by Robert Crais
James stroked her, long and slow, but he glared at Leland instead of relating to the dog. This set Leland off into one of his tirades.
“Talk to her, goddamnit. She ain’t a stick of furniture. She is one of God’s creatures, and she will hear you. I see these goddamned people walkin’ dogs, yakking on their phones, makes me wanna kick their sissy asses. What they got a dog for, they want to talk on their phones? That dog there will understand you, Officer James. She will understand what’s in your heart. Am I just shouting at the grass and dog shit out here, or are you reading what I am telling you?”
“I’m reading you, Sergeant.”
Leland watched him stroke the dog, and talk to her, and then he shouted again.
“Obstacles.”
The obstacle course was a series of jumping barriers and climbs. Leland had taken her through the course five times, so he knew what to expect. She was fine with the climbs, made the low jumps easily, but when she reached the last and highest barrier, a five-foot wall, she balked. The first time Leland took her through, he assumed her hips hurt because of her wounds or her strength was gone, but he stroked her and spoke with her, and when they tried again, she clawed her way over, and damn near broke his heart for trying so hard. Officer James brought her to the high barrier three times, and all three times she hit the brakes. The third time she splayed her legs, spun toward James, and snarled. To his credit, James did not jerk her lead, raise his voice, or try to force her. He backed off and talked to her until she calmed. Leland knew of a hundred other things Officer James could have done to help her over, but overall he approved of James’ response.
Leland called out another instruction.
“Off the line. Voice commands.”
James led her away from the obstacle course, unclipped the lead from her collar, and ran through the basic voice commands. He told her to sit, she sat. He told her to stay, she stayed. Stay, sit, come, heel, down. She would still have to learn the LAPD situational commands, which were different from military commands, but she did these well enough. After fifteen minutes of this, Leland called out again.
“She done good. Reward.”
Leland had been through this with her, too, and waited to see what would happen. The best dog training was based on the reward system. You did not punish a dog for doing wrong, you rewarded the dog for doing right. The dog did something you wanted, you reinforced the behavior with a reward—pet’m, tell’m they’re a good dog, let’m play with a toy. The standard reward for a K-9 working dog was a hard plastic ball with a hole drilled through it where Leland liked to smear a little peanut butter.
Leland watched James dig the hard plastic ball from his pocket, and wave it in front of the dog’s face. She showed no interest. James bounced it in front of her, trying to get her excited, but she moved away, and appeared to get nervous. Leland could hear James talking to her in the squeaky voice dogs associated with approval.
“Here you go, girl. Want it? Want to go get it?”
James tossed the ball past her, watching it bounce along the ground. The dog circled James’ legs, and sat down behind him, facing the opposite direction. Leland had made the mistake of throwing the damned ball way out into center field, and had to go get it.
Leland called out.
“That’s enough for today. Pack her up. Take her home. You got two weeks.”
Leland returned to his office, where he found Mace Styrik drinking a warm Diet Coke.
Mace frowned, just as Leland expected. He knew his men as well as his dogs.
“Why are you wasting his time and ours, giving him a bad dog like that?”
“That dog ain’t bad. She’s just not fit for duty. If they gave medals to dogs, she’d have so many, a sissy like you couldn’t lift’m.”
“I heard the shot. She squirrel up again?”
Leland dropped into his chair, leaned back, and put up his feet. He brooded about what he had seen.
“Wasn’t just the dog squirreled up.”
“Meaning what?”
Leland decided to think about it. He dug a tin of smokeless tobacco from his pocket, pushed a wad of dip behind his lower lip, and worked it around. He lifted a stained Styrofoam cup from the floor beside his chair, spit into it, then put the cup on his desk and arched his eyebrows at Mace.
“Have a sip of that Coke?”
“Not with that nasty stuff in your mouth.”
Leland sighed, then answered Mace’s original question.
“His heart isn’t in it. He can do the work well enough, else I would not have passed him, but they should have made him take the medical. God knows, he earned it.”
Mace shrugged, wordless, and had more of the Coke as Leland went on.
“Everyone has been carrying that young man, and, Lord knows, my heart goes out to him, what happened an’ all, but you know as well as I, we were pressured to take him. We passed over far better and more deserving applicants to give him this spot.”
“That may be, but we gotta take care of our own. We always have, we always will, and that’s the way it should be. He paid dear.”
“I’m not arguing that point.”
“Sounds like you are.”
“Goddamnit, you know me better than that. There are a thousand jobs they could have given him, but we are K-9. We aren’t those other jobs. We are dog men.”
Mace grudgingly had to agree.
“This is true. We’re dog men.”
“He is not.”
Mace frowned again.
“Then why’d you give him that dog?”
“He said he wanted her.”
“I say I want things all the time, you don’t give me squat.”
Leland worked the dip around again, and spit, thinking he might have to get up for his own Coke to wash down the taste.
“That poor animal is unfit for this job, and I suspect the same about him. I hope to God in His Glory I am wrong, sincerely I do, but there it is. They are suspect. That dog will help him realize he is not right for this job. Then she’ll go back to that family, and he’ll retire or transfer to a more suitable job, and all of us will be happier for it.”
Leland dug the remains of the dip from his lip, dropped it into the cup, then stood to go find a drink of his own.
“See if he needs a hand with her crate. Give him the dog’s file to take home, and tell him to read it. I want him to see what a fine animal she was. Tell him to be back here at oh-seven-hundred hours tomorrow.”
“You going to help him retrain her?”
Dogs suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder shared similar stress reactions with humans, and could sometimes be retrained, but it was slow work that required great patience on the part of the trainer, and enormous trust on the part of the dog.
“No, I am not. He wanted that German shepherd, he got her. I gave him two weeks, and then I will re-evaluate her.”
“Two weeks isn’t long enough.”
“No, it is not.”
Leland walked out to search for a Coke, thinking how some days he loved his job, and others he didn’t, and this day was one of the sad ones. He looked forward to going home later, and taking a walk with his own dog, a retired Mal named Ginger. They had long talks when they walked, and she always made Leland feel better. No matter how bad the day, she made him feel better.
6.
Scott held the driver’s seat forward, and hipped the door open wide to let the dog out.
“Here we go, dog. We’re home.”
Maggie stuck her head out a few inches, sniffed the air, then slowly jumped down. Scott’s Trans Am wasn’t a large car. She filled the back seat, but had seemed to enjoy the ride from Glendale to his place in Studio City. Scott had rolled down the windows, and she lay across the seat with her tongue out and eyes narrowed as t
he wind riffled her fur, looking content and happy.
Scott wondered if her hips ached when she got out as much as his side and shoulder.
Scott rented a one-bedroom guest house from an elderly widow on a quiet residential street not far from the Studio City park, and parked in her front yard under an elm tree. MaryTru Earle was short, thin, and in her early eighties. She lived in a small California ranch-style home at the front of her property, and rented the guest house in the rear to supplement her income. The guest house had once been a pool house and game room, back in the days when she had a pool and children at home, but when her husband retired twenty-odd years ago, they filled the pool, created a flower garden, and converted the pool house into the guest house. Her husband had been gone now for more than ten years, and Scott was her latest tenant. She liked having a police officer close at hand, as she often told him. Having a police officer in the guest house made her feel safe.
Scott clipped the lead to Maggie’s collar, and paused beside the car to let her look around. He thought she might have to pee, so he took her on a short walk. Scott let her set the pace, and sniff trees and plants for as long as she wanted. He talked to her as they walked, and when she stopped to worry a smell, he stroked his hand along her back and sides. These were bonding techniques he learned from Leland. Long strokes were soothing and comforting. The dog knows you’re talking to her. Most people who walk their dogs take the dog for a people walk instead of a dog walk, drag the little sonofabitch along until it squeezes out a peanut, as Leland liked to say, then hurry back home. The dog wants to smell. Their nose is our eyes, Leland had said. You want to show the dog a good time, let her smell. It’s her walk, not yours.
Scott knew almost nothing about dogs when he applied for the slot at K-9. Perkins had grown up training hunting dogs, and Barber had worked for a veterinarian through high school and raised huge white Samoyed show dogs with her mother, and almost all the veteran K-9 handlers had serious lifetime involvements with dogs. Scott had zip, and sensed resentment on the part of the senior K-9 crew when he was shoved down their throats by the Metro commanders and a couple of sympathetic deputy chiefs. So he had paid attention to Leland, and soaked up the older man’s knowledge, but he still felt totally stupid.
Maggie peed twice, so Scott turned around and brought her back to the house.
“Let’s get you inside, and I’ll come back for your stuff. You gotta meet the old lady.”
Scott walked Maggie through a locked side gate and back alongside the house, which is how he got to his guest house. He never went to the front door. Whenever he wanted to speak with Mrs. Earle, he went to her back door, and rapped on the wooden jamb.
“Mrs. Earle. It’s Scott. Got someone here to meet you.”
He heard her shuffling from her Barcalounger in the den, and then the door opened. She was thin and pale, with wispy hair dyed a dark brown. She gave a toothy false-teeth smile to Maggie.
“Oh, she’s so pretty. She looks like Rin Tin Tin.”
“This is Maggie. Maggie, this is Mrs. Earle.”
Maggie seemed perfectly comfortable. She stood calmly, ears back, tail down, tongue out, panting.
“Does she bite?”
“Only bad guys.”
Scott wasn’t sure what Maggie would do, so he held her collar tight, but Maggie was fine. She smelled and licked Mrs. Earle’s hand, and Mrs. Earle ran her hand over Maggie’s head, and scratched the soft spot behind her ear.
“She’s so soft. How can big strong dogs like this be so soft? We had a cocker spaniel, but he was always matted and filthy, and meaner than spit. He bit all three of the children. We put him to sleep.”
Scott wanted to get going.
“Well, I wanted you to meet her.”
“Watch when she makes her pee-pee. A girl dog will kill the grass.”
“Yes, ma’am. I’ll watch.”
“What happened to her hiney?”
“She had surgery. She’s all better now.”
Scott tugged Maggie away before Mrs. Earle could keep going. The guest house had French doors in front that used to face the pool, and a regular door on the side. Scott used the regular door because the French doors stuck, and it was always a wrestling match to open them. He had a spacious living room behind the French doors, with the back half of the guest house being split into a bedroom, bath, and kitchen. A small dining table with two mismatched chairs and Scott’s computer was against the wall by the kitchen, opposite a couch and a wooden rocking chair that were set up to face a forty-inch flat screen TV.
Dr. Charles Goodman would not have liked Scott’s apartment. A large drawing of the crime scene intersection was tacked to the living room wall, not unlike the map Scott had seen in Orso’s office, but covered with tiny notes. Printouts of eight different stories from the L.A. Times about the shooting and subsequent investigation were also tacked to the walls, along with sidebar stories about the Bentley victims and Stephanie Anders. The story about Stephanie ran with her official LAPD portrait. Spiral notebooks of different sizes were scattered on the table and couch and the floor around his couch. The notebooks were filled with descriptions and dreams and details he remembered from the night of the shooting. His floor hadn’t been vacuumed in three months. He was behind with his dishes, so he used paper plates. He ate mostly takeout and crap out of cans.
Scott unclipped the lead.
“This is it, dog. Mi casa, su casa.”
Maggie glanced up at him, then looked at the closed door, then studied the room as if she was disappointed. Her nose sniffed and twitched.
“Make yourself at home. I’ll get your stuff.”
Getting her stuff took two trips. He brought in her collapsible crate and sleeping pad first, then the metal food and water bowls, and a twenty-pound bag of kibble. These things were provided by the K-9 Platoon, but Scott figured to pick up some toys and treats on his own. When he got back with the first load, she was lying under the dining table as he had seen her in the LAPD run—on her belly, feet out in front, head on the floor between her feet, watching him.
“How’re you doing? You like it under there?”
He was hoping for a tail thump, but all she did was watch him.
Orso called as Scott was heading out the door.
“You want to see what we have, can you get in here tomorrow morning?”
Scott thought about Leland’s scowl.
“I’m working the dog in the morning. How about late morning, just before lunch? Eleven or eleven-thirty.”
“Shoot for eleven. If we get a call-out, I’ll text you.”
“Great. Thanks.”
Scott figured he could leave the dog in Glendale when he split for the Boat.
When he got back with the food and bowls, Maggie was still under the table. He put her bowls in the kitchen, filled one with water, the other with food, but she showed no interest in either.
Scott had figured he would set up her crate in his bedroom, but he put it beside the table. She seemed to be comfortable there, and now he wondered if she had bothered to cruise through his bedroom and bath. Maybe her nose told her everything she needed to know.
As soon as he had the crate up, she slinked from under the table and into the crate.
“I have to put the pad in. C’mon, get out.”
Scott stepped back, and gave her the command.
“Come. Come, Maggie. Here.”
She stared at him.
“Come.”
Didn’t move.
Scott knelt at the crate’s mouth, let her smell his hand, and slowly reached for her collar. She growled. Scott pulled back and stepped away.
“Okay. Forget the pad.”
He dropped the pad on the floor beside the crate, then went into his bedroom to change. He took off his uniform, grabbed a quick shower,
then pulled on jeans and a T-shirt from Henry’s Tacos. Even pulling the T-shirt over his head hurt like a sonofabitch, and made his eyes water.
When he was hanging his uniform in the closet, he noticed his old tennis stuff in a faded gym bag, and found an unopened can of bright green tennis balls. He popped the tab on the can, and took a ball so fresh and bright it almost glowed.
Scott went to the door and tossed it into the living room. It bounced across the floor, hit the far wall, and rolled to a stop. Maggie charged from her crate, scrambled to the ball, and touched her nose to it. Her ears were cocked forward and her tail was straight up. Scott thought he had found a toy for her, but then her ears went down and her tail dropped. She seemed to shrink. She looked left, then right, as if looking for something, then went back into her crate.
Scott walked to the ball, and studied the dog. Belly down, feet out in front, head between her feet. Watching him.
He toed the ball to the wall hard enough to bounce it back.
Her eyes followed it briefly, but returned to him without interest.
“Hungry? We’ll eat, then go for a walk. Sound good?”
He popped a frozen pizza in the microwave, three minutes, good to go. While the microwave was humming, he searched the fridge, and came out with half a pack of baloney, a white container with two leftover Szechuan dumplings, and a container of leftover Yang Chow fried rice. He stopped the microwave, pulled the pie, and smushed the dumplings on top. He covered it with the fried rice, then set a paper plate over it, and put it back into the microwave. Another two minutes.
While Scott’s dinner was heating, he put two scoops of kibble into Maggie’s bowl. He tore the baloney into pieces, dropped it into the kibble, then added a little hot water to make a nice gravy. He mixed it together with his hand, then took a piece of the baloney to the crate, and held it out in front of Maggie’s nose.
Sniff, sniff.
She ate it.
“I hope this stuff doesn’t give you the squirts.”
She followed him into the kitchen. Scott took his pizza from the microwave, got a Corona from the fridge, and they ate together on the kitchen floor. He stroked her while she ate, like Leland said. Long smooth strokes. She paid him no attention, but didn’t seem to mind. When she finished eating, she returned to the living room. Scott thought she was going back to the crate, but she stopped in the center of the room by the tennis ball, head drooping, nose working, her great tall ears swiveling. Scott thought she was staring at the tennis ball, but couldn’t be sure. Then she went into his bedroom. Scott followed, and found her with her face in his tennis bag. She backed out of the bag, looked at him, then walked around his bed, sniffing constantly. She briefly returned to the tennis bag before going into the bathroom. He wondered if she was looking for something, but decided she was exploring, then out came the sound of lapping. Scott thought, crap, he would have to keep the seat down. When the lapping stopped, Maggie returned to her crate, and Scott went to his computer. He had been thinking about the robbery Orso described since he left the Boat.
