Lost in the Blinded Blizzard

by John R. Erickson

  He caught his breath and knelt down. “Hank, come here, boy. My house lays a quarter-mile north of here. We won’t have a fence to foller. Can you find the house?”

  He had brought his face right down close to mine, and for some reason I felt an urge to give him a nice big juicy lick. Those urges sometimes strike me at odd moments, don’t you see, and my tongue just shoots out before I have a chance to think about it.

  And that’s what it did—shot out and gave him a big slurpy lick on the face.

  He spit and wiped his mouth. “Don’t lick me, you dodo. Can you find the house in this storm?”

  I glanced off to the north and saw . . . hmmm, a solid wall of white. No house. No road. No landmarks. No nuthin.’ In other words . . .

  I turned my eyes back to Slim’s face. He looked pretty serious about this deal. I whapped my tail in the snow and tried to get the message across that, if our safety and survival depended on ME finding the house in that howling blizzard, we were probably in real trouble.

  But he didn’t wait for my message. He raised up, gave me a boot in the tail section, and said, “Find the house, pup, and don’t spare the horses. I’m fadin’ fast.”

  GULK.

  ME? Find the . . . boy, this was no time for a miscalculation, I mean, if a guy happened to lose his bearings and head off in the wrong . . . surely I wasn’t the best choice for this . . . perhaps if we postponed it until a nicer . . .

  On the other hand, the awful responsibility of saving our little group seemed to have been thrust upon me. I got that impression when Slim booted me a second time and pointed his finger and entire arm toward the north.

  “Find the house, Hank! Find the house!”

  And so, with my heart pounding in my ears, I turned my nose into the howling wind and began walking into the terrible white nothingness before me.

  Chapter Seven: Who, Me?

  I hadn’t gone more than ten steps when I realized that I was totally lost and without any sense of direction.

  Facing that terrible wind, I couldn’t see anything, and I will admit right here and for the record that I began to feel a certain uneasiness. Call it panic, if you will.

  Scared silly.

  Terrified.

  I had just about decided to throw the Towel of Life into the Ring of . . . something. Into the Ring of Fate. I had just about decided to give up the struggle when, all at once, my nose picked up a scent in the snow.

  I can tell you that there aren’t too many scents in a snowstorm. Snow covers up most of your scents, don’t you see, and that makes it tough on a dog, because under normal conditions we rely pretty heavily on our noses.

  When that nose blanks out, fellers, it throws our whole navigation system out of whack.

  Okay. I happened to lower my nose to a point just a few inches above the snow—and I began getting a reading! I walked a few steps further to the north and picked up another one.

  Now, if you’re familiar with the navigation business, you know that one reading isn’t worth much because it’s impossible to draw a straight line between one point.

  It takes two points to make a line, see, and once I got the second reading, I knew that I was onto something. I had the two points I needed, and a line that pointed somewhere besides Oblivion.

  I went several more steps and ran another check, and sure enough, there was Point Number Three!

  Even though the road was buried under the snow, I knew that I was following it. Following the road, that is, not the snow. Well, I was following the snow too, but . . . forget it.

  I had found a scent that would lead me straight to Slim’s house!

  You want to guess what it was? You’ll probably guess that it was a trail of gasoline that had leaked out of the flatbed pickup.

  Nice try. The flatbed leaked gas, all right, and oil too, but the scent of gasoline doesn’t last long. It evaporizes in the air.

  No sir, the scent I had picked up came from the tires of Billy’s pickup—which, if you recall, I had very carefully marked the night before.

  Which just goes to prove how important it is for a dog to mark every tire of every vehicle that comes onto the ranch. A guy never knows when one of those routine marking jobs might save his life.

  Well, once I had discovered my own mark in the snow, finding the house became a simple matter of switching over to instruments and running periodic checks of the navcom system. A piece of cake, in other words. No problem.

  In fact, the only problem came when I got so far out in the lead, Slim had to call me back several times. Shucks, I was ready to take ’er on home and curl up in front of that stove!

  When old Slim saw the house looming up ahead in the blizzard, he gave a cowboy yell and screeched, “You did it, Hankie! By gollies, you found the house!”

  Well, what did he expect? I mean, you put the Head of Ranch Security in charge of things and you start seeing results, right?

  I was the first to reach the house. I ran straight to the door and laid a mark on it, just to establish the fact that I had personally led a brave team of explorers through snow and ice and howling winds and conditions that weren’t fit for man nor beets, and now I was planting our flag, so to speak, on the summit of the threshold.

  Slim arrived next, huffing steam in the air, his cheeks rosy red from the cold, his beard covered with frost, and his glasses fogged over.

  Last, and definitely least, came Little Mister Squeak Box. “Oh Hank, I’m so cold, and this leg of mine . . .” And so forth.

  Slim opened the door and we all staggered inside. Drover and I made a dash for the stove, while Slim stripped down to his red long-johns and his socks, and collapsed into his easy chair.

  “Whew! Dogs, I don’t know about you, but I am wore out. That’s a terrible storm out there, as bad as any blizzard I ever saw. We’re lucky we made it back to the house.”

  (I should point out that luck had nothing to do with it.)

  Just then, the phone rang. Slim scowled at it. “Well, there’s Loper, wondering what happened to us.” He picked it up. “Hello? Hello? Can’t hardly hear you, Loper. Something must be iced over, either the string or the tin cans.”

  He told Loper about our experiences in the blizzard—including the part about me guiding the expedition to the house.

  “So we’re afoot. I’m sure sorry, but man alive, I couldn’t find the dadgummed road! It’s bad out there. Well, how’s Molly doing?”

  I studied his face. He pressed his lips together and shook his head.

  “Well, that settles it. I’ll start out afoot. Huh? No, I told you I’d get up there with the medicine, and that’s what I’m a-going to do. Don’t worry, I’ll make it.”

  He hung up the phone and stared at us for a long time. “Boys, the thought of going back out in that storm kind of shakes me up, and I ain’t scared of anything.”

  He stood up and started pulling on his clothes. The phone rang.

  “Hello. Who is this? Oh. Speak up, Loper, can’t hear you. Yes, you’re right about that. Well, sure, it’s risky but . . . Yes, he did, he sure did. I was right proud of the old . . .”

  Slim’s face rose into a big smile, and suddenly he was looking directly at me. I held my head up high and thumped my tail on the floor. By George, old Slim was sure . . .

  “You know, that just might work! Tie the bottle around his neck and send him down the road!”

  HUH?

  Whoa, wait a minute, hold it, halt!

  Tie the bottle around HIS neck and send HIM down the road?

  Who was the HIM to be sent down the road, and WHOSE neck was being volunteered for WHAT?

  “By gollies, Loper, I believe that’s the best idea of the year. I’ll get him on his way.” He hung up the phone and flashed a big grin and took a step in my direction. “Here, Hankie, come here, boy.”

  Oh yeah? “
Here, Hankie” my foot! If old Slim thought that THIS Hankie was going to . . . no way was he going to pitch me out into . . . there must have been some mistake, because surely . . .

  I, uh, went into Stealthy Retreat Mode and, uh, began slinking back toward the, uh, bedroom, so to speak, while casting glances back toward Slim to see if he, uh, had any crazy notions about, well, following me.

  He did seem to have such notions, and yes, he was following me.

  “Come here, Hankie, I’ve got a little job for you.”

  He came at a slow walk. I moved away at a slow walk. He picked up the pace. I picked up the pace. He made a dash for me and I made a dash for the back of the house.

  “Hank, come back here!”

  Come back here? Was he losing his mind? What kind of fool did he think he was dealing with?

  Hey, I might appear dumb on a few rare occasions, but when the chips are down, and when they’re MY chips, fellers, I don’t just stand around looking simple.

  I run and hide under the nearest bed!

  I went streaking down the hall and slithered my way under the bed—fighting my way through all the cobwebs and dust and lint that had accumulated there. “Jenny wool,” we call it.

  I saw Slim’s nose appear under the bed, then his eyes. He was wearing a crazy grin on his mouth.

  “Hi, puppy. I see you.”

  Yeah, well, he could look at me all he wanted, but as far as me coming out . . . no sale.

  “Hank, get out from under that bed!”

  No way, Charlie.

  “I’ll get the broom.”

  So get the broom.

  He got the broom. He swept and he swatted, and I could have told him that no broom was going to flush me out from under that bed.

  At last he gave up on the broom. His face appeared again. It didn’t look so friendly this time.

  “Hank, I’ve got this great opportunity for you.”

  Yes, I knew all about his “great opportunity.”

  “And I’m giving you one last chance to volunteer. And if you don’t come out from under that bed, I’m a-going to pull off the mattress and springs and kick your little doggie butt up between your shoulder blades.”

  I took a deep breath and thought the deal over one last time. Slim needed help. The baby needed the medicine. Duty was calling. I was the best dog for the job.

  Ah, what the heck, maybe I could . . . I crawled out from under the bed and volunteered for the job.

  Yes, I knew it was going to be one of the most dangerous missions of my entire career. I knew there was a chance that I would never reach my destination, that I might be lost in the raging storm and never heard from again.

  I knew all that. But I also understood the terrible consequences that might occur if I didn’t go.

  I might become a permanent freak. I would be laughed at and scorned. I would never win the heart of another woman.

  Girl-dogs will forgive many flaws, but they aren’t impressed by guys who wear their fannies up around their shoulder blades.

  Chapter Eight: Don’t Forget: I Volunteered

  Slim carried me into the bathroom and closed the door behind us.

  That really wasn’t necessary. Did he actually think that I might . . . hey, I had volunteered for this mission! He didn’t need to treat me like a common crinimal.

  I resented that. It really hurt.

  On the other hand, I did happen to notice that he had left a little crack in the door, and I wondered what might happen if I hooked my paw around . . .

  SLAM!

  He couldn’t take a joke, that’s all. No sense of humor.

  He left me alone in that prison cell and re­turned a few minutes later. He was holding an old boot top that had been stitched at one end so that it would hold cow medicine.

  He shoved the bottle of cough medicine inside the boot top, rigged up a kind of harness device out of whang leather, and tied it around my neck.

  This deal showed every indication of getting out of hand. I mean, it appeared that he might actually go through with it.

  He left the room again, and when he came back, I was sorry to see that he was dressed for cold weather. The worm of fate had crawled another step toward the apple of . . . something.

  Disaster, probably.

  “Well, Hankie, all these years we’ve been a-saying that you ain’t worth eight eggs. I guess this is your big opportunity to prove us wrong. Or maybe right. You ready?”

  You bet I was ready—so ready that I tried my very best to crawl into the cabinet where he kept his towels and wash rags. He grabbed me and I sank my claws into the nearest towel and went to digging.

  He got me out of there, but he knew he’d been in a struggle. And I carried one of those towels all the way to the front door.

  As we passed Drover, he raised his head and gave me a grin. “Good old Hank, what a guy! I’d sure like to go with you, but this old leg of mine . . .”

  I wasn’t able to come up with words to express the thoughts that marched across the vast expanse of my mind. So I just glared at him and hoped that the cruel slant of my eyes would convey the message.

  Suddenly we were outside in the raging ferocious blizzard. I could hear the wind roaring like a freight train through the cottonwoods. Frozen limbs creaked. The snow swirled before my snow-blinded eyes. I gasped for breath.

  Surely Slim wouldn’t . . . it was time for Heavy Begs. I moaned and whined and tried to kick my legs. No luck.

  Slim didn’t put me down at this point, which struck me as a shabby cheap trick and a vote of no confidence. I mean, did he think I would try to scramble back into the house or hide behind the wood pile or make a run for the feed barn?

  Yes, apparently that’s what he thought, and come to think of it . . . but I didn’t get the opportunity because he carried me away from the house, out into the storm, and down the road, which wasn’t there anymore because it was buried under six inches of snow.

  Oh yes, and along the way he pulled a limb off a tree and I couldn’t imagine what he might . . .

  At last he stopped and dropped me into the snow. It would be hard for me to express just how awful that snow felt as it closed around my nice warm paws and invaded the inner warmth of my inner being.

  Let’s just say that it felt awful, and that I looked up into his eyes and switched my tail over to the I-Don’t-Believe-You’re-Doing-This-to-a-Loyal-Friend Mode.

  That didn’t work either.

  “Go home, Hank. Take the medicine to Molly. Double dog food if you make it.”

  Oh yeah? And what if I didn’t make it? It would be double dog food for the buzzards, right?

  “Go on! Go to the house. Find Loper.”

  I whimpered and moaned and howled and cried and tried to . . . but he raised his stick in a threatening manner, almost as though he planned to . . .

  “GO HOME!”

  Okay, all right. I just hadn’t understood his . . . he wanted me to find my way back to the house, it appeared, and perform a very dangerous mission of mercy, which was sort of my specialty, and there was no need to yell and threaten and . . .

  GULP.

  It seemed that heroism had been thrust upon me, and as I’ve said many times before, when all else fails, a guy might as well go ahead and do what’s good and right.

  Yes, they had definitely chosen the right dog for this job. Or, to put it another way, they were very lucky that I had volunteered for this mission.

  I glanced up into Slim’s face one last time, just in case he might have thought it over and changed his . . . drawing back the stick? That was uncalled for, I mean, it’s not necessary to bully and browbeat the Head of Ranch . . .

  “Go home, Hank, go home!”

  All at once I felt a powerful urge to go home. Yes, and to deliver the precious healing medicine that would cure Baby Molly
of the cough that had tormented her sleep.

  The words of my Cowdog Oath returned to me: “. . . to protect and defend all innocent children against all manner of monsters and evil things, regardless of the consequences.”

  And with those words fresh in my mind, I turned my back on the comfort of the house and the warmth of the stove (Drover would pay for this) and went plunging into the Great White Unknown.

  The tracks we had left in the snow half an hour before had already vanished, but I had no trouble finding my way back to the cattle guard. That was the easy part—traveling with the wind at my back and following my own scent in the snow.

  I reached the cattle guard in good shape and in record time. But once I had conquered the easy part, the part that remained to be conquered promised to be less than easy.

  Hard.

  Very difficult.

  Somewhere between impossible and ridiculous.

  At the cattle guard, I negotiated a 90 degree turn into a crosswind that was running about 40 degrees below zero, and began stumbling through snow that had drifted much deeper than I might have wished.

  This was tough going, fellers. I mean, every step in that deep snow required a terrible effort, and after fifteen or twenty of those lunging steps, I was already shot.

  But I couldn’t stop. The words of my Cowdog Oath kept me going. Also the knowledge that if I stopped, I would become a doggie Popsicle. I mushed on.

  After what seemed hours, I reached the flat­bed pickup, which we had left abandoned in the ditch. The hood had already disappeared beneath a drift.

  I paused for a moment to catch my breath, then plunged onward into the storm. I reached the top of that hill just south of the alfalfa field. So far, so good. But the last mile to the house would be the most treacherous, for there were no trees or haystacks or fences or other landmarks to mark the land.

  Up ahead, I saw nothing but a huge white blank. Up until recently, it had been my policy to avoid huge white blanks, but there appeared to be no way of avoiding this one.