The Case of the Prowling Bear

by John R. Erickson

  Thank you!

  Thank you!

  Thank you, thank you, thank you!

  You want some more? Well, listen here:

  Thank you, thank you, thank you.

  Thank you, thank you, thank you, pooch, and stick ‘em in your ear.

  I’m proud to be a buzzard, I’m proud to be uncouth.

  I despise all forms of manners and that’s the gospel truth.

  The trouble is that saying “thank you” always makes me sick,

  And throwing up on mouthy dogs is a famous buzzard trick. Ha!

  Thank you, thank you, I think that I shall tank you.

  Thank you!

  Thank you!

  Thank you, thank you, thank you!

  You ever see a buzzard launch his dinner from a tree?

  Thank you, thank you, thank you, pooch,

  And here’s a gift from me!

  Sometimes, during presentations of buzzard music, my mind wanders. I mean, it’s so bad, the mind wishes to fly away to a happier place. But on this occasion, I just happened to be listening to his words, and caught just enough to realize that trouble was heading my way.

  See, the old sneak had devised a way of getting his revenge. When he sang that line about pitching his lunch from a tree, he wasn’t kidding. That’s what buzzards do when they’re mad or unhappy: they throw up on whoever made ‘em that way. And we don’t need to go into horrifying details about what buzzards eat.

  Bottom line: you don’t want to get hit.

  When he launched, I saw it coming and had just enough time to scramble out of the way. The awful stuff hit the ground with a splat, and fellers, you talk about STINK! I’m sure it killed every weed and blade of grass within fifty feet.

  I beamed him a glare. “Now, why’d you have to go and do that?”

  “By grabbies, you made me do manners and it made me ill, and that’s what you get—paybacks! Teach you to force manners on a buzzard. I hope you get corns on your feet and fleas in your hair.”

  “Yeah, well, I kept a count on your thank-yous, and you only did thirty-eight. You owe me twelve more.”

  His eyes lit up. “Well, now, that ain’t a problem. If you want to get all huffy about it, I’ll sing that song again, fifty times, if you want. Hee. To be real honest, I’d love to take another shot at you, even if it means saying a bunch of mealy-mouth thank yous.”

  I backed farther away from the tree, just in case he was reloading. “No, that’s okay. You cheated, but I’m not going to press my luck.”

  He gave a snarling laugh. “Well, maybe you ain’t as dumb as you look. Sorry you have to leave so soon. Have a nice day. Or, even better, go sit on a porcupine and come back sometime when you can’t stay so long.”

  “Thanks, Wallace, it’s always a pleasure doing business with you. See you around, Junior, and watch out for bears.”

  I returned to the pickup, chuckling to myself and enjoying the memory of old Wallace yelling “Thank You!” It had really made my day…but then a darker thought moved across my mind. A black bear was running loose on our ranch, and you know what? That wasn’t so funny.

  I slowed to a walk and noticed something else that wasn’t funny. The air, which had been soft and still all afternoon, had begun to stir…and it was cold—not just cool or chilly, but cold. We’re talking about air from a deep freeze. Dark clouds raced over us from the north, and all at once, tumbleweeds began loping south across the prairie.

  Slim noticed it too. He had stripped down to his tee shirt, you might recall, and now he felt the sudden chill. He looked up at the sky and that’s when the wind slammed us—a blast of frigid air that turned his breath into fog.

  “Load up, dogs! Let’s get out of here.”

  By the time we made it back to Slim’s place, the wind was screaming through the big cottonwood trees along the creek. I don’t know how much the temperature had dropped, but it was falling like a cinder block, and little bullets of ice smacked our faces as we ran to the house.

  We darted inside and Slim went to work stoking up the fire. Nice idea, but the wind was coming down the stove pipe and pushed clouds of smoke into the house. See, when the fire in your stove burns down to ashes, there isn’t enough heat going up the chimney to keep the cold air from coming down.

  Slim had been through this before and knew what to do. He built a roaring fire with newspaper and got the stove hot enough so that the chimney would draw, then he added pieces of pine lumber and small chunks of hackberry bark, until he had a good hot fire and was able to close the stove door.

  He heaved a sigh and fanned the smoke away from his face. “Dogs, we’re in for a bad night.”

  He had no idea how true those words would turn out to be. Neither did I, but I was getting a real bad feeling about it. I mean, when you hear the house creak and groan, when the windows are rattling in their frames…fellers, it makes you feel pretty small and fragile.

  Then the electric lights started blinking, and Slim had a pretty good idea what was coming next. He hurried into the kitchen and rummaged through the cabinets until he found his kerosene lamp. He hadn’t used it since the last time the power had gone out, so the lamp’s glass chimney was covered with black soot, dust and mud dobber nests. He cleaned it and had just lit the wick when the power went out.

  He shook his head and growled, “I’m never ready for these things, always half a step behind.” His eyes grew wide. “Good honk, I’d better fill the bathtub in case my water freezes up!”

  He dashed into the bathroom. Under normal conditions, we dogs follow our people from room to room, but on this deal, I wasn’t sure that would be a good idea. I mean, we’d had an unfortunate incident in that same bathroom the night before and I had no wish to reopen old wounds.

  But I did follow him to the door and watched as he turned the bathtub’s water spigot. Two drips of water came out, then nothing. His head slumped. “No electricity, no water pump, half a step behind. Well, it looks like we’re going to have a dry camp for a while.”

  Holding the lamp in front of him, he went back into the kitchen and rummaged through cabinet drawers until he found a flashlight. He found five of them, actually, but only one that worked.

  That sent him into another grumbling tirade. “These stinking flashlights sit there in the drawer for two years, just waiting for the power to go off, and then they all drop dead at the same time. The only time a flashlight works is when you don’t need it.”

  To teach the flashlights a lesson, he slammed the drawer shut as hard as he could. BAM! Too bad he didn’t get his thumb out of the gap. He let out a yelp of pain, shook his hand for a solid minute, and even put the thumb in his mouth and sucked on it.

  I turned my head so as not to add to his embarrassment. I mean, we dogs could tell many stories about our people, but this was one that didn’t need repeating, a grown man sucking on his thumb. The poor guy was having a real bad evening.

  Chapter Ten: A Sound in the Dark

  Armed with the one flashlight on the ranch that worked, Slim went out on the porch to check the thermometer. It didn’t take him long. He came flying back inside, hugging his arms and gasping for breath.

  “Holy cow, you can’t believe how cold it is! The temperature’s down to ten degrees, and I’ll bet the wind chill is twenty below zero. Everything’s going to freeze up tonight.”

  Well, it was going to be a long night: no lights, no water, wind screaming, house groaning and popping, windows rattling, and tree limbs banging on the side of the house.

  Slim fixed himself a sad little supper out of a can: sardines embalmed in mustard. He laid one of the dead fish on a stale cracker. It was so bad, he gagged on it, which explains his sudden burst of generosity. “Here Hankie, you want a bite?”

  Was he serious? I’d been sitting there, watching him gag on the stuff, observing his face as i
t became a pinched prune, and now he was going to share it with ME?

  Ha. No thanks. I’d had a few dealings with his sardines. I lowered my head, tucked up my tail, and went slinking into the living room. Behind me, I heard him grumble, “Dumb dog.”

  Fine. As we dogs often say, “Some cowboys need more ignoring than others.” I would take dumb over sick any day.

  Speaking of sick, he still hadn’t found the deposit I’d left under his bed, but on the other hand…sniff, sniff…you know, sardines smell pretty bad at first, but after you get used to the first blast of dead fish smell…I found myself drifting back to the kitchen.

  I mean, you never know. Past experience isn’t everything. Just because every sardine you’ve tried was toxic doesn’t mean that you won’t become best friends with the next one.

  I met Slim in the kitchen door. “Too late, Mister Fuss Budget, I ate ‘em all.”

  Anyway, as I was saying, we dogs have to be very cautious about the stuff our people try to feed us, because they will give us any kind of garbage. One of the keys to success in the Dog Business is to choose your food with care, and be very suspicious of anything that smells like a dead fish.

  Your sardines are a high risk food category, don’t you know, and the best answer to a sardine is Iron Discipline. So, yes, once again, Iron Discipline had saved me from a bad food experience.

  It’s pretty impressive that a dog could exercise so much self-control, isn’t it? You bet.

  Even though the stove was running at full blast, the house was getting colder. The icy wind penetrated every seam and crack, and you could feel a draft moving across the floor. Slim settled into his easy chair, covered up with a wool blanket, and started reading a book by the light of the kerosene lamp. Drover and I moved as close to the stove as we could, without starting a hair fire on our backs.

  The wind roared. The house creaked and groaned. Tree branches scratched on the side of the house like frozen claws.

  And then we heard a banging noise outside. That was the first indication that…well, I guess you’ll find out, if you decide to go on with the story. To be honest, I’m not sure you should. I’m not at liberty to reveal any details at this point, but I must warn you that we’re about to leave the gentle and easy parts of the story and move into…well, troubled waters, so to speak.

  It gets scary, that’s all I can say. You’ll have to be the judge on whether you go on or not.

  I sat up and glanced around. Drover was asleep. Slim was reading. He hadn’t heard the sound, so I barked. His eyes rose from the book and stabbed me like a two-pronged fork. He was about to tell me to knock off the noise (I know him so well), but then he heard it too. He cocked his head and listened.

  Bam. Bam. Bam.

  “What in the world is that?” He threw off his blanket and went to the north window, parted the faded, dusty curtains, and looked outside. “The saddle shed door blew open.” He scowled and rubbed his chin with a finger. “I know I closed it. I think I closed it. Huh.”

  You know the one thing he didn’t think about? You’ll find out soon enough. I didn’t think about it either.

  Even though it wasn’t a long walk to the saddle shed, he put on his warmest winter clothes: a heavy wool coat with a fleece collar, his wool Scotch cap with the ear flaps, insulated gloves, snow boots, and a silk wild rag tied around his neck. The man was dressing himself for the coldest weather we’d ever seen on the ranch.

  Good. I was proud of him for going to all that trouble, and I really wished him the best, because I had no intention of going with him. I mean, somebody needed to stay and guard the stove, right? You bet, and besides, I wasn’t the one who’d left the door unlatched. That was one careless mistake he couldn’t pin on his dogs.

  Bundled up like a robot, he lumbered to the door. His hand closed around the knob and he pulled the door open. Frigid air rushed in and I could hear the roar of the wind outside. I moved closer to the stove and wished he would hurry up and shut the door.

  He turned and looked at…well, he seemed to be looking at me, and that didn’t exactly cause bells of joy to start ringing in my heart. I flattened myself against the floor, hoping that…well, that maybe he wouldn’t see me and might forget that I was there.

  “Hank, come on. You too, Stub Tail. Y’all need to make a pit stop, and a little exposure to that wind might tell you what a couple of pampered mutts you are.”

  Pampered mutts! I couldn’t believe he’d said that.

  “Hurry up, let’s get this over with. Out!”

  Oh brother. For several seconds, I studied my options: hide under the coffee table; dash down the hall and hide in his bedroom? No, any of those diversions would have merely inflamed the situation and made it worse.

  I rose to my feet and gave Drover the boot. “Get up, soldier, we’re going on a forced march. Rattle your hocks.”

  You never heard such moaning, whining, whimpering, squeaking, wheezing, groaning, and griping. “It’s freezing out there! This leg’s killing me! My tail’s so cold, it’ll hardly wag! Help, murder, my leg!” And so forth.

  It did no good. Slim was waiting at the door, his face as stern as granite. He wasn’t going to give us a pass on this deal.

  When I stepped out on the porch, the wind hit me like a wall of ice. I’d experienced my share of cold winds before. I mean, this was the Panhandle, not Port Isabel, and we were accustomed to harsh winters. But THIS! Fellers, it was more than cold, more than bitter cold. It took my breath away and left me stunned.

  This was killer cold.

  Slim stepped off the porch and went trudging off toward the saddle shed, following the beam of his flashlight. I could have stayed on the porch with Mister Squeak and Moan, but the thought of listening to his noise just…I don’t know, it overwhelmed me, I guess. I didn’t think I could stand it.

  And besides, going with Slim was the right thing to do. Slackers can sit on the porch and whine, but your top-of-the-line cowdogs stay with their people, through thick and thicker.

  I stepped off the porch and caught up with him. He was humped over and trying to protect his face from bullets of ice, and every breath made steam in the air. He gave me a weak smile and said, “Pooch, this is how people froze to death in the old days.”

  Right. And there I was, right beside him, even though he’d hogged all the sardines.

  These people have no idea how hard we work to please them.

  By the time we reached the saddle shed, I was already half-frozen. We needed to get the door secured and return to base, but while we were there, I figured it wouldn’t hurt to do a quick check of the shed. I mean, sometimes coons will sneak into a shed and get into mischief, right? You bet, and coon mischief can be very destructive. So while the door was in the open position (it had been banging open and shut, don’t you see), I darted inside.

  Familiar smells reached my Noseatory Sensors, mostly alfalfa hay and horse feed, but I noticed another smell that wasn’t so familiar, a kind of musky, oily smell. I sent that information to Data Control and while I was waiting for the results to come back, I saw a hairy, roundish, shadowy form sitting behind a bale of hay. Oh, and I could hear it chewing on something.

  When the report came back from DC, I put the clues together and knew we had a Bingo. We had caught a thieving raccoon in the barn!

  Chapter Eleven: Sure ‘Nuff, We Found a . . . HUH?

  How did I know it was a coon? Easy. Let’s do a quick review of the Clue List.

  Musky smell: Raccoons have a lot of oil on their hair and skin.

  Roundish form: In the wintertime, coons get lard-fat and grow a heavy coat of hair, and the combination makes them about twice as big as they look in the summer.

  Eating something: The “something” was horse feed, also known as “sweet feed.” It contains oats and molasses, and coons love it. Who or whom would you expect to find stealing horse feed on
a cold winter night?

  Do you get it now? Heh heh. I had just walked into a burglary-in-progress and things were fixing to get exciting. I mean, scuffling with a coon can be a lot of fun when we’ve got a cowboy around to break up the fight in case it gets out of hand. A shovel works wonders in those situations—applied to the coon, don’t you see.

  The only question was whether the perp was my old pal Eddy the Rac or one of his thuggish cousins. The profile suggested someone quite a big bigger than Eddy, maybe one of his cousins, Harley or Choo Choo. I’d sparred a few rounds with those bums and they were pretty tough, but now, with Slim backing me up…

  Just to be on the safe side, I tossed a glance behind me. The door had blown shut and my partner seemed to be struggling to open it in the wind. I waited. At last, he pried it open and I saw the glow of his flashlight.

  “What you got, Hankie, a mouse?”

  The sound of his voice gave me a rush of courage. A mouse? Oh no, much better than a mouse. I whirled back to the thieving raccoon and announced our presence with a jarring bark. “Hank the Cowdog, Special Crimes Division. Hands up and reach for the sky!”

  I love doing that. It makes me feel so…so…so something. Strong. Stern. Powerful. Important. A figure of great authority. The Dog in Charge.

  At that very moment, the beam of the flashlight landed on the…my goodness, that was a big coon, and he’d sure piled on the lard over the winter months.

  That was a real big coon.

  That coon was HUGE.

  Slowly, he turned his head around: short muzzle, little green eyes, enormous teeth, and slobber dripping from his lips. I felt the hair rising on my back, and ten thousand volts of electricity shot down my spine and went all the way out to the end of my tail.

  And then he growled. Coons don’t growl like that. My eyes bugged out and my ears flew up.

  Behind me, I heard Slim’s astonished voice. “Good honk, that’s a BEAR!”