(Part One can be found here.)
Watching Ali bound off to a group of girls who seemed to have materialised out of nowhere, Louise could tell that they wanted to talk with her. Louise thought maybe she could wave and continue on home, but the girls were walking toward her. Well, better just to be friendly and cut this short – one of the girls stepped forward and Louise recognised her.
“We wanted to know the name of your dog. We always talk to him outside the bakery,” said the girl with long, brown hair.
“Your blue bicycle is really cool,” added the tallest girl of the group.
“We were wondering if we could see some of your paintings,” said another.
“Sure come on over tomorrow and I’ll show you some of my work if you’d like,” responded Louise. Suddenly it dawned on Louise that she’d never painted outdoors.
“How do you know that I paint?” she asked. The girls looked at each other and finally the brown-haired girl admitted that they had seen her painting one night while peeking in her windows. Louise was taken aback – and asked how often they had done this. “Oh, just once or twice when we’re down this way”, announced the tallest girl.
So Ali doesn’t bark at people he knows, Louise mused, but then began to wonder if he barked at anyone at all who came out this way. Before she had left Toronto, Ali had always barked at strangers. Louise hoped that he still did.
