Brilliant (9 page)

It was moving, just a shadow, right under a bunch of small trees, in front of a huge, long building.

They knew the building. They'd been here before, loads of times. They were at the Liffey Valley Shopping Centre.

The Dog was a shadow moving through other shadows. A darker shadow, sliding, rolling slowly. Gloria could feel her heart pumping.

“Come on,” said Raymond.

“There's not much blood in a shadow,” said Ernie, and he sounded disappointed.

Gloria tried to laugh. But she couldn't. Her mouth was too dry.

There were no cars or people—it was very late. It was just Raymond, Gloria, Ernie. And the shadow. Raymond ran straight at it.

He couldn't believe he was doing this, running at his biggest fear, charging straight into darkness. “But,” he thought, “it's only a shadow.” He knew that shadows were easily explained. They were made of light and shade. So he wasn't just surprised when his hands touched something solid.

He was terrified.

“Aaah!”

“What's the story?” said Ernie.

“I felt it!”

“Felt what, Rayzer?” said Gloria.

“The Dog,” said Raymond. “The fur.”

“But there's nothing here,” said Gloria. “It's gone.”

She was right—but she wasn't. There was no dog near them, or in among the trees. But there
was
something.

The cold.

It seemed to be right over them now, a dark, icy cloud. Or a freezing, silent animal leaning over them.

“Ah, here,” said Ernie. “It's only a cloud.”

Now Gloria laughed.

“Brilliant!”

And the cloud—the weird patch of extra darkness—moved away.

“It's not even dog-shaped,” said Gloria.

They weren't sure now if it was even there.

“It was definitely fur,” said Raymond.

Gloria believed him. They were looking up at the sky, searching for the cloud, trying to make it out in the darkness.

“Poor Rayzer,” she said. “It must have been disgusting, was it?”

“A bit,” said Raymond.

“Here,” said Ernie. “Why are we doin' this, and anyway?”

“For Uncle Ben,” said Gloria. “Me and Rayzer's uncle. He's depressed.”

“And the Black Dog has stolen Dublin's funny bone,” Raymond told Ernie.

“And Uncle Ben will get better if we can get the funny bone back,” said Gloria.

“Says who?” said Ernie.

“Our granny,” said Gloria.

“Ah, well, then,” said Ernie. “Fair enough.”

“Do you know our granny, Ernie?”

“No,” said Ernie. “But I always feel brainier after I've drunk a granny's blood.”

“Really?”

“On the level.”

“Deadly,” said Gloria. “But you're to promise not to drink our granny's blood, Ernie. She'd freak out, she would. Ernie?”

“Wha'?”

“Promise.”

“Okay,” said Ernie. “I promise. But it's against me principles.”

“That's it there,” said Raymond, pointing down the street, and up. “Look.”

The cloud was back—it was definitely there.

“Is it only a cloud, Rayzer?”

Gloria hoped it was, just a cloud behaving strangely. But that made her feel bad because she knew she was supposed to hope it was the Dog. But this—the cloud, the shape, whatever it was—was more frightening than a solid dog, even a huge one, would have been.

“Rayzer?” she said. “Is it only a cloud?”

“I heard you the first time,” said Raymond.

They stood still, looking.

“Well, is it?” Gloria.

“Don't know,” said Raymond. “Don't think so.”

“Is it a mirage?”

“Wrong time of day, honey,” said Ernie. “You only see mirages in the daytime, I think.”

“It has to be hot for a mirage,” said Raymond.

“Then it's definitely not a mirage,” said Ernie. “I'm freezin'.”

“Maybe it's nothing,” said Gloria.

She knew what she was doing, what they were doing. They were filling the air around them with their voices, protecting
themselves against the silence. The cloud was less scary while they talked.

“Maybe it's just something we think we can see,” she said.

But, as Gloria spoke, they watched the cloud sink to the street, and it stopped being something they thought they'd seen and became something solid and real that they could definitely see. The cloud had black streaks that looked like legs. They touched the ground.

“The Dog!”

“Oh my God!”

A big black dog. A big, ordinary dog—they could even hear his paws smack the ground as he ran away.

What they'd just seen, a strange cloud changing into a black dog, was frightening, nothing close to anything Gloria and Raymond had ever seen before. But the result of the change was far less terrifying. The Black Dog was scary—but he was still just a dog.

“Come on!”

They ran down a road that was a steep hill, where cars leaving the shopping center rolled onto the main road, back to Dublin or away in the other direction, to the country. There were no cars or trucks now, though—it was too late. They had to slow down because the slope was making them go too fast. Their chests and heads were going ahead of their legs, and they'd have toppled over. They could see the Dog clearly under the streetlights. They could see his coat gleaming, like he was healthy and well looked after.

Gloria knew which way they were going. She knew she lived in Dublin West and that the rest of Dublin was to the east. She'd learned that in school. She'd followed the main road, the N4, on the map with her finger, from where she lived to the city center. She'd loved it, that you could see a real place, a place as big as Dublin, on a page that fit into a schoolbook. They were running east now, toward the city—or “town,” as their parents always called it. Farther east, there was Dublin Bay and the sea. The River Liffey flowed east too. It was beside them, somewhere near, to their left—although Gloria couldn't see or hear it. They wouldn't see the river till they got to town, but Gloria didn't know if they'd have to go that far before they caught up with the Black Dog. She didn't know—she just ran.

Raymond was the first to run off the sloping road and onto the N4. “This is great,” he thought. “I'm doing something.” He was chasing the Dog. He wasn't sure why, exactly. It wasn't as clear as that. He just knew that the Dog had the funny bone. He couldn't see the bone sticking out of the Dog's mouth, and he hadn't seen it earlier, when the Dog had climbed out of the cloud.

But, for now, that didn't matter. He was chasing the Dog. He was saving his Uncle Ben.

There were cars here, all going in the same direction as Gloria, Raymond, and Ernie. They were running on the hard shoulder—that was what the side of the road was called. The car lights lit the Dog ahead of them. They hadn't been running for long, so Gloria had plenty of breath for talking.

“Why's it called the hard shoulder?”

She asked Ernie, because he was the oldest.

“Haven't a clue,” said Ernie. “'Cos it's hard, I suppose.”

“Maybe it's called that because you'd break your shoulder if you fell on it.”

“Nice one,” said Ernie.

Raymond was well ahead of them now.

“Hurry up!” he shouted back.

“What's his problem?” said Ernie.

“He's right,” said Gloria. “Come on.”

Raymond could hear his sister and Ernie catching up. He didn't want to be by himself when he caught up with the Dog. But he wasn't scared—not really.

“Sorry, Rayzer.”

It was Gloria beside him, puffing from the effort. Ernie was beside him too. But he wasn't moving his arms or feet. He was standing straight, like a statue, but rolling along beside them.

“Are they skates?” Raymond asked, and he pointed at Ernie's shiny shoes.

“Not at all,” said Ernie. “I just keep forgettin' I can do this.”

“Do what, Ernie?”

“Dunno,” said Ernie. “I suppose you'd call it glidin'.”

“Deadly.”

“Yeah,” said Ernie. “One of the perks of the job.”

“Can you carry me?”

“I can, yeah,” said Ernie. “But I won't.”

They stopped talking then. They weren't tired yet—not nearly—but talking took too much breath and energy. And the passing traffic was hard work too. The cars and trucks cut through the air and sent invisible waves that shoved right against them and nearly pushed them off the hard shoulder. Paper flew around them, and empty plastic bottles bounced between their feet. But it didn't stop or slow them down.

They didn't speak. They kept going and they kept up with the Dog. Small stones flew from under car wheels and shot past, low, sometimes whacking their shoes and trouser legs. But it was good, Raymond and Gloria decided, although they didn't say it to each other. The stones, the bottles, and the trucks—they were all trying to slow them down, to stop them. But they couldn't, because Gloria and Raymond wouldn't let them. They were fighting, and winning. A sharp little stone nipped Gloria's ankle, but she didn't care. She was doing this for her Uncle Ben. A stinging ankle didn't matter.

Sometimes they seemed to be catching up, even though they were getting a bit tired now and Ernie had forgotten that he could glide. His shiny vampire shoes were a bit big for him
and they were slapping the road as he ran. Sometimes the Dog seemed to be getting away, but they could still hear him—his breath and his paws on the road—just ahead.

Gloria had a thought.

“Is he letting us chase him?”

Raymond had been thinking the same thing.

“Don't know,” he said. “Maybe.”

“But why?”

“Don't know.”

“It might be a trap,” said Ernie.

“Yeah,” said Raymond. “But what kind?”

“The usual,” said Ernie.

“What's that?”

“One you get caught in.”

But they kept running. Trap or no trap, they still had to catch the Black Dog.

They could see the Phoenix Park ahead, and the shape of the trees. They were surprised, and pleased. It usually took ages to get this far in their dad's car. But there it was, just ahead. The trees were a blacker shape against the black of the night sky.

“What's that noise?”

They could hear other feet, other shoes hitting the ground, behind and nearly beside them—a few at first, then more. Gloria slowed down, so she could look.

“What's going on, Rayzer?”

They began to see the other kids. They came running out of the dark. There were two of them, then four, eight—more.

Boys and girls, brothers and sisters, like Gloria and Raymond, and others by themselves. No grown-ups. All kids—children.

All of them were running.

And Gloria knew: They were all chasing the Black Dog.

CHAPTER 8

B
ut the Dog was gone.