When is a piece of rope not just a piece of rope?

This is the last part of this tale.

 

Part 3

And on coming downstairs later that morning we solved half of the mysteries when we discovered, by opening the fridge, that the safety switch that it was on, had been thrown during the night. This also meant that certain circuits throughout the house were out but others weren’t. Now the phone call about perishables and the light that still worked but the phones that didn’t, made sense. Well almost. I still don’t know why he asked about perishables but hey I can live with not knowing the answer to that one. No conspiracy there anyway. 

So that left the man with the dog. I still couldn’t understand why he didn’t leave after he wasn’t answered the first time. Later that day however, quite by chance, I got my answer. Opening the front door to admit one of my son’s friends, a door we never use unless we have visitors, I noticed a rope tied to one of the veranda posts. Now I knew straight away it wasn’t our rope. It was very distinctive and nothing like anything we’ve ever owned. So why was it there and who had tied it? As I was holding it, contemplating the matter, my daughter came past and said “that must have been the man.”
I looked at her puzzled, “what man?”
“The man with the dog” she said “I saw the dog after he’d left. He must have thought he was our dog and tied him up.”
“Did you see the dog tied up out here?” I asked lamenting about why she hadn’t thought to tell us this piece of information earlier.
“No” she said “I didn’t look. But I saw the dog through the window and thought he was loose and had just wandered onto our veranda. I guess the real owner saw him and came and untied him.”
And as she moved away, unaware of the importance of what she had just divulged, I smiled. Now I could sleep peacefully, all the puzzles were explained and not a conspiracy in sight.