all of this?” I wanted to know.
“In the East,” he answered slyly.
At the time, I thought that he was just joking. But now I know better.
My spaniel, I’d come to realise, had many secrets. I suppose I shouldn’t have been that surprised when he made his big announcement a few days later.
On the morning of my maths exam, William sauntered into our bedroom and said, “We are going on a trip this holiday.” I was so busy memorising my 12 times table that I didn’t really pay much attention. “Sure, William, sounds good. Whatever makes you happy,” was all I said in reply. William grinned gleefully. At that stage I had no idea what he had in store for me …
* * *
Three days before the end of term, he came to me looking serious. “We need to start making preparations for our travels, Alex.”
“So where are we off to?” I asked, my curiosity finally getting the better of me.
“Oh, a few places,” he replied secretively. ‘But we’ll be starting off in Istanbul.”
“Istanbul? Isn’t that somewhere in Russia?” I was astonished by the idea of such a far-off place.
“Certainly not!” he replied with a frown. “Istanbul is the capital of Turkey. How can you hope to pass Geography if you don’t even know that? Now follow me to the shed.”
In the garden shed stood a large wooden crate. It was empty. I could see William doing some mental calculations as he looked it over.
“Great! It’s the perfect size,” he declared after a few seconds. Then he rattled off a list of instructions which I agreed to follow to keep him happy. It was good to see he had finally cheered up, even though I still had no idea what he was planning.
William whistled merrily and made himself comfortable on an old couch cushion to watch me work. He’d told me to nail some old blankets to the inside of the crate and to make some holes in the lid, which I carefully did using my dad’s tools. “The holes are for fresh air,” he explained. I started to feel worried. What exactly was he planning?
Next, I had to put a latch on the inside of the lid so that it could be opened from the inside. It was difficult, but luckily I’m handy and I managed to do what he had asked.
“Excellent!” he declared after examining my efforts. “Now we’ll need to organise some supplies.” I had to get all his favourite snacks from the pantry and store them in the crate. “We’ll leave the day after tomorrow,” he announced. “That’s when school term finishes. Some nice, fresh sandwiches would be nice. Double ham on mine, please – no cheese! I suggest you also make yourself a thermos of hot chocolate to take along, and definitely enough bottled water for at least two days … just in case.”
“And where do I tell my parents we’re going?”
“Oh, that’s all arranged. Don’t worry!”
I think up to that point I hadn’t really taken William’s plans that seriously. I’d thought he was just fooling around. He was quite good at inventing games. He had even invented his own set of chess rules which always made him win.
He trotted off and returned with a neatly typed letter. At the top was my school’s letterhead. “Where did you find that?” I asked, bewildered.
“Easy! I downloaded an old email from your headmaster, Mr Paterson, from the computer. I kept the letterhead and signature and just added my own text. Then I clicked ‘print’. Simple, right?”
William certainly was no ordinary dog!
The letter went like this:
Dear Mr and Mrs Simpson,
Many congratulations! Alex has been chosen for our U13 soccer A-team. We have some exciting news! The team will be touring Argentina during the forthcoming winter holiday. I am sure they will win all their matches.
The school bus will collect Alex from your home at 8 a.m. on Thursday. Please make sure that he has packed all his soccer gear and has his passport ready. The tour will be paid for, but you may want to give him some extra spending money.
Kind regards,
Mr Angus Paterson, Headmaster
“This will never work, William!” I moaned. “My parents know what a terrible soccer player I am.”
“Rubbish,” came his curt reply. “They have no clue. They think everything you do is fantastic. That’s the advantage of being an only child – your parents have no one to compare you to! And your mom always goes to the gym for her 8 o’clock yoga class on Thursdays, and your dad will be stuck in traffic on his way to work. They won’t be here, so we can go ahead as planned.”
“Which involves what exactly?” I asked, feeling nervous.
“Tomorrow you must call this phone number and read out this message,” said William, ignoring my question and handing me a note. It was the neatly typed number of an international freight transport company with a friendly request to collect a crate from our home address for overnight air-freight to Turkey. My father’s credit card number was listed to cover the transport costs.
Only then did I realise what his grand plan was.
Fast Mail to Turkey
“You can’t be serious, William!” I cried out. “Do you honestly believe you and I can shut ourselves in that crate and get posted off all the way to Turkey?”
“Absolutely,” he grinned. He looked so confident that I was almost convinced that the plan would work. Maybe he was right after all … except:
“Uh, how long will the journey take? I mean, what do we do when we need the toilet?”
William looked unconcerned. “About a day. I have a very strong bladder. I’ll be fine. And I’m sure you can come up with a plan – just spare me the details!”
I could see it wasn’t going to help to argue. William always had an answer for everything. All I could do was go along with his plan and do as he said.
* * *
That Thursday morning I said goodbye to my parents, who were thrilled that I had turned into such a star soccer player – if only they knew the truth. “Son, I am so proud of you. Try and score some goals, okay?” my father said, beaming.
“And don’t forget to write!” my mom said, wagging a finger, her eyes glistening with tears.
As soon as they had left, William and I scurried around the house getting a few last-minute things together. I made our sandwiches, grabbed some extra underwear, a warm hat and a jacket. My mom had put my wallet with some overseas money and my passport into a side pocket of my backpack. At the last minute, I also stuffed my harmonica into my jeans pocket. I couldn’t really kick a ball to save my life, but I was rather good at playing some lively tunes on the little instrument.
William
