Barking Up the Right Tree

7 After nearly two months, my life in Ashton Mead had settled into a comfortable routine. My only disquiet centred on my next door neighbour. All I had been able to learn about Alice was that her daughter was away travelling. Everyone in the village knew Sophie, but no one was able to tell me very much about her, and no one seemed to know exactly where she had gone. When I had first moved to Rosecroft, the fence between Alice’s property and my own had intrigued me. I couldn’t work out why anyone might want a fence like that in Ashton Mead. Now, every time I went out in the back garden, Poppy would run straight over to Alice’s fence and whimper, for no apparent reason. My dog’s obsession with the fence fuelled my own curiosity. ‘It’s not as if there’s a crime wave around here,’ I said to Hannah one day. ‘She can’t be worried about her security, can she? So why do you think it’s there?’ Hannah shrugged. ‘It’s just a fence. It’s her garden. To be honest, I didn’t even know it was there until you started going on about it. Why shouldn’t she put up a fence? What’s the big deal?’ ‘It’s not a normal fence,’ I replied, irritated that she was so uninterested in something that intrigued me. Preoccupied with Poppy, I soon forgot about my neighbour, but my curiosity was rekindled by seeing her coming home with several shopping bags over her arm. I was just setting off for work, but halted in surprise on seeing her walking towards me. Since I was standing between her and her front gate, she had no choice but to stop. Poppy growled; when I stepped forward, she let out a frenzied bark and seized the hem of my trousers in her teeth and tried to pull me away. Ignoring Poppy’s antics, I tried again. ‘Hello, Alice,’ I greeted her in a loud voice. It had occurred to me that perhaps the reason she hadn’t responded to my earlier greeting was because she was hard of hearing. On the few occasions I had spotted her from a distance, her bowed shoulders and shuffling gait suggested a woman older than the forty or so years she appeared to be close up. She had dark eyes and a thin pointed nose, and looked somehow faded, as though she might once have been lively and attractive. All of this flashed through my mind as we faced one another in the street. ‘I’m Emily,’ I called out. ‘I’ve moved in next door to you. I live at Rosecroft,’ I added, jerking my head fatuously in the direction of my house. Even the most socially diffident of people could hardly refuse to acknowledge so friendly a greeting. The woman tilted her head back slightly so she could look at me. With a wariness that was almost palpable, she glared at me while I repeated my greeting. ‘Yes, yes,’ Alice said testily, breaking her silence at last. ‘I know who you are. I heard all about you from Maud.’ While my neighbour was speaking, Poppy rose up and pressed her front paws against my legs, as though she wanted to push me towards Rosecroft. Leaning down to tell Poppy to desist, I saw Alice spin on her heel and turn away from me. With the movement, one of her shopping bags swung on her arm and tilted. Several apples and oranges burst from the bag. Cascading to the ground, they rolled along the pavement in a colourful jumble. Poppy immediately gave chase, tugging at her lead and letting out a frustrated yelp each time she nudged a piece of fruit with her nose and sent it spinning out of reach. ‘I’m sorry, I’m really sorry,’ I stammered, pulling on Poppy’s lead to stop her from reaching any more of my neighbour’s fruit. ‘She’s not disobedient, really she’s not. She thinks it’s a game.’ I lunged at Poppy, but she was too quick and darted out of reach. She was having far too much fun to stop. Eventually I seized her and held her under one arm while Alice retrieved her fruit. I crouched down and gathered up those I could reach with my free hand, and dropped them into a fallen bag. Most of the oranges appeared to have survived intact, but a few apples had become bruised in their tumble, and one or two had bite marks from Poppy’s exuberant assaults on them. ‘She was just playing,’ I repeated as I put Poppy down. ‘She didn’t mean any harm. I’ll pay for the damage.’ Alice sniffed disapprovingly. ‘You should keep your animal under control.’ Poppy backed away from my neighbour, crouched down and began to growl, baring her teeth. I had never seen her behave so aggressively before. ‘She’s only a puppy,’ I retorted, stung by the implied criticism of my dog handling. ‘And anyway, you were the one who dropped your shopping. It was hardly Poppy’s fault if you dumped a load of apples right in front of her. It’s only natural she’d want to play with them. She’s a puppy and that’s what puppies do. So you’ve got no cause to complain. In fact, you’re the one who should be apologising. We live next door to each other and you’ve been avoiding me ever since I moved here.’ Alice seemed taken aback by the vehemence of my attack. ‘That’s not true,’ she responded coldly. ‘Well, maybe not deliberately avoiding me, but you haven’t exactly welcomed me to the village as a neighbour should. You don’t seem to want to even say hello when we see each other. Given that I’ve moved in next door to you, and we’re bound to bump into each other from time to time, that’s hardly neighbourly. We live next door to each other, so we might at least try to be civil to one another.’ Alice frowned. ‘I had no intention of being uncivil,’ she said. That was a blatant lie, but I let it go. At least we were talking now. ‘Do you have any pets?’ I enquired. Unless she had a dog, or perhaps chickens, I could see no reason for the metal fence which had piqued my curiosity, but I hadn’t heard any animal noises coming from her garden. ‘No,’ she replied. ‘I work at the tea shop,’ I went on, hoping that by sharing something about myself it might encourage her to be more forthcoming. ‘You should come in for tea one day.’ ‘I have a kettle,’ she replied, deliberately missing the point. ‘And now move aside so I can go home.’ She might deny being uncivil, but that didn’t alter the fact that she was being rude to me. Realising that I had returned to my earlier position in front of her gate, blocking her entrance, I hesitated. I could hardly prevent her from entering her own home, but I didn’t want to lose the opportunity to look around inside her house. ‘Would you like me to help you take your shopping inside?’ I asked, keeping hold of the bag of fruit I had gathered from the pavement. She scowled at me. Poppy began growling again and Alice seemed to reach a decision. ‘I don’t want that feral dog coming in,’ she said, glaring sourly at Poppy who was barking furiously again. ‘I can tie Poppy up outside for a few minutes,’ I replied, keen to see inside Alice’s house. ‘She won’t be any trouble. You keep to the path and no digging in the earth,’ I told my dog sternly. As though she understood I was cross with her, Poppy hung her head, but she kept her eyes fixed on Alice. I hoped she wouldn’t begin burrowing among the plants as soon as my back was turned, and followed Alice without much confidence that Poppy would sit still while she waited for me to return. There were plenty of plants within reach that she might be tempted to dig up, but I wanted to see inside Alice’s house, and decided not to worry too much about her front garden. It was her back garden that interested me. If I could only get a glimpse of it from inside the house, I might solve the mystery that had been puzzling me since I moved in. Until I saw for myself, I could only speculate about what might be hidden on the other side of the fence bordering my garden. Clutching a bag of bruised fruit, I followed my neighbour, ignoring the sounds of frantic barking that started up behind me as I crossed the threshold. It struck me that Poppy seemed to want to warn me not to go inside, but I dismissed the thought at once. If Alice was hiding anything, Poppy could have no more idea what it might be than I had. But I intended to discover the truth.