It was a lovely summer morning. Michael had fed the dogs their socks and had let them pee on the Diagon Alley brick street as he walked them. He had put new felt pads on their feet because their wooden legs kept getting scratched on the brick. He'd polished their wood frames and cleaned their upholstery--Ottos brown leather and Faline's pink chintz. Otto had a matching brown leather leash and Faline had a white leash. Michael could not bring himself to get the pink one she had preferred to be seen on. They had learned to be rather well behaved footstools. They knew how to heel, sit, stay, rollover, fetch, and play dead. He had a canvas messenger bag full of black socks in case they got hungry.
Some old crone had come out of one of the shops and had been disgusted by the sight of two cocker spaniels, well, footstools who believed they were cocker spaniels. Otto had taken a dislike to her immediately and that made Faline follow suit. They began to run at her, snapping and barking. The woman turned on MIchael, ready to swear at him when Otto bit her. She screached.
"That's what you get, you old bat!" Michael said sharply. Otto went to raise his leg on her cloak, and she took a step away from the leather footstool.
"Your dog was going to...well,...well..." she was flustered.
"Well?" Michael looked at her blankly. "So was I. He just got to you first." The woman turned and stormed off in a huff. Michael petted the dogs. "Good dogs. They really shouldn't let old bats like that out of the house in the first place."