Ben Soul

by Richard George

“Wait here,” she said, and went into the kitchen. She returned shortly with a small Styrofoam plate of mashed potatoes and gravy and a plastic bowl with fresh water. She edged the door open, keeping her foot well in the way so the dog could not enter her kitchen. No knowing when some inspector or other might happen by. The dog retreated before her feet, but not far. Potatoes and gravy offered too much attraction for her to go very far.

  Rosa put the plate and bowl down where the dog could reach them. “Have at it, pup,” she said, and went back inside to her range and refrigerator. Later, when she checked, the plate was empty, and the water bowl nearly dry. She refreshed the water in the bowl, and locked up her restaurant for the night.

  Rosa had grown up without pets, and did not understand that once one has fed a dog that dog will return for more food. So she was surprised when she opened her restaurant in the morning to see the dog sitting on the stoop. She brushed the dog off the stoop with her foot, gently, opened the door and went in. The dog did not stay brushed off.

  “Harry,” Rosa said to Harry Pitts, her waiter and general factotum, “how does one get rid of a dog on one’s doorstep? I gave it food and water last night, hoping it would go away, but it’s still here this morning.”

  “And it will stay around hoping you feed it again. Got any scraps we can share with it?”

  “I don’t want it in my restaurant.”

  “I’ll feed it out behind the trash bin. I saw it this morning. It’s just a pup. Either it got away from a family that it belongs to, or some wicked person dumped it. We can share enough to keep it alive for a few days, until we know whether it’s lost or dumped.”

  Such a long speech from Harry surprised Rosa. The taciturn former missionary seldom strung more than a few words together, unless he was talking about his beloved Bible. On those rare occasions, shutting him up was difficult indeed.

  “You deal with it, Harry. I don’t have time or patience.” Thereafter Harry made sure the pup had food and water every morning. Other than basic feeding and watering, he didn’t spend any time petting the dog, talking to it, or otherwise encouraging it to think of him as pack.

  The dog thrived. After the first week, she began to widen the horizon of her world. She never went near the highway. Cars passed there. Cars meant terror and disruption to her. So she went west, as though Horace Greeley moved her, and found San Danson village. Emma noticed the dog a couple of times. Once she put out water, for the sun was very high that day, and she saw the dog panting. Of course, Emma didn’t tell Prime Pussy what she had done; Prime Pussy was a jealous cat.

  In her second week, the pup also made the distant acquaintance of Dickon. Dickon “inadvertently” dropped bits of wiener and bun where the pup could find them. The dog began sleeping under the porch of a vacant cottage near Emma’s house. The dog was waiting, waiting for she knew not what.

  One morning in the fourth week of her isolation, when the mists sharpened all the scents on the hill, the dog began to climb toward the crest. She encountered a strange-smelling creature, a scent of sheep mixed with violets. Stillness came over her, and she sat before the creature. It was as if she had come into the presence of the One Who Sniffs All Things, and the dog recognized a holy moment. The stillness flooded through her, warming her. The dog understood her waiting was near its end. She would soon have pack to be her family. She had a mission.

  She turned and trotted down the hill. She went to the cottage she thought of as her cottage. Instead of crawling under the porch, she went up on it and sat to wait.

  The dog knew when the bag-burdened man started up the steps of the porch that her person had arrived. The sense the strange creature on the mountain had given her of impending pack and family now felt fulfilled. Naïve as she was, she expected the man to know it immediately, too. Her first lesson in people training was the discovery that persons are not as wise as dogs about the things of the heart and spirit. Over the coming weeks, she would learn that dogs could love their people through almost all conditions. This was the particular strength and wonder of dogs.

  She wagged her tail as the person approached her. He set a bag down on the porch. She sniffed it for courtesy’s sake. The man extended his hand to her. She sniffed it, glorying in the smell of her person, and licked his hand. Before he could rub her head or scratch her ears, or otherwise show her affection, as she fully expected him to do, another person came up behind the man and spoke. The dog recognized her scent as that of the woman who had provided her water. She wagged her tail for the woman, as well, despite the musky odor of cat that clung to her.

  The people wanted to enter the cottage. The dog politely stepped aside for them, and followed them in before the woman, her hands encumbered by a plate of people-food, could shut the door against her.

  The dog wagged her tail again, and put her most appealing look in her eyes. The woman bent over and stroked her head. She spoke some words to the man. Then the woman sat on a chair by the table. The dog moved closer to her. The woman stroked the dog’s head. The man busied himself making tea. Then he sat to eat with the woman while they talked. After a time the woman got up to leave. The dog stayed quietly where she was.

  Now, perhaps, she could begin training her person. However, the man went out, and returned after a little while with more bags. He did this several times. The dog was bored, and took a nap. She was more comfortable inside the cottage than she was under the porch. The man seemed to have forgotten her. He took things out of the bags and put them in cupboards and on shelves. Eventually he worked around to where the dog was sleeping on the hearthrug. He insisted she get up and go out. Reluctantly the dog went.

  She lay on the porch in the bright afternoon sun, waiting. As the sun began to slip behind the fog standing just off shore, she whimpered. She went to the screen door, and whimpered more loudly. The man came.

  Moving In

  The morning fog had retreated seaward by the time Ben got to San Danson Station with his small library of books and CDs. He had selected only a minimum of what he liked to have around him because he knew he had to carry each ounce up the bluff over the path to the cottage. He also had to allow for clothes and a few cooking utensils. He had packed everything in brown grocery bags; he learned years before that a bag of books was quite enough weight to carry.

  Ben stopped at the Inn, where Harry Pitts gave him the key for the cottage. Harry said no more than “Hello,” and “Here’s your key” to Ben. He wondered at Harry’s lack of welcome, but when he saw Harry was immersed in his Bible, he put the lack of enthusiasm down to that and Harry’s naturally laconic nature.

  Ben took a small load for the first trip. His first bag held his favorite cooking pans, one for pasta, one for frying, and a small one for vegetables. He planned to make most of his meals at home; the Café was the only nearby restaurant, and Ben knew, no matter how good its cuisine, too frequent sampling would make it pall.

  Ben’s first real welcome came from a small dog on the cottage porch. It was obviously a young pup, a little past weaning. “Hello, pup dog,” Ben said. The dog wagged its tail. Ben saw it was a female. It was brindle, with a mask of lighter hair around its eyes and a feathered beige back end. Ben put his bag down on the lower step and held out his hand. The dog sniffed it and licked it. Its tongue was soft and warm, and only a little raspy. The dog’s ears still flopped over.

  “What’s your name?” Ben asked the dog.

  “Doesn’t have one,” an older woman said. Ben straightened up suddenly and looked around. A woman stood on the path behind him. She wore a flower-sprigged dress and a red-bordered white apron, one that flowed over her ample bosom and down her stout front. Her hands held a plate of cookies. Chocolate chip cookies. She had won her way to Ben’s heart. Smile-wrinkles crinkled her round face.

  “I’m your neighbor, Emma Freed.” Her eyes twinkled.

  “Oh, hello,” he said. “I’m Ben, Ben Soul
.”

  “I know. Elke said you’d be here today.” She smiled at him. “I’ve swept the place, washed the windows and basins, and things.”

  “That’s very neighborly of you. Thank you.”

  “Elke hired me to do it. The cookies are my offering, though.” She held them out to Ben. He took them; chocolate chip were his favorite cookies.

  “Come in,” Ben said, “if the pup dog will let us go in. I think I have some tea in the bag here. Surely we can find a pot to boil water in.” Ben grinned at her. “Chocolate chip cookies should be eaten in company, you know. They’re as addictive as booze. Same principle. Never drink alone; never eat chocolate chip cookies alone.”

  “I’ll have to remember that,” she said. “I’m very fond of chocolate chip cookies, too. I’d never realized they were addictive.”

  “I have it on the best authority. My Mom.”

  The dog stepped aside for them; then she followed Ms. Freed in as Ben held the door for her.

  “Oh, I’m sorry,” Ms. Freed said. “The dog has followed me in.”

  “It’s okay by me, I like dogs. Is it your dog?” Ben shut the screen. The dog stood, wagging its tail slowly, asking for acceptance.

  “No, I’ve never seen it before last week. I’m afraid somebody dumped it on the