The Dog That Saved Stewart Coolidge

by Jim Kraus

  At this Hubert began to dog-dance and bounce and whimper and growl and lick and head-butt with wild abandon.

  Stewart let him go on for a long moment, then gathered the wiggling dog in his arms and just held him, held him firm and tight.

  And the truth shall set you free.

  Hubert had been in jail for five days.

  Stewart continued to show up for work and do his job as best he could, but very few of his fellow employees said much to him, afraid that if they were seen consorting with him, and if Stewart somehow got blamed for everything that had gone on during the dog bandit’s run of brazen, daylight thefts, then they might be cojoined with him—and somehow be exiled from favored employee status.

  And no one wanted to be exiled and left adrift on Mr. Arden’s bad side.

  To Stewart’s surprise, and to everyone else’s, Mr. Arden had hardly said a word to Stewart about anything. Stewart heard a few snatches of gossip—that Mr. Arden had been instructed by the company team of lawyers and attorneys and HR consultants to steer clear of “the offender” until the city council held its hearing on the locked-up canine. Then, once Stewart and the dog were found guilty, in an almost court of law, the corporate hammer could fall on him.

  No one wanted to be near that corporate hammer when it fell.

  The only person who expressed interest in the situation was Denny King, who worked nights most of the time, and who was said to have a checkered past, and, as some claimed, was working only because of a state program that found jobs for ex-convicts.

  “Tough,” Denny said the morning after the arrest. “You weren’t busted, were you? Like for aiding and abetting or anything?”

  “No. Just the dog.”

  “Good. If you need it, I got a name of a great lawyer in Lewisburg. He’s sort of a weasel—but then, aren’t they all?”

  Stewart nodded, not sure if he actually knew any lawyers personally.

  “He can get anyone off on anything. You need him, give him a call and mention my name. Okay? He’s a righteous guy, if you know what I mean.”

  Stewart didn’t know what he meant, but thanked him for the information. He was sure he didn’t need a criminal lawyer. And even if he did, he couldn’t afford one.

  And I don’t think animals get court-appointed legal representation—like the criminals do on TV.

  Now, after five days of Hubert’s incarceration, Stewart had made friends with most of the police force of Wellsboro—not that there were that many to befriend. To a man (and two women) they all expressed dismay at having a dog locked up, and even further dismay over the sad state of political affairs—even in a small town like Wellsboro.

  And as he got to know them, he became more interested in the paths they had taken to join the police force. To his great surprise, one of the older patrolmen had actually majored in political science at the University of Pittsburgh.

  “Waste of my time,” he explained to Stewart. “Should have just gone to the academy right out of high school.”

  “And you like what you do?” Stewart asked.

  The patrolman smiled. “It’s the best job I ever had, son. I love every day. Always something different. Like dogs who steal, you know?”

  Stewart was mostly certain that he was telling the truth and that he did really like what he did.

  I wonder what that feels like—to like what you do?

  The evening of the fifth day of Hubert’s incarceration, Lisa and Stewart walked from their house to the police station. It was a warm evening, and Stewart liked walking with her. It extended their time together and it gave them a chance to talk with no interruptions.

  Hubert, Stewart stated, seemed to be holding up well. “He looks a little bored, but he’s happy every time I come and doesn’t whine too much when I have to leave again.”

  That evening, Stewart and Lisa gathered up a bouncing Hubert and took him out for his nightly constitutional.

  The warm air was thick with the scent of real lilacs or some other flower filling the night, and the sky showed dark and clear, holding a canopy made up of the jeweled light of the stars.

  A few blocks into their walk, Lisa pulled Stewart’s hand close to her. All three of them stopped and Stewart and Hubert looked at her, wondering why.

  “Stewart,” Lisa said in an almost whisper, earnest, and a little scared, “can we break him out?”

  Stewart actually stepped back a half step.

  “Break him out? Hubert?”

  Hubert listened, then sat, thinking that this conversation might take more than a few moments. His head was tilted to one side, as if trying to follow dialogue being spoken in a foreign language.

  Lisa looked both ways, up and down the street, as if checking for eavesdroppers. They were standing next to a vacant building that used to house a video rental store.

  “Listen, Stewart, I was thinking. I couldn’t live with myself if something happened to Hubert. And I have to think that a lot of this hubbub over the bone stealing and all was because of the stories I wrote for the Gazette. If the stories weren’t there, no one would care, probably. So…I just couldn’t bear to see something bad happen.”

  Stewart turned to face her directly.

  “Nothing bad will happen, Lisa. It won’t.”

  Lisa turned her head, almost as if she were about to run off, or like she was unwilling to make eye contact.

  “You can’t know that, Stewart. You can’t.”

  “I’m sure. I am.”

  Lisa snapped back to him. Her eyes flashed, even in the dark, angry, or at least upset.

  “My father said he would never leave my mother—and he did,” Lisa hissed. “So what’s sure and certain in this world, Stewart? We have to take care of Hubert. We have to. I don’t want to spend the rest of my life feeling guilty. I’ve done enough of that already.”

  Stewart was confused, and a little scared. Even Hubert, all of a sudden, as if feeding on Lisa’s emotions, seemed to grow nervous, and anxious, and whimpered a bit—more of a low whine, a noise Stewart had never heard him make.

  Stewart dropped the leash. He was sure Hubert would not move anywhere, not without the two of them by his side. Stewart put his hands on Lisa’s shoulders—stopping for just a moment, thinking how small and delicate her shoulders were, how precise and how doll-like they felt—and turned her to face him.

  “Lisa, I understand what you’re asking. I’ve thought about it. I could just say that he got off his leash and took off. But then what? I would have to hide him upstairs and then we would have to move. I would think even the police here in Wellsboro would consider me as a prime suspect. And Hubert is not a dog I could hide under the bed. And if we had to leave, I would have to leave you. I don’t want to do that. Not now. Not ever. Besides that, I don’t think lying is something they teach in church. I don’t think lying is part of the truth, you know?”

  Lisa stared up at Stewart—angry, sad, confused, worried—and then, slowly, all of those feelings began to change and turn into something else, perhaps akin to wonderment, or a sudden, joyful acknowledgment of an unspoken dream, a goal she’d had but had not mentioned yet to Stewart.

  “The truth? What do you mean, Stewart? The truth? Like the Bible sort of truth?”

  That was when Hubert barked and bounced and placed his front paws on Lisa’s shoulder as well. He couldn’t quite stretch that far, but he came close, as if he were trying to explain something very important to Lisa, trying his best to see what actually had occurred and that she should be happy.

  Stewart knew that what he was about to say would be confusing. He was still a little, or a lot, confused. But he felt something different as well. Confused, to be sure, but also certain that he was on the right path. Often, in the past, Stewart had felt as if he were left alone in the darkness, but now, way off in the distance, within reach, he could now see light. He could now see a way out of that darkness.

  And he could see, or sense, a glimpse of that peace.

  And truth.
r />   He looked into her eyes and did not look away, even though the words were hard to grab on to.

  “I picked up a Bible. There was a stack of free ones in the jail. They probably have them there for like, hardened criminals and deviants and, you know, bad guys. But I started reading it to Hubert. He seemed to like it. I got the feeling that he wanted me to read it. And he would fall asleep with his head in my lap when I did. And to be honest, I sort of like reading it. I like when it talks about looking for the truth, or finding the truth.”

  Lisa appeared to be near tears.

  “Really?”

  “Really.”

  Lisa’s broad, happy smile gradually faded and she grew puzzled.

  “But I thought you went to church. I thought you knew all about faith.”

  Stewart shook his head. “After my parents both took off for good, when I was a freshman in high school, my grandmother took up with this…sort of crazy church. I’m not sure it was a real, honest-to-goodness church. You know, like a real church that follows the rules and all that. I guess we went to church when I was real little. But not for years and years. So I didn’t know what to expect. But I thought that her new ‘group’ was pretty nuts. Lots of screaming and shouting. And lots of blame. She blamed everyone but herself for everything that had gone wrong in her life and with her family. And she acted like all of a sudden she knew all about what to do and not do. She was always telling me all the things that I can’t do and if I did do them I would go to hell and she would point out people that we knew who were going to hell. And for sure my dad was going to hell, and of course, my mother—after a while, I stopped listening.”

  Lisa was crying now, very softly, very small, the tears on her cheeks catching the starlight as little jeweled facets.

  “I didn’t know.”

  Stewart felt a sudden, and unexplained, sense of boldness.

  “And I didn’t know that I didn’t know. But then I met you. And I watched you, Lisa. That’s what I did. It was nothing that you said, really. It was how you acted. Sort of how you lived. I saw right away that you had a sense of peace that I didn’t. And I wanted that. So I paid attention. And it’s also because Hubert seemed to keep nudging us together.”

  “You think?” Lisa sniffled. “Hubert?”

  “I do. Don’t you? Didn’t you get the sense that he was the happiest when we were together?”

  Lisa sniffled again, louder this time, and almost laughed.

  “I thought it was just me. I thought I was imagining it. Or that I wanted it—to get to know you—and that I was projecting onto poor Hubert.”

  Stewart looked down at the dog.

  “No. I think he’s had a hand in this from the beginning. Or a paw, as it were. I think he knows what he’s doing. He knows about the truth. I see it in his eyes.”

  Hubert bounced several more times, barking and growling.

  Stewart decided then that a very long embrace was just what Hubert would want to see, and apparently it was, because as they hugged, Hubert sat back down, then found the loose end of the leash and picked it up in his mouth and sat, grinning, watching his two humans hold tight to each other and whisper soft things to each other.

  Stewart broke the hug after a while.

  “We better get back or they will think we’ve let him go.”

  Lisa giggled in response.

  “And, Stewart, you won’t tell anyone about what I asked, will you? About breaking him out and escaping? I don’t know what came over me.”

  Stewart, still feeling bold, bent down and kissed her on the forehead. He kept his eyes open and saw that Hubert almost dropped the leash when he pressed his lips to the top of Lisa’s head.

  “I won’t say a word. And it was nothing that I didn’t consider a few hundred times myself.”

  Stewart reached down and took the leash from Hubert’s mouth.

  Being together, the three of them, felt like they had been doing it forever, which, of course, they had not, but each one of them, without saying another word, all hoped that this feeling would never end and that the three of them would always be together.

  And then Stewart thought that not all things go according to what we want—and he would be okay, no matter what happened.

  Stewart guessed he would have no choice but to trust.

  When the three of them were back in the jail cell, Lisa, in a mouse-small voice, said, “We could pray about this, you know. I sort of forgot to do that. Maybe that was part of my problem.”

  Stewart locked the cell door and knelt back beside Lisa. They had been kneeling like this all along to be able to say good-bye to Hubert and pet him just before they left. But tonight, Hubert whimpered and growled a little and then put his paw through the bars so Lisa could hold it.

  “Could you pray, Lisa? I’d rather hear you pray than me. And I’m still not sure of what words to use, you know?”

  And she did, quietly, offering a prayer as soft as a rabbit’s fur, as gentle as a morning mist, and as heartfelt as a toddler’s request for a hug. It was all perfect and it was all planned and Hubert whimpered along with every word Lisa said to God, as if Hubert were adding his voice to hers, to make it better understood by the Divine Creator, that guiding force of nature that Hubert knew as his protector.

  And Stewart, in that most pellucid moment of clarity, was certain that the prayer was heard and that its requests were being considered—by the very Creator of all things bright and beautiful.

  Wellsboro, after dark, grew soft and hushed. There were a few bars open with loud music, and a few late-night businesses, but for the most part once the sun went down Wellsboro relaxed, yawned, and grew still.

  Stewart and Lisa said the final good-byes to Hubert, said good-bye to Sergeant Wilson who was at the desk, and stepped out into the darkness again.

  But this darkness was different. Stewart, in the past, preferred the daylight hours, where nothing could hide in the shadows. But tonight, that fear—that unconscious, unknowing fear—while not vanished, was less than it ever had been.

  Stewart would think back on this night and ponder why.

  Maybe it’s because I finally admitted to someone the truth about my parents. Like opening a door into a locked cellar. It doesn’t change what it was, but it changed me.

  He took Lisa’s hand in his, this time on his volition, and they walked for several blocks, in silence. The only sound they made was their soft footfalls on the sidewalk.

  “Do you really think Hubert had a plan?” Lisa asked as they turned down Maple.

  “I don’t know,” Stewart said. “I mean, no one will ever know. But it sure seems like he knows what he’s doing. And he really likes us together. And he got me to think about the Bible and all that. So…I guess he did have a plan.”

  “Good dog, Hubert,” Lisa said. “Good dog.”

  “I think he helped me grow up,” Stewart said. “I never had someone in my life who needed protection.”

  Lisa squeezed his hand.

  “I know you mean Hubert,” she said, “but when I’m with you, I feel protected, too.”

  “Good. I meant you, too.”

  Lisa was silent for a half a block, as if she had something to say but was searching for the right words.

  “You’ve been damaged, Stewart,” was what she finally said. Lisa pushed a few strands of hair from her face and turned to look at him as she spoke. “We all have been damaged, I think, in one way or another. The world is broken, Stewart. I used to think that if we tried hard enough, everything would be better. I think trying to be good is a good thing, but the world will stay broken. You know what I mean?”

  Stewart said that he did.

  “When my parents divorced,” Lisa said, “I was hurt. It’s still hard to trust. But everyone thought that once the thing that causes the pain is over—like a bad marriage or a divorce—then the pain will be gone.”

  “And it’s not,” Stewart added.

  “No, it’s not gone. It’s kind of like an echo that
never fully fades away.”

  Stewart nodded, making sure that she saw him nod. He had read somewhere that if a man wants to show his interest in a woman, he had to be sure that she knew he was listening to her.

  I don’t remember where I read that. It sounds like it would be true.

  “My mother still wants me to be careful with you, Stewart,” Lisa said quietly, almost as an admission of guilt.

  “Why?”

  “She doesn’t want me to get hurt. Like she was. But more because I was…before. She worries a lot. And to be honest, I gave her reasons to worry. I’ve done things that I’m not proud of.”

  Stewart nodded again.

  After a moment, he said, “And my grandmother still wants me to be careful with you.”

  Lisa stopped walking and turned to Stewart.

  “But she doesn’t know me at all.”

  It was obvious to Stewart that Lisa’s mother’s warning went down easier with Stewart than did his grandmother’s warning to him about Lisa went down with Lisa.

  I read about that, too…somewhere. The differences between men and women.

  “She thinks you’re after my money.”

  Lisa could not hold her laugh.

  “And you have money?” she asked.

  “No. I don’t. That’s what makes it so bizarre.”

  Neither of them had paid much attention to where they were walking. Across the street was the Wellsboro Park, almost in the center of town. In the center of the park lay a sculpture inside a large fountain. Without needing to ask, they both walked toward the sound of the water. A ring of benches surrounded the fountain. A few other people were in the park that evening, but if asked later, Stewart would not have been able to tell you if there was one or a hundred.

  From off in the distance, a few blocks over, perhaps, came the sound of music. It was a live band doing “All the Hits of the 60s, 70s, and 80s.” It was like listening to a car radio three or four cars over. It provided a pleasant background, and you could talk over it.