Chase

by Linwood Barclay

  “You just take it easy,” he said. “I’m going to get you something to eat and drink and try to find out who you belong to.”

  Chipper studied the boy with his brown eyes, which Jeff noticed had an odd quality about them. Chipper knew his eyes would appear strange to anyone who looked at them closely, that they did not look entirely natural. He blinked his eyes—something he didn’t actually need to do—to break the boy’s attention on them.

  Chipper felt, for the first time since his escape, not just happiness. He felt a sense of hope. Without even having to think about it, he managed to convey that to Jeff.

  “Hey!” said Jeff. “You’re wagging your tail!”

  Just a little, Chipper thought. You should see how much I can wag it when I’m feeling better.

  “Yes!” Jeff said. “This is great!”

  He dropped to his knees, cradled the dog’s head in his arms, felt the soft fur of his ears on his palms, and put his face right up to the dog’s. “I am going to do everything I can to help you. But I have to go now. I’m going to be back real soon.”

  Do you have to go? Chipper thought. Can’t you stay here with me? After all I’ve gone to, to find you?

  Jeff raced down the stairs and out of the station. He decided to leave his aunt’s truck by the station, and hightailed it through the woods to Emily’s house at Shady Acres. He put his nose to the screen door, peering inside, as he rapped on the frame. When no one answered, he ran towards the lake, where he found Emily sitting on the end of a dock, dangling her feet in the water.

  “Hey!” he shouted. But she didn’t turn around. As he got closer, he could see that she was listening to music, but when he ran out onto the dock, she pulled the buds from her ears, wound them up and tucked them into her pocket.

  “You have to come with me!” he said.

  “What? Where?”

  “To the station.” He took a couple of deep breaths. “You have to come.”

  “What is going on with you?”

  “We need water, and some food. Like, do you have any hot dogs? Or some raw meat? Like some hamburger? And water! Yes, we need water!”

  “Are we having a picnic? Because if we are, I am definitely not into raw meat.”

  “No, not a picnic. Come on, come on. You’re wasting time!”

  “Stop talking and tell me what’s happening!”

  Jeff blinked. “Which do you want? For me to stop talking, or to tell you what’s happening?”

  Emily gave him a look of total exasperation. “Just tell me.”

  “I found a dog. He ran in front of the truck. I don’t think I hit him hard, but he’s hurt and I took him to the station.”

  “Whoa,” Emily said. “Why didn’t you just take him to your place?”

  “My aunt hates dogs.”

  She thought a moment. “We could tell my dad.”

  Jeff shook his head. “Do you think, if we can’t find the owner, he’d want to adopt a dog?”

  Emily slowly shook her head. “He’s got like a huge dog allergy.”

  “Then he’s either going to tell my aunt, or make us take it to the dog pound.”

  “What’s all this us stuff?”

  “Are you going to help me or not?”

  She took a moment to think it over, then said, “Fine. Let me see what I can get from the fridge. Wait here.”

  Emily got her feet out of the water, slipped her shoes back on, and ran back up the hill to her house. Jeff stood on the dock and gazed out over Pickerel Lake.

  Aunt Flo was going to wonder why it was taking him so long to do a simple run to the dump. There were times Jeff wished he could put her in the truck and leave her there.

  If Jeff couldn’t find out who owned that dog, she’d never let him keep it. She’d made him give up one dog and he wasn’t going to let her do it again.

  Emily came running back down the hill with a plastic bag full of stuff. “Okay,” she said. “Let’s go. I didn’t have to tell Dad anything. He’s been clearing some brush and is going to run it to the dump. I just hope he doesn’t notice that he’s down one T-bone steak when he gets back. If he finds out I took it he’ll kill me.”

  They headed into the woods, and as the station and his aunt’s pickup truck came into view, Emily said, “What’s that smell?”

  “Oh,” Jeff said. “I was on my way to the dump when I found the dog. The truck’s full of garbage.”

  She made a face. “Barf City.”

  As they entered the old station, Jeff asked Emily what was in her bag, beside a steak.

  “Bottled water, some crackers, peanut butter, some cheese and some Rice Krispie squares.”

  “Do dogs eat Rice Krispie squares?” he asked.

  “They’re for us, bozo,” she said.

  Heading up the stairs, he said, “I hope you won’t mind, but I put him in your chair. I couldn’t put him on the flat floor. I wanted him to be comfortable.”

  “Fine.”

  They hit the top of the stairs and turned to look into the room.

  There was Emily’s beanbag chair.

  But the dog was gone.

  Aunt Flo strode up to Cabin Eight and rapped on the door hard.

  “Mr. Green?” she called. “Mr. Green, are you in there?”

  She put her face right up to the screen door and peered inside. Harry Green slowly lumbered into view and pushed the door open.

  “What is it, Flo? I was just having a little nap.”

  “Have you seen that damn fool nephew of mine?” she asked.

  “Uh, like I said, I was having a nap before I go back out to catch absolutely nothing. Is there a problem?”

  “He went off to the dump a long time ago and he’s not back yet.”

  “Haven’t seen him. I’m sure he’s fine.”

  “Oh, I’m sure he is. But I’ve got a long list of things that need doing. I took that boy in. I’m giving him a place to stay and feeding him and keeping clothes on his back. Doesn’t seem to be asking too much to have him do a few things in return.”

  “He’s been through a lot,” Harry said. “Losing his mother and father. And so tragically, too.”

  She softened some. “I suppose.” She decided to change the subject. “You enjoying your first summer here?”

  “Oh, yes, very much.”

  “How’d you hear about my place?” Flo asked.

  Harry Green furrowed his brow. “Someone must have mentioned it at work one time and it just stuck in my head.”

  “What sort of work did you do?”

  “Oh, a bit of this and that,” Harry said. “Nothing very interesting. What did you say Jeff’s parents did? Worked for some drug company?”

  “Something like that,” Flo said. “Heck of a thing, what happened to them. Jet blowing up in mid-air over the water. It was some kind of engine failure. Or something with the electronics. That’s why I don’t fly.”

  “Let me ask you this, Flo,” Harry said. “Have there ever been any people coming around here, asking about Jeff, checking up on him?”

  “What do you mean?”

  Harry shrugged. “Just what I said. People dropping by, maybe people his parents used to work with, asking how he is, whether there is anything they can do to help?”

  Flo shook her head. “Nope, nothing like that. Were you thinking there would be?”

  “I don’t know,” Harry said. “Just asking.”

  “I’d still like to know where he’s gone off to. You sure you’ve got no idea? I see Jeff talking to you now and then.”

  Harry gave her a sly smile. “If I were a betting man, I’d say a girl might be involved.”

  “Oh for heaven’s sake,” Flo said. “That’s all we need.”

  “He was right here!” Jeff told Emily, pointing at her beanbag chair. “I left him right here in this chair!”

  “Uh, huh,” she said dubiously, holding the bag of food she’d taken from her house.

  There wasn’t any place for the dog to have hidden upstairs he
re, which meant he had to have gone downstairs. But the door was closed when they got here. Jeff went back down to the main floor, ran through what was once the waiting room for passengers, poked his head into the former office, looked behind the counter where, decades ago, people once stood selling tickets.

  He even looked in the old bathroom where stained and rusted toilets sat disused in stalls.

  Jeff didn’t see the dog anywhere.

  But he did discover one busted window over behind the ticket counter. The glass had been shattered at some point, leaving teeth-like shards around the edges. There was an old, broken chair and desk in front of it, so it wouldn’t have been hard for the dog to use them as steps to get up to the window.

  There was a wisp of black fur, and blood, on one of the glass shards.

  “Oh, no,” Jeff said, pointing.

  “Crap,” said Emily.

  Once outside, Jeff called out, “Dog! Hey, dog! Come on, boy! We’ve got food for you!”

  “Shh!” Emily said. “I hear something.”

  Jeff went quiet and held his breath. There were the usual forest sounds. A rustling of leaves, a breeze blowing through the trees.

  And something else. A kind of grunting.

  “I think it’s coming from the truck,” Emily said.

  Jeff turned in the direction of the pickup. “Something’s in the back,” he said. “With the garbage.”

  They approached the truck cautiously. Jeff knew there were plenty of other creatures that could be in the truck. Raccoons, foxes, a skunk—even a bear was a possibility. Any one of those animals might be interested in feasting on that trash.

  The good news was, Jeff didn’t see any big, black, furry bear’s head sticking up over the sides of the cargo bed.

  The bad news was, he saw blood on the side of the top edge of the tailgate.

  Emily and Jeff moved around to the back of the truck, heard more rustling and grunting noises. “Stand back,” Jeff said, approaching the tailgate. He slipped his fingers under the handle and got ready to pull as Emily took three steps back.

  Jeff dropped the tailgate in one swift motion.

  The dog, his butt to them, whirled around suddenly. He’d managed to pull one can over and had had his snout deep into a bag of trash. If a dog could look terrified, well, that was how he looked when he saw them. Eyes wide, jaw open. There was fresh blood matted into the fur of his belly. “It’s okay!” Jeff said. “It’s me!” He pointed to Emily. “That’s Emily! She brought food!”

  Chipper looked at Emily and tried to assess whether she was a friend or a foe. Dogs, even dogs without a few million dollars’ worth of software built into them, often had an instant sense of people, and Chipper was no different.

  He thought Emily was probably okay, especially when she raised the bag in her hand and smiled.

  “So you don’t have to eat this yucky stuff, okay?”

  Emily dug into the bag and brought out something wrapped in freezer paper. “Wait’ll you see this,” she said. “It was going to be my dad’s Sunday night dinner.” She ripped through tape and unfolded the paper to reveal the steak. “Bet you’ll like this.”

  Chipper’s mouth instantly watered. That steak looked even better than those wieners he’d stolen from the barbecue. Emily tore off a chunk of it and extended it in her hand. Chipper gave it a sniff, then gently took it from her palm, being careful not to bite her.

  Two quick bites, a gulp, and it was gone.

  Not bad, Chipper thought. Better than that cheap stuff they gave him at The Institute.

  Jeff put a hand close to the bloody fur without actually touching it. “You did that going through the window—didn’t you, you dumb dog, you?”

  Chipper eyed him with tired, sorrowful eyes. He’d found enough strength to get out of that beanbag chair, jump through a window, and hop into the back of this truck for something to eat, but now he felt very weary. He was starting to waver.

  “I think maybe you got up too soon,” Jeff said. “Whaddya say we take you back up to the comfy chair and give you a little more to eat and drink and we take a look at that cut?”

  Jeff put one arm around his front legs, just under his neck, and the other around his back, tucking his tail in as he did it. Chipper made no objections. Emily followed them back into the train station and up the stairs, where Jeff gently placed him back in the chair, his head resting over the edge.

  Emily got out everything else she had in the bag. She’d brought two bottles of water, cracking one open immediately. “I’m an idiot. I should have brought a bowl.” But when she tipped the top of the bottle up to Chipper’s mouth, he managed to drink it. She gave him more of the steak and a piece of cheese while Jeff looked at the cut on his stomach.

  “We need to get some bandages and stuff,” he said.

  Chipper wanted to tell them it wasn’t that bad. He wanted to tell them a lot of things. Maybe, before too long, they’d find an opportunity.

  “I’ll start making a list of the things we need,” Emily said. “Bandages, a bowl, a brush to comb out his fur, which is all natty and totally a mess.” She got out her phone, opened some app she could make notes on, and tapped away with her thumb.

  “Write down a board and some nails,” Jeff said. “We don’t want him jumping out the window again, or anything bad getting in.”

  Won’t do that, Chipper thought. Want to stay with you.

  Emily said, “I can only get so much in one trip. We can fix the window another time.”

  The dog had swallowed his steak and cheese, so Emily gave him some more.

  His tail softly thumped.

  “You said you checked his collar for a tag?” she asked Jeff.

  “Didn’t see anything.”

  “Let me have a closer look. Hey, fella, just want to check your collar there.”

  Emily worked her fingers under the black fur, found the collar and ran her fingers around it.

  Emily looked puzzled. “This is strange,” she said.

  “What?”

  “Well, you’re right, there’s no tag, but the collar is super tight. I can’t get my finger under it anyplace.”

  “He must be choking,” Jeff said.

  “Yeah, but, his neck doesn’t feel all squished or anything. It’s like—this is totally strange—but it’s like the collar is stuck right to his body.”

  “Let me try.”

  Jeff got his fingers on the collar and confirmed what Emily was saying. “You’re right. It’s sort of like the collar is part of him. Maybe it’s like, when you wear a ring for years, your finger kind of grows around it. My mom’s finger was like that.”

  “Why would anyone put a collar on a dog that tight? That just seems like such a mean thing to—”

  “Whoa,” Jeff said. “Hang on.”

  “What?”

  “There’s something…there’s something weird on this collar. In fact, this whole collar is kind of weird.”

  “How?”

  “It feels like…metal.”

  Emily brushed her hands up against Jeff’s as she gave the collar another feel. “I see what you mean.”

  Jeff put her hand in his—and felt a bit of a shiver when he did—and moved it to the part of the collar on the right side of the dog’s neck. “Feel that.”

  Emily did. “That feels like a…”

  “Like a what?”

  “I’m not going to say. You’d think I was insane. I have to see it.”

  She gently moved Chipper over onto his other side, spread the fur apart the way you might part someone’s hair, looking for a bump on the head. She exposed the collar, which was dark silver and had a soft sheen to it, then zeroed in on what she’d been looking for.

  “I don’t believe it.”

  “What? I can’t see it.”

  “It’s an opening,” Emily said. “It’s a port.”

  “A port? What do you mean, a port?”

  “Like you’d plug a computer into, or an iPhone, or a USB stick.”
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br />   Jeff looked closer at what Emily had found. “That is insane,” Jeff said. “It is a port. But where does it go?”

  Emily touched Jeff’s shoulder so he’d turn and look at her. “It goes right into the dog,” she said.

  “But why…why would anyone do something like that? Why would a dog have a slot to plug a computer into?”

  “I guess I’ll go get my computer,” Emily said, “and we’ll find out.”

  Jeff stayed with the dog while Emily ran back to her place for a laptop computer and a cable. The whole idea of what they were about to try seemed crazy. They were actually going to plug a computer into a dog?

  But then Jeff thought, no, they weren’t plugging a computer into a dog. They were just plugging a computer into a dog’s collar. Maybe that wasn’t quite so weird. They made computers so small these days, you could probably fit all kinds of stuff into that band that ran around the dog’s neck.

  After all, couldn’t you implant a little GPS chip in your pet these days, so that if it went missing, you could find it? Yeah, that made sense. Of course, you couldn’t really connect to that chip, but maybe this was some variation on that. By putting the chip in the collar, you didn’t have to actually break the dog’s skin, which, when you think about it, is not a very nice thing to do to a dog or a cat or even a gerbil.

  That’s probably all this was, Jeff figured. Just a fancy locater for somebody’s pet. And once Emily was back here with her computer, and plugged it into that collar, they’d know who this dog belonged to and could organize a reunion.

  The thought of which made Jeff a little sad.

  He hadn’t spent a lot of time with this dog, but he liked him. He liked him a lot. But the boy had to face reality. Even if this dog turned out to belong to nobody, there was no way he was going to be able to keep him. Not with Aunt Flo hating pets.

  And speaking of Aunt Flo…

  She must be having six fits that he still hadn’t returned. He hadn’t even gotten to the dump yet. He was wondering what he’d tell her. The dump was closed? He’d had to go to one in a different county? Flat tire?

  Alien abduction?

  The dog turned his head slightly and looked up at Jeff from his spot on the beanbag chair. “How ya doin’, buddy?” Jeff asked.