Leonora's return

Leonard and Tata decided to wander outside and form a reception committee for the return of Leonora.

To be more accurate, Tata wandered elegantly outside, and Leonard, with the help of a little crutch, limped outside, dragging a chair with him.

He made sure to take a packet of cigarettes so that he could be smoking when Leonora arrived. That would be guaranteed to put her in a bad mood.

Tata, on the other hand, was not very pleased with that.

"Ruff," she barked in annoyance.

"Aw, Tata, come on. We're outside, and you can hardly smell the smoke. It just drifts off into the air," said Leonard.

Tata gave him a look of disgust and went to investigate some nice smells in the garden - a long way from Leonard and his horrible cigarettes. She was pleased that Mrs Leonard did not allow smoking inside the house. Tata did not consider passive smoking to be good for either her health or her appearance.

Leonard sighed and wondered whether Leonora would arrive before he had finished his cigarette, or whether he would need to start a second. It was a difficult one and he reckoned it was pretty borderline.

Meanwhile, Leonora had finally done a three-point turn in about ten manoeuvres. Even she sometimes thought it would be nice to have a vehicle with power steering, as she hauled round the two and a half tons of ancient Land Rover with its amazing turning circle of 47ft.

She was wondering if she had made the wrong decision. She figured she had. She should have stuck to her guns and just kept on heading home. The trouble with Leonard was that he was so persistent, he always ended up wearing her down and getting his own way. But she couldn't wriggle out of it now or she would look even more stupid than she already did.

Leonora consoled herself on the return journey with the thought of a nice long walk and the promise of the fine vegetarian lunch out. She hoped Leonard would still be suitably contrite and well-behaved enough not to mention that boring geocaching rubbish. That would be the last thing she could cope with. Hunting around for hidden treasure that turned out to be tacky little objects in silly jars or tins. Leonora seriously thought Leonard had started to lose it when he first told her about his new hobby. Even worse, he had insisted she go along to convince her how exciting it was. She had not been remotely convinced.

She breathed deeply and pulled onto the drive. Leonard limped a few steps towards her and gesticulated to where she should park. Leonora was not impressed with being dictated to by a parking attendant. She was quite capable of working out where to park by herself. And why was he smoking anyway when he knew she was coming back? She scowled without even realising it. Leonard noticed the scowl and thought - first point to me.

He limped - in a very pronounced manner, much to the discomfort of the little crutch - over to the Series. As Leonora reached her long legs down to the ground from the driver's seat, he stood there patiently waiting for the kissy-kissy routine. And waving his cigarette in Leonora's face.

"Leonard. Why are you waving that cigarette in my face?"

"Oh, I'm so sorry, I didn't even realise I was still smoking it," he said apologetically, still waiting for his kissy-kissy. "Morning. Pleased you are back though."

Leonora groped inside the Land Rover, took out her bag and stormed past him. The expected kissy-kissy didn't happen. Leonard rolled his eyes, stubbed out the cigarette - fortunately he had only needed one to achieve the desired effect - and limped after her. Second point to me.

Tata ran across the garden to greet Leonora.

"Aruff ruff ruff," she barked happily.

"I'm so sorry that I left, Tata, without going for a walk with you, but I'm back now, so we can all go out together."

"Ruff," barked Tata, twirled around, and glued herself to Leonora's side as the two went inside.

"What do you think?" said Leonard, who was so pleased that he was even talking to the little crutch.

The little crutch thought Leonard was being particularly nasty to Leonora but didn't like to say so.

"Oh, it's good she's back," it said, non-committally.

"My thoughts exactly," said Leonard, smirking again.

Mrs Leonard came to greet Leonora.

"Hello Leonora. It's good that you could come back after all, we were so looking forward to spending a few days with you," she said.

"I'm sorry for putting you out, I just forgot that I had made other arrangements for today," said Leonora, lying merrily.

"Don't worry about it. I've done some fruit salad for breakfast, but I thought I'd wait for you to return before I prepared the rest. Put your stuff back in the bedroom and come and chat to me in the kitchen and tell me what else you want to eat," replied Mrs Leonard.

Tata and Leonora went off to her bedroom. Mrs Leonard disappeared into the kitchen as usual.

Leonard limped into the house and immediately went over to the computer to print off some geocaching maps and directions and download the waypoints to his GPS. He even decided to print off a bit of info about some vegetarian restaurants to pretend to keep up to his promise. Fortunately there weren't very many and they weren't remotely near to the planned caches.