Bobo was a basset hound with ears so long they dragged along the ground like two sleepy scarves. His nose was the size of a plum and twice as useful. And tonight, he had a very important job. Sniff, sniff, sniff. The lady at the bakery looped a small paper bag around Bobo's neck. Inside: six cheese biscuits, still warm, for Ida's supper. Outside: rain. Lots of it. Bobo waddled out onto the cobblestones, bag swinging, ears immediately dipping into the nearest puddle.
Sniff, sniff, sniff. Oh. OH. Bobo's left ear had found something extraordinary — old bread, river mud, and something that smelled powerfully of sardines. His whole body swung left, then right, then hard left toward a lamppost. He walked into it with a soft, dignified bonk and sat down to reconsider. The paper bag swayed. The biscuits stayed dry — because Bobo's ears, draped over the bag like a little tent, were keeping every raindrop off. Bobo did not notice this. He was already moving again, nose twitching at a crisp packet wedged under a bicycle wheel.
He had just decided the crisp packet was not cheese and therefore not his problem when he heard it. A very small sound. Smaller than rain. Smaller than a dropped coin. A tiny, uncertain peep. There, in the gutter, stood a duckling. Yellow as a pencil. It was staring straight down into a puddle, peeping softly at its own reflection, absolutely convinced it had found a friend. The rain pattered on its head. It did not care. Bobo approached slowly, ears fanning out across the wet cobblestones. He sniffed the duckling once. The duckling peered up at him, then back at its reflection, then back at Bobo, deeply unsure which one was more interesting.
Bobo knew about the park pond. His nose knew everything. He gave the duckling one gentle nudge with the very tip of his plum-sized nose, and the duckling wobbled forward. Then another nudge. Then another. They moved together through three puddles and around a bicycle wheel — Bobo nudging, the duckling peeping, the paper bag swaying, the big ears dragging like twin rudders through the wet. A woman in a yellow mac watched from a doorway and said absolutely nothing, because some things are simply too good to interrupt.
The pond appeared through the park gate, black and shining under the rainy sky. The duckling waddled straight to the edge, slid in with the tiniest splash, and paddled two circles. Then it turned and looked at Bobo once, very seriously, before sailing away into the dark water. Bobo shook himself from nose to tail. Then he turned, found the smell of warm cheese biscuits still hanging in the air around his own neck, and remembered he had somewhere to be. Sniff, sniff, sniff.
Ida's door was lit up orange at the end of the lane. Bobo climbed the step, sat down, and waited. When Ida opened the door, she found one extremely soggy basset hound, ears dripping, tail going like a slow windscreen wiper. She opened the bag. Six cheese biscuits — perfectly dry. And sitting on top, stuck there like a medal, was one small yellow feather. Ida looked at Bobo. Bobo looked at Ida. He blinked his long, serious eyes once, and let her scratch behind his ear.
