I shoo him back and peek inside, where it’s pitch black. Then I turn to Gray. “Science question. If I light a match in an enclosed area full of old chicken guano, will I blow up?”
“Really more of a chemistry question,” Gray says. “But no, the concern is methane, and this coop is not large enough to be dangerous. Still, may I at least do that part? Hold a match at the doorway for you?”
“Fine,” I say. Then add, “Thank you.”
He holds the lit match. I bend and enter, even as my eyes water from the smell.
There’s no dog inside. I figured that—I’d have heard it. But there is a bowl and a pile of what looks like feces. I check the bowl. Smeared blood and bits of meat suggest whatever food had been in there wasn’t for the chickens. The still-damp pile of feces definitely didn’t come from a chicken. What I find next clinches it: a gnawed bone. And beside the bone? A few shed dog hairs. Brown, bristly, terrier-like hairs.
I collect the bone and the hairs, exit, and hold them out to the guys. “I think we found Bobby.”
We’re right on time for getting to Roy before he begins his performance. McCreadie accompanies us and calls for a constable on the way. By “calls for a constable” I don’t mean rings him up. That isn’t possible, obviously. Instead, we veer into McCreadie’s district, and he speaks to the first constable he sees and passes on a message. He can’t just take that constable—the guy is on patrol, and this is hardly urgent. But he will tell the next constable he sees, until the message gets to someone who can swing by.
The message includes a request for the constable to hang back. Without a uniformed officer at his side, McCreadie can pass for a civilian. Well, he can in the sense that any plainclothes officer can, in a neighborhood where a sizable portion of the population makes it their job to memorize every cop’s face.
As we walk, some people fade into the shadows on seeing McCreadie. Just as many, though, tip their hats or murmur a hello, a reminder of how desperately people in difficult neighborhoods want to see a decent officer, someone they can trust not to haul them off to the station because they looked at him wrong.
We arrive just as Roy must be starting his performance, because we hear him over the general hubbub of the street.
“—one and only Greyfriars Bobby, resting under this sheet.”
I reach the small crowd and edge deeper into it, men reflexively stepping aside when they see me, which might be the one good thing about being a woman in this era. Like a small child, I have no problem getting to the front of a crowd.
There, at the center, is a man in his early twenties, with dark hair. He matches the description given by Dorrit’s two friends, though he’s missing the cowboy gear. Today, he’s dressed as a gentleman, though his suit is shabby, the jacket hanging loose, the trousers showing a good four inches of stockings. He even has a top hat, which he’s currently brandishing at a cage covered by a dingy sheet.
“You all know the story of Bobby, do you not?”
He doesn’t wait for a response before launching into the tale, complete with embellishments that would please Jack. Bobby was no mere pooch. He was his owner’s right-hand man—or dog—helping him solve case after case while rescuing small children along the way. No mention, of course, of the fact that John Gray was a night watchman, not a constable.
As Roy tells the stories, he intersperses them with side notes about Bobby’s failing health and the cost of getting him good care, while passing around his hat for donations to the cause. This is typical for tourist-area huckster shows—draw out the reveal as long as possible while collecting money.
“Poor wee Bobby is an old man,” Roy says, “and yet no one seems to have had the heart to take him home and care for him. Worse, they were going to take him out and shoot him.”
A gasp from the women and whimpers from the children.
“You may not know this,” Roy says, “but stray dogs are illegal in Edinburgh. They must all have a license. But fear not—I am paying for one for Bobby.”
The hat goes around again, and I bite my tongue against comment. Yes, stray dogs are illegal. Yes, they must be licensed. But the lord provost of Edinburgh himself pays Bobby’s annual license fee. That’s a known fact.
Roy continues, “I have warned you that he is elderly and unwell. So I must prepare the women and children for what they are about to see. Know that he is under the best of care and receiving only the most delicate victuals, thanks to the generosity of people like yourselves.”
Pass the hat again . . .
Roy begins to slowly pull back the sheet. “I would ask that no one come close or make too much noise, or you risk giving the wee fellow heart failure.”
I brace myself. He’d said Bobby was unwell, which is technically true, but everyone I’ve spoken to says he’s in fine shape for his age.
What has Roy done to him? Hurt him or?—
The sheet slides off, answering my question as I see the dog within lifting a groggy head from the tattered pillow on which he lies. He is indeed old—with that classic look of elderly dogs, stained whiskers and graying muzzle. He also matches the breed of dog I’ve seen in pictures.
“Behold Bobby, wee king of Greyfriars, the most loyal dog who ever lived,” Roy says.
“That is not Greyfriars Bobby,” says a voice that sounds remarkably like Gray’s.
“What?” Roy says. “Is there a naysayer among us? Who here has seen Bobby? You will know this is him, complete with the collar his master gave him and the new license on it.”
