December 4

Jigger's Journal, Part 4

I had a more serious problem than Santa seeing me in a pink dress. I was starving. I had eaten my last cucumber sandwich several hours ago and I had run out of berry juice.

“Where do you keep your cucumbers?” I asked.

“In the grocery store,” said Kate. “In summer. You won't get a cucumber at this time of year. Unless you like soggy old ones.”

“I don't think so,” I said. “I like them crisp and fresh. And we need good brown bread for the sandwiches.”

“You need to change your diet. Are there any foods you like that aren't cucumbers?”

I thought about it for a few minutes. Of course there were other foods I liked – cloud berries, deep fried lichen, the little mushrooms we fight the reindeer for. But none of those foods could be found in Ireland, so I kept thinking. Finally I answered.

“I like jelly and mustard and sausages and smelly cheese and pickles and chocolate and toffee and coffee and cake and mince pies,” I said.

“All at the same time?” asked Kate with a laugh.

“When I can.”

So she went down to the kitchen while Leroy and I sat on the bed and played cards. He was very good. I've never been beaten by a dog before, and I was getting good cards so I was surprised when he kept getting better ones. Then I noticed that every time he looked at his cards he sneezed and rubbed his nose against his sleeve. So I began watching him carefully, and wouldn't you know it? He had extra cards up his sleeve.

“You're cheating,” I roared.

“No I am not,” he said. “I am playing by different rules than you.”

“And do those rules allow you to bring in extra cards to beat mine?”

“Of course they do. Rules that make me lose are no good to me.”

I was so annoyed I felt like biting him. In fact I did try to bite him, but he jumped away.

“Don't be a sore loser,” he laughed.

“I'm not a sore loser. You cheated, so I won.”

It was about to get ugly, but then Kate arrived with the food. It was a banquet fit for a king or an emperor. Certainly good enough for a super spy. I began by mixing the jelly with the pickles, and adding the smelly cheese. Then I had some jelly and mustard. Then I put a sausage into a mince pie and ate that. Then I poured some coffee over the toffee and chewed on that. I finished with chocolate and mustard, which was delicious.

Kate only had jelly and chocolate. She wouldn't try the mustard with the chocolate. Foolish girl.

Leroy had twelve sausages and twelve mince pies and no mustard at all. Strange dog.

When we were finished I burped as loud as I could, because that is polite where I come from. You need to burp so that the person who made the meal knows you enjoyed it. I burped so loud that the windows shook and rattled.

“What's going on up there?” shouted Kate's dad from downstairs.

“Shhh...,” she hissed at me. “Do you want him to catch you?”

I did not, so I stopped burping, even though that was very rude.

He didn't come up the stairs to investigate, so I was safe for the moment. We took out the cards and began to play a game, all three of us. I quickly spotted that Kate cheated as much as Leroy, which was different from any game of cards I had ever played. Did she learn it from him, or he from her? But neither seemed to mind the other cheating, so I decided to join in, producing cards by magic and adding them to the game. Soon we had about twice as many cards in front of us as when we started, and we were all laughing and having a wonderful time.

I finished with a flourish, producing four Pokemon cards to won the last game.

“You are better at cheating than both of us,” said Kate with awe. I felt a small glow of pride, and a small pang of guilt.

It was beginning to get dark outside.

“Do your parents have a suitcase?” I asked Kate.

“Yes. They keep it under their bed.”

“Wonderful. I’ll sleep there tonight, and we can work out how to get me to Bunratty in the morning.”

“Do you always sleep in a suitcase?” she asked.

“Always. Every spy does. We sleep in the case and sneak out at night to check whether people have been naughty or nice.”

“What if they have no suit case? Some people use rucksacks instead.”

I was ready for that, thans to one of Morley's better contraptions. I ran over to the radiator, where my clothes were now so dry they were stiff. I pulled my wallet out of the pocket and opened it. Inside was a large suitcase, big enough for me to sleep inside comfortably.

“You could use that and sleep here,” suggested Kate, seemingly unsurprised at the sudden appearance of a suitcase far bigger than the wallet it was kept in.

But the rules were clear; spies slept in the suitcases under parents' beds, and anyway my own suitcase would do as a spare room. I would sleep in comfort this night, after spending a few days in a small box at the hands of the postal service.

So I snuck off and got ready for the night. Tomorrow my mission could really begin.