Ivy and the Puppy's Lead

Ivy could whistle two whole notes, low then high, like a small kettle. Nobody else on her lane could do it. She whistled at birds. She whistled at the wind. Then Nutmeg came to live next door, a puppy the colour of toast, with ears too big for his head, and Ivy decided she would whistle him into being her best friend.

"He has to learn his name first," said Nan, who kept the garden between their two houses. "And you have to learn to hold his lead."

Ivy held the lead. Nutmeg pulled the other way, toward a bee. He pulled toward a leaf. He pulled toward nothing at all, just for the fun of pulling, and sat down hard in the wet grass.

"Nutmeg," said Ivy, kindly. Nutmeg looked at a beetle.

She tried the whistle. Low, then high. Nutmeg's big ears went up like two little sails — and he trotted three steps closer, then got distracted by his own tail and spun around twice, tumbling into the wildflowers that had sprung up all over the hillside after the rain. Ivy laughed so hard she had to sit down too.

She tried again from further off. Low, then high. This time Nutmeg came galloping, ears flapping, and skidded straight into her knees, knocking her flat with a soft oof. He licked her chin like it was the most interesting thing in the garden.

"You knew my whistle," Ivy said, delighted, flowers stuck in her hair.

"That's not your whistle he knows," said Nan, smiling. "That's you he's learning. He'll come for the sound because it's yours."

Ivy whistled once more, quietly, just to check. Nutmeg's ears twitched, and he pressed his warm toast-coloured head against her arm and sighed, a long doggy sigh, and did not move again, not even for the beetle.