Page 35 of The Secret Christmas Bookshop
She was about to ask what the top score was now – it hadbeen a while since she’d played, but Harry mentioning it had unearthed a dormant competitiveness – when Fiona appeared in the doorway, her cheeks flushed, her breaths coming in short, sharp bursts.
‘Quick,’ she said. ‘Quick, Sophie!’
‘What’s wrong?’ Sophie had never seen her friend so panicked.
‘It’s Felix,’ Fiona huffed out. ‘Felix is on the rampage.’
‘Felix …’ It took a moment for her brain to kick into gear. Harry’s goat. The sweetest thing she’d ever seen, who loved paisley knitted jumpers. ‘On therampage?’
‘He’s in Birdie’s garden,’ Fiona explained, as Sophie wished Annie a hurried goodbye and they raced up Perpendicular Street. ‘I don’t think there’s going to be anything left if we don’t get him out of there soon.’
Birdie’s house was one road back from the green, an ancient flint cottage surrounded by gardens that looked like a fairy grotto. There were mature, twisting trees, grasses that added shades of green, blue and yellow throughout the year, a vegetable plot that changed with the seasons. Right now a winter jasmine was lush with delicate yellow flowers, and Sophie remembered how dreamlike her garden had looked in summer, the burst of colour and scent, the myriad flowers the old woman had nurtured to perfection. On first glance it gave the impression of being wildly overgrown, until you looked closer and saw order in the chaos.
As Sophie and Fiona reached the cottage, they could hear voices coming from the back garden, Felix’s name being called, the high screech of a young girl. Lucy, Sophie thought, as they pushed open the gate and took the cobbled path round the side of the house.
Birdie was standing on her back doorstep, her arms folded over her chest. Her silver dress was covered in tiny, twinkling beads, her long grey hair pulled into a bun. Sophie was surprised to see Jazz standing next to her. She hadn’t seen her since the night they’d found her, and she looked better – less tired, less unkempt – but still had a restless energy about her that Sophie understood all too well.
‘Hey, Sophie.’ Jazz gave her a quick smile then turned back to the drama.
‘It’s good to see you, Jazz.’
‘You too,’ Jazz said distractedly. ‘Get a load of this.’
Thiswas Dexter, standing with his feet gingerly planted between two rows of winter vegetables, his arms outstretched, while Lucy hopped up and down on one of the meandering, paved walkways. Felix, wearing a purple jumper with a pattern Sophie couldn’t make out, was standing on the roof of the shed, munching on something.
‘I told you, Sophie!’ Fiona pressed her hands to her cheeks.
‘How did he get up there?’ Sophie asked.
‘He’s a goat,’ Dexter called. ‘Goats love jumping, and they love making mischief.’
‘It’s a rather ungrateful move, considering I’ve made him all those jumpers.’ Birdie turned her twinkling eyes on Sophie and Fiona. ‘It’s lovely to see you both.’
‘Are you OK?’ Fiona asked. ‘He’s destroying all your hard work.’
‘He’s a very small goat,’ Birdie said. ‘He’s trampled one of the grasses, stolen a couple of carrots and unearthed a sprout tree, but that was ready to harvest anyway.’
‘This is like a proper community garden,’ Jazz said, sounding awed. ‘There’s so much here.’
‘It’s wonderful, isn’t it?’ Sophie said. ‘You’re not angry, Birdie?’
‘I would rather he got down from the roof,’ Birdie mused, ‘and I don’t want to have theentirevegetable plot uprooted, but I do like seeing how well he is. It’s Dexter and Lucy who are making a big deal of it.’
As if to prove her point, Lucy squealed when Felix took a step closer to the edge of the roof.
‘He’ll be OK, Lucy!’ Dexter inched closer, as if there was an unexploded bomb up there rather than an adorable goat. ‘We just need to get him down.’
‘What if he falls?’ Lucy shouted.
‘He won’t, darling,’ Birdie said. ‘Goats are incredibly agile.’
Jazz put her hand over her mouth, probably to hide a grin.
It was, Sophie had to admit, a funny situation, but Lucy looked on the verge of tears.
Fiona went over and wrapped her arms around the girl. ‘Your dad will get him down,’ she said soothingly.
‘Someone needs to call Harry,’ Dexter shouted. ‘I have no fu— flipping clue how to get this goat to come down.’ He turned his head. ‘Sophie, can you do it? You know him better than I do.’
