Dog and mouse

The travellers are standing in the park on Melle market day. Tired eyed and wire-haired, grasping small cans of lager, one of them is holding onto a long piece of orange string with a brandy-coloured, sad-eyed Great Dane at the end.  It is hot, even in the shade, and the dog is slathering long, stretching drops of clear saliva onto the weather-burnt grass.

From out of his pocket, the shorter, slighter traveller produces a small white mouse. Its pulsing little body flurries across his fingers, twists its way up his wrist and arm; tries to escape under a short yellow sleeve.

The traveller gently grabs it back, lifts it by its tail and puts it on the grass in front of the salivating dog.

Big, brown eyes look down at the tiny creature as it twitches in the dried-out space between his paws. He sniffs at it, carefully nudges its furry back with his fat, black damp snout. Then he offers it back to its dreadlocked owner.

The man sees me watching and he comes over. He puts the mouse into my cupped hands. I feel its tiny feet patter across my palm, its tail like a heavy feather dragging along my skin. Its heartbeat paces with each fidget of its long white whiskers.

I wonder how much longer the mouse will survive.

“Don’t worry,” the traveller tells me in broken English, “they’re friends; I would never let any harm come to them.”

He takes the mouse from me, stroking the top of its head. It runs up and down his hands, between his fingers. He slides it back into his pocket.

The traveller smiles at me. “Thank you for stopping,” he says.