My sister, when a young girl, was bitten on the bum by a German Shepherd.
Not the job title, the dog breed.
Back then they weren’t called German Shepherds. They were Alsatians, but their bite was pretty much identical.
We kids liked to spend time at Gran and Pop’s butcher shop.
There was fun in abundance. Skating on the sawdusty floor; peeling the fat from kidneys, scoffing parsley from the window display; making sausages; pumping pickled pork; locking each other in the cool room and, of course, the high-stakes swordfights with butcher’s knives.
The cellar. A real one, where we would lurk for hours and get up to stuff. You could look up through this grate to the footpath outside.
There were two great things about that grate.
First, you would not believe the awesome dosh in the form of coinage that came down through the grate. I don’t know whether it was young lovers mistaking it for the Trevi Fountain or punters with holes in their pockets. All we knew was it would keep us in licorice cigarettes and aniseed sticks indefinitely.
Second, when we’d finished scavenging for coins we could stick our fingers up through the grate and moan pitifully, stuff like: Ohhhhhh! Won’t you please help a lost soul?
I’m trapped! Send for help. Get me out of here. Quick, oh quick, they’re coming.
Hey you, send word to Cucamunga!
Occasionally, someone would try to stamp on our fingers, but we were too quick.
Anyway, on the day of the attack, Helen was out on the footpath talking to Rosie Marino from the fruit shop next door and I was in the cellar rehearsing a new and pitiful wail of imprisoned agony to send up through the grate.
Break my fingers. Chop my very liver, but I will never, ever, tell. Aieeeeee!
The ‘Aieeeeeeeeee!’ seemed to go on forever – well after I’d stopped shrieking.
Wait, it was someone else squealing.
It was Helen, and it was for real.
I dropped everything immediately and raced upstairs.
No, actually I counted up all the coins I’d collected first, but I did it fairly quickly: my sister needed me.
The footpath was a sea of butchers, grandparents, fruiterers, concerned citizens and rubbernecks.
An enormous hound under restraint.
In centre throng stood a stepladder.
Helen huddled, cowering, squealing and cradling her buttock on the second bottom rung.
On the next rung stood Cecil the window cleaner bloke, looking just as upset and trying to kick her off the ladder.
Pop took charge. Sis was retrieved, cuddled and consoled. The buttock was bared and inspected before a rapt audience.
Oooh!
Ouch!
Poor little thing!
There oughta be a law!
Although stitches weren’t indicated, the skin was broken and the bruising was heavy. Helen would need the dreaded Tetanus Needle.
I was mortified. It was common knowledge among kids that the Tetanus Needle was enormous, blunt and generally fatal.
The entire Marino family fell to their knees and begged forgiveness.
Crucifixes were brandished, and watermelon slices were distributed.
Gran responded with a ‘Don’t be silly’ and ‘Beautiful melon, Mrs Marino.’
What had actually happened?
One moment Prince had been lounging among the lettuce crates and the next he was leaping at Helen and sinking his fangs into her rearmost region.
She’d run to the window cleaner’s ladder for safety, but Cecil had taken a dim view of what he considered a hostile takeover of his business and proceeded to repel boarders with a wet squeegee and extreme prejudice.
Had Helen razzed the dog up?
Had he just been protecting Rosie?
The impromptu Commission of Inquiry simply concluded that Alsatians were ‘vicious brutes’, and that was that.
Prince lived to bite another day and Helen never did die from the generally fatal Tetanus Needle.
You want to know what I think?
It’s simple.
Prince went mental.
Why?
Because Prince lived in a fruit shop.
A fruit shop.
A fruit shop next to a butcher’s shop.
The torment! A hell of veganity.
Surrounded by beans, quinces and brussels sprouts when what he craved was chump chop, sirloin and gravy bones.
And out trots Helen, reeking of lamb chop, tripe and sausages.
In his delusional delirium he innocently mistook her for silverside.
Not guilty, on the grounds of temporary insanity. Open and shut.
A lesson to us all.
Bullgoose.
and then