Like the
Queen Mary on her final voyage to California, Winnie has continued to steam about in the background of cottage life at a slow sedately pace.
Most afternoons she is able to walk the hundred yards or so to
Trendy Carol's garden , where she ignores the warm shade of the privet, favouring more the comfy sofa in her all glass conservatory.
But that is as much as she does now, and remains tired enough not to leave the cottage on longer walks or even for lengthy trips in the car.
But sometimes the old girl gets a certain glint in her eye
And this is where a sense of devilment seems to overtakes her
It's a quiet humour that's often perfectly timed
Almost as if
Miriam Margolyes has taken over her body in a comedy vignette
Today, quite unexpectedly she decided to come to bed with me after shift.
Now she has not done this for months and months, preferring to sit in the reading chair in the kitchen or on the couch in the living room but after several deep breaths she plodded up their staircase with all the finesse of
Big Daddy from
Cat On A Hot Tin Roof and kicked open the bedroom door with one mighty swing of a forepaw.
With dramatic effect she stood in the doorway waiting for a reaction
What do you want ? I asked her , not playing her game, and the old girl schlepped on the antique wooden floorboards until she faced the bed without glancing at me at all.
Here she sat thinking
She thinks a great deal
All bulldogs do.
Finally, and with much effort she placed both front paws on the bedrame and jumped with a loud grunt.
Mary was bright enough to have already moved out of the way of a dog the size of the Queen of Tonga landing on the duvet but Dorothy being rather challenged in the intelligence stakes lay in a direct trajectory and as Winnie landed she booted Dorothy to one side like a miniature football.
And there she stayed, spent and content.
I slept to the right of her, my head on my pillow next to her head on hers.
A massive paw rested against my shoulder rather tenderly
Both of us snoring like pigs in warm mud.
Mary, Dotty and finally Albert squished in the base of the bed as best they could
As the old Queen rested in her bulldog sleep,
Secure she had made all of her decisions herself,
Perhaps for one final time
