by Susan Conant
We headed back toward Mellie’s. When we were four or five houses away, a young woman with braided hair and library pallor emerged from a doorway, and I asked whether she’d happened to notice a loose dog.
“Actually, I did,” she said. “A big husky. Smaller than yours, but something like that. It went down a driveway. This was maybe thirty minutes ago.”
“Near here?”
“I’ll show you,” she volunteered.
Rowdy and I trotted after her. When she was two doors from Mellie’s, she stopped and said, “Here. The dog ran down that driveway. Good luck.”
The woman walked away, and Rowdy and I headed down what was, in fact, a small cutout, a freshly graveled area with low shrubs on either side and exactly the space required for the one car that occupied it, a bright blue subcompact hybrid sedan. I remember wondering why the owner of the house hadn’t sacrificed the greenery, widened the cutout, and rented out the parking space. In every possible way, Cambridge parking is a nightmare. Even if you have a resident permit for on-street parking, you’re in danger of being ticketed and, worse, towed. In the winter, you have to be careful not to park in places that are tow zones during declared snow emergencies, and during the rest of the year, you have to check the signs to make sure that you aren’t leaving your car on the side of a street scheduled for street cleaning. The towing for street cleaning is draconian: enforcement is vicious, and reclaiming your car is, as my neighbor Kevin Dennehy says, wicked expensive. Consequently, even the most unprepossessing little off-street parking space can go for a high rent.
The owner of this house, however, apparently didn’t need the income. Like Mellie’s, the place was almost a cottage, two stories high, with a small porch and wooden steps, but it had been recently painted in the warm yellow familiar from the Longfellow House on upscale Brattle Street. The windows looked new and had off-white fabric blinds, all lowered. When Rowdy and I walked to the end of the parking area, I saw that the backyard was landscaped with diminutive shrubs that I couldn’t identify, a dwarf weeping tree of some sort, and a heavy layer of bark mulch. A five-foot-high wooden fence stained dark brown ran around the sides and the rear of the yard. There was no sign of the missing Siberian and no sign of anyone at home. Rowdy showed no particular interest in entering the yard. I continued mainly because the pale woman had said that the dog had been here. It was possible, I thought, that the owner of the pretty little house had taken her in and had perhaps called animal control. Only then did I realize that I’d neglected to ask Mellie whether Strike had an ID tag on her collar and, if so, whose name and phone number were on it. On second thought, would Mellie have noticed? Did Mellie know how to read?
When we rounded the corner of the house, I saw the full extent of the renovations. At the back were large sliding glass doors, and across the entire rear of the house ran a low deck with teak planter boxes, matching benches, and a small teak patio table and chairs. I also saw unmistakable evidence of recent neglect: the lawn needed mowing, and the petunias in the teak boxes were wilted, as were the mums and patio tomatoes in large terra-cotta pots on the deck. Cambridge being the temple to academe that it is, the life of the mind always has top priority around here; the failure to mow the lawn and water the plants might simply mean that the owner was writing the final chapter of a book or completing preparations to teach a new course. Still, I felt mildly critical. This yard was about the size of ours, and if we could miraculously cure the dogs of ruining our potential oasis of urban greenery, I’d find a few extra minutes every day to water the plants instead of letting them wilt.
When I stepped onto the deck and approached the glass doors, it was not, however, with the intention of delivering a lecture about horticultural responsibility. I merely wanted to take a close look at the planter boxes and the benches they supported, an attractive and sturdy set that I thought might stand a chance of surviving the dogs. No lights were on, and no sounds came from the house. Still, the bright blue subcompact was parked in the cutout. To avoid the embarrassment of being caught examining the furnishings on the deck, I made what I intended as the token gesture of rapping my knuckles on one of the glass doors. As I knocked, I looked in. Only a few feet from the glass door, on the tile floor of what proved to be a kitchen, a woman was sprawled facedown. Everywhere around her, in fact, everywhere I could see in the interior of the little house, were piles of broken crockery, cartons that had held milk and orange juice and cereal, emptied bags of flour and sugar, and books and magazines that had been tossed onto the floor. Potted plants had been knocked over. Next to the door was the carcass of a rotisserie chicken. Every cabinet door and every drawer was open, as were the doors of the oven and the refrigerator. Two gigantic fish tanks must have been shoved off their low stands; the glass had been smashed and dead fish lay amid glass shards on the damp tile. The stench of rot and death must have leaked out around the door frame. The spoiled remains of the rotisserie chicken contributed to it, I’m sure, as did the heaps of damp food and the sad little tropical fish, but its principal source must have been the body of the woman and the blood that had pooled, congealed, and dried around her. She wore cropped white jeans now stained red and a bloodied aqua T-shirt that revealed what could only have been gunshot wounds. I froze in place and stared.
In books and movies, it’s always the dog who alerts the dog walker to the presence of a corpse in a ditch or a shallow grave or under a pile of leaves and branches. Rowdy’s only interest was in persuading me that we’d wasted enough time hanging around and that it was now my obligation to relieve his boredom. In other words, his contribution consisted of awakening me from my trancelike state of shock. When I turned from the scene of horror that lay inside, everything in the neat little yard and on the beautifully furnished deck seemed momentarily unreal, as if the handsome wooden fence, the weeping tree, the shrubs, the planters, and all the rest were nothing more than images cast by a projector. Then my eyes met Rowdy’s, and his big, powerful, loving reality dragged me back to the world of substance. Sensing my disquiet, he moved to my left side, and I put my left hand on his back and leaned on him for support. The familiar texture of his coat, the coarse guard hairs over the soft padding of the undercoat, gave me comfort and strength, and his questioning look reminded me of the need to breathe and the need to take action.
“Dear God,” I said aloud. “Rowdy, I love you with all my heart. Get me out of here.”
CHAPTER 5
I stopped when we reached the sidewalk and then led Rowdy to the front of the house, where I found the street number on a decorative tile mounted next to the door. After taking a seat on the steps, I called 911 from my cell. Having promised to stay where I was, I remained there and tried to compose myself. My thoughts were racing. Mellie’s fear of the police meant that the sirens would frighten her. For all I knew, she’d assume that I’d called the police to come and arrest her for dog-sitting without a license. But I couldn’t go to her; I had to stay where I was until the police arrived and until I’d directed them to the deck, the glass door, and what lay beyond. The woman simply had to be dead. The scene had looked anything but fresh. The frames of the shattered aquariums were large. Those big tanks must have held a lot of water, but there had been no pools on the floor; all that remained was the dampness visible in the mess of flour, sugar, cereal, and whatever other food had been thrown to the tiles. Or was there a slight chance that the woman was still alive? Could anyone have lost so much blood and survived for the time it had taken the water to run off or evaporate? The petunias in the planters and the mums and tomatoes in the pots were so thoroughly wilted that the rain we’d had earlier in the day had failed to revive them. How long had it taken the plants to dry out so completely? Days rather than hours, certainly, but I had no idea how many days. Still, days rather than weeks. Wilted though they were, the plants were still green and still recognizable as petunias, mums, and tomatoes; they hadn’t become anonymous brown stalks.
But Mellie! Should I run to her house
and explain? Persuade her to follow me back here so she wouldn’t be alone when the police arrived? There’d be an ambulance, too, and other emergency vehicles.
“And how do I explain to her?” I asked Rowdy. “We’re two houses from Mellie’s. Mellie probably knows her. And, of course, there’s Strike, too, and Strike’s owner, whoever that is. I have to find out. For all we know, Strike ran off and headed for home.”
When the emergency vehicles approached, Rowdy’s eyes lit up, and he began to raise his head. Before he had the chance to burst forth with glorious howls, I put a finger to my lips and said, “Shhh! Not more malamutes, buddy. Just sirens. Good boy.”
A cruiser arrived first, and just behind it was an emergency medical van. Instead of wasting time searching for parking spots, the cops and the EMTs halted in the middle of the street, which was so narrow that it should probably have been one-way. I rose and rapidly explained to the older of the two cops, a massive guy with thick black hair, that I’d been looking for a lost dog when I’d happened to glance inside the door and had seen…but he should look for himself. Followed by the cops and two EMTs, Rowdy and I led the way to the backyard, where I pointed to the deck and the sliding glass doors. “In there,” I said. “I’ll be in front of the house.”
No one objected, but the second cop accompanied us. He was a young African-American guy with light skin, hazel eyes, and the lean build of a long-distance runner. When we reached the graveled cutout, he leaned against the bright blue car and pulled out a notebook and pen. “Looking for a dog,” he said. “Yours?’
“No. Just helping someone else.” It’s been pointed out to me that when I talk about dogs, I have a tendency to elaborate a bit. This time, I did not. Rather, I limited myself to giving my name, address, and phone number and saying that I had no idea who lived in the house. If I hadn’t been so concerned about Mellie’s reaction to the arrival of the police and, inevitably, to the news of a murder so close to home, I’d probably have mentioned Lt. Kevin Dennehy and said that he was my next-door neighbor. In fact, friendly person that I am, I’d have made some sort of contact with the young cop. Strangely enough, Rowdy took his cue from me. Instead of stacking himself in a show pose or demonstrating the full range of northern breed vocalizations or hurling himself to the ground to beg for a tummy rub, he made none of his usual bids for attention and admiration, but sat quietly and unobtrusively at my side.
In almost no time, I was free to return to Mellie’s, as I promptly did. One glance told me that she was as frightened as I’d feared. In fact, she’d taken refuge inside her house. Still clutching the fabric lead, she was peering out through a front window. Catching sight of Rowdy and me, she opened the door, and before she had a chance to speak, I said, “Someone needed an ambulance. That’s why the police are here. It has nothing to do with you. You don’t need to worry. But I didn’t have any luck finding Strike.”
Mellie shook her head back and forth. “Me neither.”
“I have some ideas about what to do next.” Instead of explicitly inviting myself in, I asked, “Is there somewhere we can talk?”
Mellie looked bewildered. From her point of view, I realized, we were already talking, weren’t we?
“We could sit here on the porch,” I said. It had two folding aluminum lawn chairs, the uncomfortable kind that find their principal use around here after snowstorms, when people who shovel out their cars are careful to designate the snow-free spaces as personal property rather than as the open-to-anyone spots on city streets that they might otherwise appear to be. Traffic cones and trash barrels are also popular choices. As a dog person, I take a keen interest in this local custom, which is clearly a human version of territorial marking, which is to say, leg lifting.
This time, Mellie got the point and invited me in. The first floor had only two rooms, a living room at the front, with a flight of stairs leading up to the second floor, and a kitchen and dining area at the back. The living room had brown carpeting, a brown couch, two brown chairs, a profusion of small pillows in bright colors, a large television set, and a great many small tables crammed with religious objects and framed photographs. On the wall hung two large reproductions of oil paintings, one of the Last Supper, the other of the Madonna and Child. The kitchen had dark brown cabinets and a floor of dark brown linoleum, but on the table in the dining area was a bright yellow tablecloth, and the refrigerator was plastered with photos of dogs held on by magnets. The little rooms were incredibly clean. The sink and appliances were white and unstained. Even the refrigerator magnets looked as if they’d been scrubbed. Francie had described Mellie as a model for independent living. I’d begun to wonder about the accuracy of the claim, but the sight of the well-kept house relieved some of my concern, as did Mellie’s pleasant, ordinary offer of coffee and her obvious competence in using her coffee machine and in setting out mugs, spoons, a sugar bowl, and a pitcher of half-and-half.
As the coffee dripped, she showed me the photos on the fridge. “My dogs,” she said with a giggle.
“Dogs you take care of?”
“Rusty, I walk him. He’s a Yorkie. Celeste. She stays with me sometimes.” Most of the dogs were small or medium size, but there were a couple of Labs and a golden retriever. The highbrow names of some of the dogs gave Mellie trouble. The Pomeranian she called Kink and Guard was clearly Kierkegaard, but I was unable to translate a few of the others. To my amazement, she pointed to a picture of one of the Labs and said, “Milton has hip dysplasia.”
Why shouldn’t Mellie have known the term? What right did I have to be surprised? But I was. When she’d finished reciting the names of all the dogs, she addressed Rowdy, who was still on leash. “And you’re a good dog, too,” she said. “Rowdy, you want a cookie?”
Instead of pinching the treat between her fingers to offer it to him, she placed it on her flat palm, and when he scoured her whole hand with his tongue, she laughed so raucously that a tense dog might have been startled. Then she clapped the same moist hand over her mouth. “Bad! Be quiet!” In a near whisper, she said, “Good dog.”
“Mellie, as long as you sound happy, he doesn’t mind if you laugh. Or even if you yell.”
“Don’t yell!” she protested in a near yell before adding softly, as if repeating an oft-repeated phrase, “Pretty voice.”
Someone had obviously tried to teach Mellie to modulate her voice. A special education teacher? A speech therapist? Interestingly, although she sometimes lost control of her volume and had changed an unfamiliar name to familiar words, she’d mastered hip dysplasia and, even more strikingly, had used the dog trainer’s term cookie in place of dog biscuit.
When we were seated at the table drinking our coffee, I reluctantly raised the topic of Strike. “Mellie, it’s possible that she’s gone home. Where is that?”
“Here.”
“But when she isn’t here. She’s staying with you, but she belongs to someone else. Who is her owner?”
Mellie’s face shut down.
“It’s one thing if your own dog gets loose,” I said, “but when it’s someone else’s dog? It’s easy to feel really guilty about that, even though it’s not your fault.” For all I knew, Strike’s escape was Mellie’s fault, of course, but I had no intention of saying so.
Mellie’s jaw was locked.
“This probably isn’t the first time Strike has escaped from somewhere. Siberian huskies are escape artists. Some of them climb fences. They squeeze out under fences. Strike’s owner has probably been through this before. Does Strike live near here?” Feeling increasingly like an interrogator, I continued to press Mellie. How long had Strike been with Mellie? Awhile. Was her owner a man or a woman? A girl. A nice girl. Yes, Strike was wearing a collar.
“With tags?” I made the mistake of calling Rowdy to me and showing Mellie the ID attached to his rolled leather collar. “Like these?”
“Like Rowdy,” she agreed.
I had the frustrating impression that she was responding mainly to my suggestion
; in reality, Strike might or might not have been wearing tags.
The only other piece of information I elicited was that Strike had arrived sometime after August 24, and I got that date by accident. Having abandoned my direct questioning about Strike, I gently asked Mellie about her own dog. Mellie produced a sheaf of snapshots that showed an adorable Boston terrier. Her name was Lily, and Mellie went on and on about her. Lily, I learned, had lived to fifteen and had gone to heaven. Father McArdle had said so. Mellie then produced a card with a picture of the Virgin Mary. In clear script, someone had written Lily’s name on it, together with the dates of her birth and death. Lily had died on August 24.
“Were Lily and Strike friends?” I asked. “Did they play together?”
Mellie looked confused. Then, having apparently decided that I’d said something silly, she declared with a hint of scorn, “Lily was in heaven.”
“So Lily went to heaven, and then, after that, Strike got here.”
Mellie’s response was loud and emphatic: “Of course!”
I gave up. Mellie and I then took a look at her backyard, which had a five-foot-high chain-link fence and a chain-link gate secured with a snap bolt. Either the missing Strike or another dog, perhaps many others, had dug holes in what remained of the grass, but some forsythia and a mock orange tree had survived. Visible at the rear of the fence was evidence of Strike’s means of escape. The earth by the fence showed the signs of recent digging. Right under the fence itself was a small depression.
