings and fluttered away with loud, frightened squawks, and Lucky barked after it.
“Sorry, Lucky!” Georgia splashed into the water. “I forgot you were chasing him. You’re such a clever boy! How did you learn to swim, hey? Come on!” She dog-paddled along with him, even though she was in such shallow water that her knees kept hitting the sand. “Do you think he can swim a bit further out, Dad?” she called.
Dad shook his head. “Maybe not yet – he might get tired quickly, like he did with walks at first. He’s never done it before, remember. Just splash about in the shallows with him.”
Adam came running down the beach to join in, and they spent the next hour swimming out to sea and then back to the beach and letting the little waves carry them up on to the sand, while Lucky swam and splashed and barked delightedly around them.
They were worn out by lunchtime, so much so that Lucky went to sleep in the shade of the big rock after he’d eaten his dog biscuits and had a big drink of water. Adam and Georgia lazed around reading while their sandwiches went down – Mum said they had to wait for a while before going back in the sea.
“It’s been ages since lunch…” Adam moaned. “Can we go swimming again?”
“It’s only been about ten minutes!” Mum laughed, and Adam sighed.
“All right. I’m going to blow up my alligator.” He lay down on the rug and started to puff fiercely, till the alligator was longer than he was. “Now is it swimming time?”
Mum looked at her watch. “Yes, I suppose so. Oh, Lucky!”