“Paint,” said Horace.
They stood in the back yard of an empty house near the butcher’s shop. Silverside had suggested it would be a good place to hide the lawnmower. There they could work on it in the daytime, with no-one to disturb them.
“Paint,” repeated Tickety. Dipping the brush in a jar of silver paint, she handed it to Horace.
Horace paused. “You’re sure your human won’t mind us painting his lawnmower, Ragbag?”
“Of course not!” she barked. “He’ll have the most beautiful lawnmower in town. And the fastest.”
Horace was convinced. Holding the brush in his mouth, he carefully painted a silver zigzag along the lawnmower’s side. Boo bounced forward with a jar full of red glitter and hurled it at the wet paint.
“That’s more like it,” he said with satisfaction. “Other side!”
Soon the whole lawnmower, including the tyres, was covered in glittery scarlet and silver lightning-strokes.
“Now, how do we make tail-fins?” asked Horace.
“I thought we could paint these pizza cartons silver to match,” said Tickety, “and then stick them to the grass box.”
The pizza cartons were duly painted and stuck on.
Horace stood back to admire his work. “Not bad... but I feel it’s missing something,” he muttered.
“A 250 brake horsepower engine,” said Kimi.
“No, no. Something else.”
“A name!” said Tickety. “It needs a name written on the side! The Sensational Staggering Houndmobile!”
“Too long.”
“Just call it the Staggerer,” said Kimi.
Horace stared at his car, perplexed. “There’s nowhere left to paint a name. I don’t want to spoil all the lightning flashes.”
Silverside nodded. “What your car needs is a wall to paint the name on. And it needs a roof to keep you dry.”
“Oh, that’s just what it needs,” said Kimi.
“You think so?” Horace asked.
She rolled her eyes. “Why not just stick your dog-house on the top?”
“Wow!” Horace wagged his tail delightedly. “What a brilliant idea! Thank you! I’ll go and fetch my dog-house right this minute. Silverside, you’re strong: you come and help.”
So the two dogs trotted off to the Hays’ house and through the side gate into the garden.
“There it is,” said Horace.
“Nice dog-house,” said Silverside, scratching his ear, “but how are we going to get it back across town?”
“I’ve already thought of that!” Horace ran to the porch and came back with Joshua’s skateboard. “Help me lift the dog-house onto this,” he panted.
The dog-house was not fixed to the ground. Between them, they were able to lift it up and balance it, rather precariously, on the skateboard.
“You’d better walk on one side,” suggested Horace, “and I’ll walk on the other.”
In this way, with one dog leaning on each side, they kept the dog-house upright on the skateboard as they rolled it along. People stopped and pointed, smiling at the sight of a dog-house trundling through the streets.
“They’re admiring it,” said Horace proudly. “This is going to look so good on top of the lawnmower! Really amazing and – uh-oh!”
Across the road, a large dog turned its grizzled head towards them. Justine...
“Keep going,” Horace muttered to Silverside.
But the police dog had already spotted them. She walked stiffly across the road and blocked their way.
“Where are you going with that?” she demanded.
“It’s mine,” Horace said with dignity. “I’m not stealing it. Look, it’s got my name on it; that proves it.”
“So what are you doing with it?”
“I’m just, er, taking it for a walk,” said Horace.
“You’re taking your kennel for a walk?”
“We’re in a hurry,” barked Silverside. “We’re on an urgent mission. Let us pass!”
Reluctantly, Justine stood aside. The dog-house trundled on. When Horace glanced back over his shoulder, he saw Justine following with an unfriendly glint in her eye.
“Speed up,” he hissed.
“I can’t go any faster!” puffed Silverside. “This thing’s heavy, and it keeps slipping off the skateboard!”
Horace felt himself grow hot and bothered. He didn’t want to lead Justine to the Houndmobile. It was meant to be a secret.
He had to divert her...
So, when they reached the empty house where the Houndmobile was hidden, he murmured to Silverside, “Don’t go in here! Keep walking to the rose garden.”
“The rose garden?”
“Just do it!”
The rose garden was a tiny park further down the road. It was little more than a square of grass with a rose bed in the middle.
Panting, the two dogs pushed the dog-house into the park. “We’ll stay here for a while until she’s gone,” said Horace.
But Justine stood in the gateway and stared at them. Horace began to roll the dog-house round the rose bed. After one circuit, she was still there: so he did a second circuit. And a third.
“I’m getting dizzy,” complained Silverside.
“Keep going!” said Horace. “She’ll be tired of watching soon. Then she’ll go away.”
Justine did not go away. She lay down on the grass and kept gazing at them.
“How long do we have to keep this up for?” asked Silverside, as they circled the rose bed for the eighth time.
“Ssh! Don’t stop!”
“I can’t go on,” said Silverside as they went round for the fifteenth time. He sat down, panting for breath. The dog-house came to a halt.
Justine got to her feet and walked towards them. She bared her teeth in a warning snarl–
–and then jumped backwards in surprise. Something black and white had flashed across the grass in front of her, before disappearing into the hedge.
“What was that?” she barked. “It looked like a snake!”
A head poked out of the leaves. A forked tongue stuck out at Justine.
“Do you mean me?”
Justine began to woof a loud alarm. “Snake! Snake! Everybody out. Clear the area! It might be poisonous!”
“I might indeed,” said Kimi. She crept out of the hedge and advanced on Justine. “If I bite you, you might turn orange and swell up like a giant pumpkin.”
And she struck out at Justine. Her fangs just missed the police dog’s nose.
Justine yelped in horror. Spinning round, she ran out of the rose garden as if there was a crocodile clamped to her tail. They heard her barking all the way down the road.
“Deadly snake! Keep clear! Evacuate the area!”
Silverside backed away from Kimi. “Don’t swell me up like a pumpkin,” he begged.
“Oh, come on,” said Kimi. “Do I look poisonous? I’m a king snake. We’re known for our charming and delightful natures.”
“You arrived in the nick of time!” said Horace gratefully. “How can I ever thank you?”
“Chocolate,” said Kimi longingly.
“More chocolate?”
“You’d still be running round the rose bed if I hadn’t come looking for you. Hadn’t you better hurry up and move that thing before Justine comes back?”
Horace saw the sense in that. So he and Silverside carefully shuffled the dog-house out of the park and over to the deserted back-yard, well out of sight.
There, it took all three dogs to lift it on to the lawnmower.
“It’s a bit wobbly,” said Ragbag doubtfully.
“I’ll tie it on with my bungee ropes,” said Boo.
“And I’ll finish painting it,” said Horace. He paused. “There’s just one thing worrying me a tiny bit. Even with all our improvements, will sixteen horse-power be enough?”
Kimi smiled. “Oh, bound to be,” she said smoothly. “I’ve worked out that your Houndmobile must be at least sixty-four thousand hamster-power. Proba
bly slightly more.”
“Wow!” gasped Tickety.
“Yay! Hamster Power!” Boo did a cartwheel.
“Well, that’s wonderful,” said Horace, much reassured. “In that case, we’ll have no trouble against those cats. Roll on race night! Because what are we going to do?”
All his four-legged friends replied in chorus.
“We’re going to win! Win! Win!”
Chapter Eight