Tail as Old as Time

Tail as Old as Time - Part 4

A great deal of Seth's excitement during Grace's first meal was for the success of his invention. Imagining and building made him happy, even if he now had to build for a dog. He saw her as an extension of the food machine, just another working part of the whole contraption.

Seth looked under the couch occasionally, and even though she had been there several days, he finally noticed Grace looked uncomfortable on the cold, hard wooden floor. He sent for a dog bed, and it arrived the next day along the network of flumes reaching to his back gate.

Grace trembled as he slid the pillowy cushion into her hiding spot. She sniffed at it tentatively, but wasn't able to lay down because the space between the top of the pillow and the bottom of the couch was too small even for a tiny puppy.

After peeking again at her hideaway, and seeing that the pillow was too tall for her cramped space, the Beast left the room. He came back and lifted the couch to wedge a stout wooden block under each of the feet. The couch stayed high enough that Grace could now snuggle into her soft new bed rather than continue lying on the unforgiving wooden floor.

Seth gave a satisfied grunt and left her alone.

Grace ate twice a day using the feeding contraption, but the Beast no longer stood at the opposite end of the room. Instead of sending food down a ramp himself, he had set the machine up to automatically drop treats in front her. As her comfort level rose, he dared to move closer to her during feeding time until he met the proximity where she would no longer come out to eat.

Luckily, his desk sat far enough away that Grace felt content to emerge when he sat there designing his inventions, so it became his routine to work while she ate.

Although Grace still found the Beast to be atrociously smelly, she saw him filling her food machine with puppy food and appreciated the soft bed he gave her. But in her heart she still wanted to go home, and kept her eyes open for any possible escape.

#

Every night, after the Beast retired to his room for the evening, Grace came out from under her couch to explore. Due to her mishap the first night, she took great care to be as silent as a feather so he would not be disturbed.

There did not appear to be any humans in the house, but the clear scent of human still existed in the rugs and the walls; the very framework. Grace thought the Beast must have scared them all away.

There were many rooms on the first level of the house and Grace knew them all by the end of a week. The large kitchen smelled strongly of lemons, and a well-stocked pantry stood tall and out of reach. She explored parlors with couches and chairs, a ballroom with ornate paintings on the walls but no furniture, a dining room filled with a great long cherry wood table, and a small powder room with its cold ceramic toilet bowl full of water.

But in every room the Beast kept the windows shut tight, and in some of the rooms the shades hung so long they completely blocked the glass panes. Grace found three doors to the outside, a front and back door, and a small side door from the kitchen. All were solid wood, and locked up tighter than a safe.

Grace could not escape her ornate prison, but she felt at home here at night. She found warm, comfortable places to rest and windows where she could peek out into the rose garden. Without the Beast awake to scare her, she could roam the halls and dream she lived here with a kind human master of her own.

The library was her favorite room in the house. She loved the way the books smelled, each one a different age, each from a unique source, each with its own layer of dust. In the library among the books, she could get lost in all of the different, comfortable scents, each one telling the story of where it had come from.

She often laid on a soft braided rug in the library set directly in front of a fireplace. Even though no fire burned in the grate, Grace could smell the long forgotten ashes and burnt charcoal mixed with the musty smell of the old books. It was here she fell asleep one evening and did not wake before the Beast.

#

As soon as Grace woke, she knew the Beast was there. His pungent odor filled her nostrils and made the hairs on her neck rise up. She did not open her eyes, thinking maybe if she pretended to be asleep he would leave her alone long enough to sneak to her regular hiding place across the hall.

But the Beast did not leave. He came closer and sat down on the rug, reaching his hand out to pet her, but Grace's natural desire for affection did not extend to the Beast.

Before he could touch her, she yipped and ran off to the den where she hid under the sofa. The Beast walked in a moment later, filled the food machine without a word, and sat down at his worktable to continue building his latest contraption.

The Beast did not try to pet her again, but that night when Grace explored the house, she found a fire in the library beside her braided rug. She slept soundly next to it, and the Beast did not come downstairs in the morning until she returned to her hiding spot in the den.

#

The new machine Beast had been working on was a tug of war game, and Grace loved it. The Beast tied a swath of cloths and ropes into a long knot and attached it to one end, then offered her the other from a reasonable distance away. When Grace pulled hard enough, she won the knotted toy. When she lost her grip, the Beast held it up tauntingly, then gave her another chance to win.

Sometimes, the Beast threw her a ball, but after grabbing it between her teeth she felt too afraid to get near him to give it back. Grace found it maddening because she wanted him to throw it again for her. When she finally gave up and abandoned the ball, he would walk close to her (she hid) and pick up the ball, then place it on a blue dot on one of his machines.

"See how I'm doing this, dog? Put the ball on the blue dot," the Beast set the ball on the dot, then held it up, then put it back on the blue dot. He repeated this gesture several times, and Grace thought he might be going crazy.

But when he set it on the blue dot and let go, and the ball rolled across the room to his desk. The Beast would go sit down, pick up the ball, and throw it again. Eventually Grace figured out that placing the ball on the dot sent it back to the Beast so she didn't have to get near him, but they could continue playing catch.

How her nubby little tail wagged when she solved the mystery! The first time she let go of the ball after placing it on the blue dot, Seth exploded with excitement, "Good girl, Grace!" he cried, "What a smart girl you are!"

She had almost forgotten it, but recognized Grace as her name, despite the fact she had been called nothing but dog since her arrival.