she thought purposefully, and then turned to watch the puppy find the feather-bag that Nicky had hidden in the reeds down by the stream, the puppy's long silky tail waving like a triumphant banner as she came to deliver it to her young master.
At last the boy and the dog came to sit at her feet together, and Nicky putone tanned bare arm around the puppy's neck and hugged her.
'Have you decided on a name for her yet?' Centaine asked. It had taken her almost two years to break down the child's resistance to her, but she felt that now she had at last won him over from his memories of Adra and his previous life.
'Yes, Nana. I want to call her Twenty-Six.' Nicxy's English had improved vastly since she had enrolled him at Western Province junior School.
'That's an unusual name. Why did you choose it?' 'I had another dog once - he was called Twenty-Six.' And yet Nicky's memories of that other time had almost faded.
'Well, that is an excellent reason - and it's a fine name. Dandy Twenty-Six of Weltevreden.' 'Yes! Yes!' Nicky hugged the puppy's neck. 'Dandy Twenty-Six.' Centaine looked down on him fondly. He was still a mixed-up and confused little boy, but he was a thoroughbred with the blood of champions in his veins.
Give us time, she thought. just give me a little more time with him.
'Shall I tell you a story, Nicholas?' she asked. She had the most wonderful family stories, of elephant hunts and lions, of wars with Boers and Zulus and Germans, of lost diamond mines and of fighter planes and a thousand other things to thrill the soul of a small boy.
So now she told him a story of shipwreck and of a castaway on a burning shore. She told him of a journey through a cruel desert with little yellow pixies as companions - and he walked every step of the enchanted way beside them.
At last she looked at her wristwatch and said: 'That's enough for today, young master Nicholas. Your mother will be wondering whatever has become of us.' Nicholas sprang up to help her to her feet, and the two of them walked down the hill towards the big house with the puppy gambolling around them.
They walked quite slowly, because Nana had a sore leg, and Nicky took her hand to help her over the rough places.
The End
