An Alarming Tale - or Three Knights and a Dog

Oh drama, oh horror, oh what-could-have-happened anxiety in the night! About ten o'clock last night, just as the dog and I were about to go out for our last walk (which would have been brief, let me tell you, as it was so cold outside that socks and central heating had been required all afternoon) I heard someone's house alarm go off. Very normal for round here, where people like to let their neighbours know whenever they are opening their front doors or their cars.

But it wasn't outside, it was indoors - in my house. In my hall and also upstairs in the spare room, to be precise. Not the full eardrum-bursting racket of an outdoor alarm, but loud enough to be thoroughly nerve-racking, and accompanied by a distinctly chemical smell of burning in the bedroom. The main control box for the alarm, which for some mysterious reason is in the bedroom and not the electrics cupboard under the stairs, had black marks round it, and was smoking slightly, as well as emitting nasty smells and loud, assaultive sounds. It was also a matter of moments before the landing smoke alarm went off too, just to send me completely mad.

And could I get the front panel of the control box off? No. And could I remember the alarm code for the key pad downstairs? No. And could I find the instructions? No. Me, the person who always knows where the torch, the candles, the matches are, and where to turn the water or the power off in an emergency, now a helpless hand-wringing ninny. I had ignored that alarm for years, never using it since I inherited the bouncing, furniture-leaping dog, and now, as punishment, I was completely foiled by two shrieking plastic boxes and a bad smell, surely the harbinger of death by toxic fumes in the next five minutes.

And so I rang Roger and Tim, because they are Truly Wonderful People always willing and able to help, and not at all because they are less likely than my other neighbours to be in bed at 10 p.m. They arrived in moments, shining armour worn sensibly beneath their warm clothing, expressions serious and manly, to wrestle with the front of the control box (screwdriver required for cleverly-hidden screw underneath the box - who designs these things?), take out the very hot acid gel battery, and to advise calling an alarm engineer when the noise didn't stop. Calm and common sense were restored to me once the potential cause of fire and hideous death was removed and we knew that the engineer would be arriving within 30 minutes. The engineer's wife had to get him in from the garden where he was watering the plants in the near-dark, he had to get the ladders on the van, and drive across the city to reach me, but what a cheerful and pleasant chap when he got here!

Unfortunately, the dog had been thrilled to see Tim and Roger, and had scuttled about getting in the way at close quarters while Roger performed his heroic hot battery-removal, thereby setting off his allergic reaction to dogs. Much cartoon-style sneezing ensued, rattling the windows and loosening Roger's head a little - yes, I saw it wobble. As we said goodbye in between enormous ah-ah-ah-ah-CHOO!!s, the over-excited kitten escaped into the street, to run about under parked cars, try to stalk a student walking home dragging a suitcase on wheels, stand defiantly in the middle of the road in the best position for an alarm engineer's van - with ladders - to squash her flat. It took ten minutes to get her back.

Eventually calm and order were restored; Roger went home to rattle his own windows, the kitten was captured and dragged indoors, protesting in a squeaky voice about how no one else's mum makes them come in so early, I remembered the alarm code number, and Brian the sainted engineer arrived to sort everything out before midnight.

There's a moral to this tale, but of course I don't need to state it. You knew it already, didn't you.