Friday's Snippet

It's Friday again, and I actually have the day off! I work tomorrow of course, but we're closed Sunday so I even get two whole days off this week (first time in a month). We'll try for a whole weekend off next. We're also trying to get more staff, but not having much luck (sigh). Anyway, have a good and relaxing weekend for me (one of us should), and here is my snippet:

We got back to the townhouse to find Shadow sitting by the back door patiently waiting to be let in. Following me upstairs, she sat on the bed and watched as I put my new books on their shelves, next to the Dictionary, Thesaurus, and Almanac that had been Laura’s contribution to my library. Remembering that I had yet to unpack my own books, I opened my traveling trunk and unpacked the few necessary paperbacks, in addition to my Shakespeare, Renaissance Poets, and of course my mysteries.

Putting up my office supplies, and arranging my desk the way I liked it made me feel like I was ready, even if I was missing my trusty, but deskbound, computer. But ready for what? I was waiting for something, something momentous, something that was the reason for my being here. Not just here in London, but Here, alive in this time and in this place. This sense of waiting followed me as I went downstairs to join my hosts for dinner.

Still feeling restless after dinner, I decided to take a walk, and perhaps explore some of the squares around the area. Ours wasn’t the only square in the area. Many of them, like ours, had parks in the center, and several of these parks were within walking distance. The one I walked in that night was quiet and still and so shaded by trees that the streets bordering it had faded into the distance, and the few cars that drove past made no impression at all as I meandered along its paths. Dr. John had told me about a fierce storm the night before I flew in, and several times I had to walk around fallen branches and debris that had yet to be cleaned up.

Shadow had been asleep upstairs when I left, but I was almost half expecting her to join me, so when I first heard the soft shuffle of steps, I thought it was her dainty steps I was hearing. Until I heard the second set, and realized that whatever was stalking me was much larger than one dainty black cat. Their deep, panting breaths alone told me I was in some serious trouble.

Turning slowly, very slowly, painfully slowly, I faced two of the largest, blackest dogs I’d ever seen: Hound of the Baskerville large, their angry red-rimmed eyes glowering blackly at me. The Baskerville Hound had been created by Mr. Conan Doyle, but if my eyes were not deceiving me, these were much, much worse.

Hell Hounds, it seemed, were real: real, living in London, and preparing to attack me.