The Mysteries of Brambly Hollow

the living room, she spied Quassi, standing by the French door, his nose crushed against the glass, his tapered tail rigid, as if he’d swallowed a snooker cue as it stuck out from his rump. Joining him she stared out. She couldn’t see anything which would account for such avid interest.
    “Come on,” she patted his head. Her touch seemed to release him from whatever spell had kept him riveted to the spot. Without even glancing up at her he was off. He shot across the room, feet scrabbling over the tiles. “Quassi,” she called desperately as she set off after him, remembering that she had left the door open. “Come back.” She knew she was wasting her breath. Emerging onto the drive she was just in time to catch a glimpse of his tail as it vanished around the side of the wall, heading in the direction of the farmhouse. Taking his lead from the hook, she set off after him. He really was the limit.
    Turning the bend, the farmhouse came into view. Her footsteps slowed of their own accord as her avoid-Elsa-phobia grabbed her by her shoe laces and tried to pull her back. Kicking away the restraints, she boldly soldiered on. To the side of the door sat an old metal wheelbarrow filled with grass clippings. Gazing around at the cracked concrete beneath her feet, Meli wondered where they could have come from. Pondering this, she was taken unprepared when the door opened and Elsa materialised. Dressed in a skin tight black tee shirt and a pair of three-quarter length black leggings, she looked like a stuffed and rolled turkey roulade, ready for the oven. Confronted by the spectacle, it was all Meli could do not to fall about laughing.
    “Morning Elsa,” she greeted, quickly managing to sober herself, controlling her trembling mouth. Elsa did not even glance at her as she wobbled past, her walking stick moving like a third leg. “I’m looking for Quassi. Have you seen him?”
    Elsa turned her head as if noticing her for the first time and squinted up at her through vacuous, raisin sized eyes. When she didn’t say anything, Meli took that to mean no.
    “Do you know anything about the trailer?” The question leaped out of Meli’s mouth before she had time to think about it. Her blood turned to water and drained down to her calves when Elsa threw back her head and brayed like a donkey on heat, mouth wide, revealing her tombstone teeth in all their gruesome glory - a place where even the most strong-stomached dentist would baulk at entering. The loose tooth she’d noticed previously was missing, as she’d suspected it would be, so it didn’t take Sherlock Holmes to place Elsa in the vicinity of the Vectra and that particular heinous crime.
    Unable to walk and bray at the same time (the pitch and roll effect of her misplaced jocularity made her too unstable), Elsa stood and quivered like a human blancmange for several heartbeats. Meli could feel the ground tremble through the soles of her shoes. Then, regaining some control, Elsa lowered her head and set off again towards her van, the farm yard impressions reduced to pig-like snuffles and grunts. What was Meli to make of that response? Was it as good as an admission of guilt? Meli noticed that Elsa had left her door wide open. Should she tell her? She watched with some fascination as Elsa mounted the van on her stubby legs, her swinging backside like two padded sacks filled with golf balls, and decided against it. If anyone was tempted to rob the place, well, rather them than her!
    The van woke with a cough and an eruption of flatulence from the exhaust that leapfrogged it forward. Meli stared after it, the image of the little woman with her hands perched at the top of the steering wheel like a little fat chihuahua ingrained in her eyes. As the sound of the agonised engine faded into the distance, Meli found herself standing alone in a cloud of choking, black fumes. Turning smartly on her heels, she went to continue her search for her motley pet. She had half a mind to just leave him, and let him come home himself, but for some inexplicable reason she did not like him down here on his own; damn it, even she didn’t like being here on her own. Something caught her eye, something just inside the door that drew her closer. She glanced over her shoulder, checking that she wasn’t being watched. But she was. Tabby had appeared and was sitting between the wheelbarrow and the farmhouse with her stringy tail wrapped around her front paws, her bright eyes following