Coming Home to Story

Captain Midnight here, your Care in the Community correspondent.

I suppose it had to happen sometime, but I confess I didn’t see it coming. Himself came out with me for my morning stroll today and I noticed that he was walking rather awkwardly. After a couple of hundred yards, a look of bemused concern came over his face.

He looked up at the sky for enlightenment and then at me, as if to ask what was going on. The cause of his discomfort was pretty obvious but I decided it would be kinder to let him find out for himself. He hobbled on for another 50 yards with me trotting along beside him. It wasn’t until we turned the corner by the postbox to go up Windmill Lane that it occurred to him to look down.

Two completely different shoes: one red, one brown.

“Ah,” he said, with that razor-sharp perspicacity for which he was once famous. “I expect that’s it.”

The dear old chap was obviously a bit embarrassed. “They were under the bed, this morning,” I said, taking pity on him. “Perhaps I moved them around by mistake while you were asleep?”

“Yes, I expect that’s the reason,” he said, seizing on this scant morsel of hope. “I wasn’t really looking when I put them on. It could happen to anyone… couldn’t it?”

He didn’t sound entirely convinced, but meekly followed me back to Folly Cottage for breakfast. While he made the toast, I went upstairs to fetch the other mismatched pair and present them for his inspection. “Phew!” he said. “At least I didn’t put them in the fridge.”

I jumped on his lap and gave his chops a friendly lick.

It’s only a matter of time, I thought.