Dead and Doggone

by Dead

  the owners, too. I mean, he works for everyone, huh? And he can't keep them all himself, can he?

  Be reasonable, Holly. That's just not possible, is it?"

  The other message was from my father. Millie was finally in labor. When I called back, he even

  answered the phone. Naturally, there's an extension in the barn.

  "Not yet," he said, "but she's doing great. She's a trooper. You'd be proud of her."

  "I already am," I said.

  "We're on 'Darling Clementine,' " he said. Bitches need very little help in whelping. Most of the

  time, the best thing to do is not interfere. Buck knows that, but he needs to feel that he's easing

  their discomfort, assuring them of his presence, and welcoming the pups into the world. The news

  that your father is singing "Clementine" to a whelping wolf hybrid bitch might make you think he's

  taken leave of his senses, but when my father becomes a musical lupine Lamaze coach, he's getting

  back to normal.

  "I'm sorry," I said, "but I still haven't got any news about Clyde. I'm doing my best." I hated to jeopardize his new-found mental health by mentioning Clyde, but I had to do it. "It's only been four

  days. I’m still looking, and I've got people helping me."

  "People," he said with disgust.

  "What else do you want me to do? I'm doing everything I can, and there's a guy who's helping me.

  I've got signs everywhere. The ads are in all the papers. I've been checking all the shelters. Everyone

  knows he's gone. I'll hear about it the second he turns up. And I know Austin Quigley doesn't have

  him, because I went there. And besides, if he were that close, I'd have heard him howling. Austin

  does not have him."

  "Someone does," Buck said. "Some bastard does."

  "You could be right. I'm working on it."

  "There are no single parents in a pack," Buck said. "Fatherhood lasts a good three or four years."

  "I know," I said. "I've read L. David Mech and Matt Ger- son, too, you know. And obviously, I've

  heard you talk about it. I'll find him."

  "Regina's back Sunday. I'll be down then."

  "Sure," I said. "Give Millie a pat for me. Sing her a verse of 'Clementine' for me."

  -16-

  Kevin doesn't like to be called at the station, but I had to do something. "Hey, Holly," he said.

  "How ya doing?"

  "My father's doing better for the moment," I said, "but if I don't find Clyde, he's threatening to

  come down here on Sunday."

  "It's my speech impediment," Kevin said. "I try to ask about you, and damned if I don't ask about your father by mistake. Let me have another go at it. What about you?"

  "Aw, shucks, I didn't know you cared." Not so. When he asks how I'm doing, he means it. "Really,

  how I am is worried about Clyde. I don't know where to go from here except to try to find out if he's

  been stolen, I guess. And if he has, maybe that means I have to find out about research labs. I've

  been doing some reading, but. . . I don't even want to think about it."

  "Yeah," he said. "But of course, the police are assisting me in my inquiries. Right?"

  Rowdy, who'd long ago discovered that I could be persuaded to pat him while I talked on the

  phone, lifted his head up as if I'd asked him a question. I shook my head and smiled at him.

  "It's only been five days," Kevin said. "That's not long for a lost dog."

  "Oh, Kevin, be serious. It's not as if he's an ordinary dog. He looks like a wolf. If he were

  wandering around, somebody would've noticed him, and somebody would've called me. And,

  believe me, the shelters all know me by now. They'd call."

  "I'd call you."

  "You've got guys looking?"

  "Yeah. What I can swing."

  "What about people who steal dogs?" I was rubbing the top of Rowdy's head.

  "Yeah. There's a kid down in East Cambridge I talked to, but in my opinion, he's got nothing to do

  with this. And I've never seen him around Fresh Pond." He didn't mean the pond itself — Fresh

  Pond is also what our neighborhood is called. "It was a long shot."

  "Thanks for trying," I said. "What about what he does with them, the ones he steals?"

  "Did I say he said that?"

  "Didn't he?"

  "Let's just say he convinced me he hadn't been around."

  "Well, talk to him again. I will. Where does he live?"

  "Not on your life," Kevin said.

  "Then you do it. Find out where the dogs go. Clyde could've ended up in the same place even if

  this kid didn't take him. Or you know what? You can visit the research labs. How many can there

  be? They're not going to let just any outsider in, especially with this ordinance coming up before the

  city council, but you could do it."

  "How is that?"

  "Think of something."

  "What?"

  "Use your imagination."

  "Sure," he said. "I'll start with Harvard. I'll tell them there's this new law that says they can't buy dogs anymore. They won't know the difference."

  "Okay. Once they've got the dogs, it's all legal. I know. Or maybe I can get in. There must be some way. I just don't know how these things work."

  "Look, I probably shouldn't say this, but how long you been in Cambridge? I been here my whole

  life. How it works is you know somebody."

  "Somebody who works in a research lab torturing dogs? Oh, sure, I know dozens of people like

  that. They're my best friends. We just don't discuss religion or politics. And what do I do if I find

  him in one of those places? He's the most gentle dog in the world. I don't think he's even brave." I

  hate to cry, especially over the telephone. "Kevin, do you know what they do?"

  "Hey," Kevin said. "Don't think about that. If he's in one of those places, he's stolen property. I'll take care of that. I'll get him out."

  "What's left of him. If anything."

  You have to know somebody, Kevin had said. The members of Mimi's animal rights group were

  the last people in Cambridge who'd know anyone on the inside, but I called anyway and the woman

  who answered the phone in their office gave me the names of some of the labs and wished me luck.

  I had a plan. Not a great plan, but something. It involved Matt Gerson. He'd make the calls and the

  visits. A Harvard professor? Scientist? With a book published by Harvard University Press? He was

  as close to the right kind of somebody as anyone I knew. The not-so-great part of the plan was how

  I was going to persuade him to do it.

  Faith Barlow called before I reached him.

  "I'm in Belmont," she said. "And there's someone here I want you to talk to. There's a story I want you to hear."

  "I can't, Faith. I'm working on finding Clyde."

  "I know. Get over here."

  Belmont is next to Cambridge, down Concord Avenue beyond Fresh Pond. The address she gave

  me turned out to be a yellow ranch house with an ordinary front yard and a long back lawn covered

  with spring bulbs. The yard ended at Spy Pond, which has water too dirty for swimming but looks

  pretty, anyway, especially when you sit at a table in the bay window of a little yellow house and

  appreciate the scene from a distance.

  "So we put an ad in the paper," said the person whose story Faith wanted me to hear, a petite

  woman with very short, very curly dark hair who'd been a neighbor of Faith's until a couple of

  months earlier. Her name was Linda. "You know, 'friendly, good with kids, free to good home,' all

  that. And it was all true. He was friendly. And wonderful with kids. The kids loved him. I mean,

  t
hey named him. His name was Grover. From Sesame Street?"

  "Yeah," I said. "The only thing was allergies. We have this pediatrician and he was totally

  insistent that we had to get rid of Grover, because Jared had this sort of perpetual cold, so what

  could we do? I mean, we believed it was allergies. This pediatrician is really famous, and we trusted

  him. And now, we find out, he tells everyone that. I mean, basically, he just doesn't like dogs. He

  doesn't like cats, either. And I find out, he always tells people that. And he didn't do cultures or

  anything. He just said it was allergies."

  "And somebody else found something different?"

  "The allergist did! He tested for allergies, and Jared isn't allergic to dogs."

  "But Grover was gone by the time you saw the allergist?"

  "Yes. But, of course, we tried to get him back. "

  "And?"

  "And we'd been so stupid. The guy we gave Grover to seemed so nice. Dave Johnson, he said his

  name was. And you could tell Grover liked him. When you give away a dog, you don't ask for

  references."

  Oh, no? You should. I didn't say it.

  "And he told us about his farm, and how Grover'd be able to run all over the place. He said his old

  dog had died. And he really had had a dog. That part was true. You could tell, because there was

  one of those wagon barriers in the back of the car. He just seemed so sincere. He seemed like a nice

  ordinary working guy. He was very likable. And then when we tried to call him, basically, he didn't

  exist."

  "The phone number was for a dry cleaner," Faith said.

  "I think he just made it up," Linda said. "But it was in Sudbury, which is where he said the farm

  was, even though there wasn't any phone listed to him there. So we didn't have an address, but he'd

  told us the name of the street, and we drove out there. That was three weeks ago. My husband and I

  went alone. We didn't take the kids. And, first of all, there weren't any farms there, just houses. And

  we stopped and asked about him. We were still convinced there was some mistake. But finally, we

  got it. Nobody there had ever heard of Dave Johnson. And then, of course, we realized it's like John

  Smith. There was no Dave Johnson."

  "I'm sorry," I said. "My father's dog disappeared in Cambridge last Sunday night. I can't find him, either."

  "We promised the kids we'd get Grover back. We shouldn't have done that."

  "How were you supposed to know?"

  "I wasn't," Linda said. "I do now."

  Faith and I talked for a few minutes on the sidewalk in front of Linda's house.

  "I don't know why the hell she didn't call me," Faith said. "I'd have kept him for a week or two to see if the kid really was allergic. And free to good home? Did you hear that?"

  "Most people don't know any better."

  "And that business about the farm?"

  "Yeah. He probably tells the girls he wants to show them his etchings, too."

  "They probably believe him," Faith said. Her hair looked more gray than blond, and her dimples

  weren't showing. "Some people will believe anything. And Linda's no fool, at least most of the

  time."

  "Yeah," I said. "She sees it all now, doesn't she? I feel so bad for her. What kind of dog was

  Grover?"

  "A big friendly mutt," Faith said. "Black with a big white splotch over one eye. White on the tip of the tail. You know, cute and funny-looking, like a clown. They got him at the pound. The pound.

  You know that's how research labs pay? They buy dogs by the pound, like they're buying meat."

  "They are," I said.

  "So I thought you'd want to know. I mean, obviously, this is a racket, right? It's a scam. And this

  is pretty close to your part of Cambridge. And they're both big dogs. I thought you should know."

  "Thank you. I'm not sure if it'll help. I was sort of starting to think about something like this,

  anyway. I think I won't tell Buck, not yet."

  "Good," she said. The dimples appeared for the first time that day. "So when do I get Rowdy

  again?"

  "We'll do the June shows. Okay?"

  "Sure," Faith said. "He's a love. He's a real honey."

  Free to good home. I thought about it as I drove back along Concord Avenue toward Cambridge,

  past the golf course, the fast-food places, the industrial parks. How was Linda to know? What was

  she supposed to do? Take big, friendly Grover to the vet and have him put to sleep, put down, done

  in? Sell him? People who buy dogs don't want a dog like Grover. They want cute puppies, and if

  they pay for them, they're apt to want purebreds. So she'd tried to do the right thing, but there'd

  been a hitch. The world is a crueler place than she'd suspected.

  Near the Fresh Pond traffic circle, I saw a black and white spotted dog following a runner on the

  path around the pond. In the back of the Bronco, Rowdy caught sight of him, too, and growled and

  yelped out a warning to get off his turf, which was, in Rowdy's view, the planet earth. I only caught

  a glimpse of the dog, but it was enough to see that he had some pointer somewhere in his ancestry,

  enough pointer to remind me of Max, and what Austin had done to Lady. I wondered if Max's days

  were numbered, too. But Max was worth something. Austin would know that. Somebody might

  even have made an offer already. Would anybody pay for euthanasia when he could get good money

  for the dog? Maybe yes. Maybe if he just didn't like the dog, the way Austin just hadn't liked Lady.

  Or, for that matter, Sissy. If he was killing off the whole family, maybe Max was next.

  I was eager to get home and get hold of Matt Gerson, but I turned left onto Walden Street, pulled

  into a permit-only spot, leashed Rowdy, and started toward Quigley Drugs. All I'd have to do was

  walk Rowdy past the place, and if Max was there, he and Rowdy would both let me know.

  Sissy's old car was parked in the driveway by the store, and Pete Quigley was standing at the open

  tailgate sorting through some cans of paint in the back. The last time I saw that car, there was a

  bumper sticker on the rear: "Caution. Show Dogs. Do Not Tailgate." I always notice bumper stickers

  like that because I don't understand why people use them. Why advertise that the dogs are

  valuable? It's a written invitation to steal them. Anyway, the bumper sticker was gone. I hoped Max

  wasn't. I was relieved to see the wagon barrier still in place inside the car, and even more relieved to

  see Rowdy's hackles go up and to hear Max start barking out some hearty threats.

  Pete looked up from the paint cans. "Dog's locked up. It doesn't bite, anyway." He sounded

  disappointed, as if he were complaining about a toy that didn't work.

  "Nice dog you've got," Reggie said.

  "Thanks," I said, rubbing Rowdy's head. "He really is a good dog. He's a honey."

  I don't know why I used Faith's word. I usually say he's a sweetie.

  -17-

  Ron was right. No gold faucets. Nothing garish, nothing opulent, nothing showy. For instance,

  the upstairs bedroom where one of the crimson-jacketed kids from Harvard Student Agencies told

  me to leave my coat had only two Matisses. Three obtrude, I always think.

  My mother believed in rules, including the rules of the human social world, and she liked them

  spelled out in writing, which may be why I grew up thinking that Emily Post was a woman hired by

  the American Kennel Club to write its human obedience regulations. Consequently, just in case you

  were wondering, I knew better than t
o show up at Mimi Nichols's in my kennel clothes, not that

  anyone would have noticed. Or cared. After all, this is Cambridge. People here notice whether

  you're really asserting or merely mouthing the views expressed in the latest issue of The New York

  Review of Books and care about whether your kids go to public school because you're political or

  because they flunked the Shady Hill kindergarten entrance exam. Even for concerts or big parties,

  people wear anything from formal evening dress to embroidered Greek peasant costumes to jeans

  and Reeboks. Not everyone has had my advantages. I wore a silky gray pants outfit that I'd picked

  up at a discount in Freeport before I decided to have Faith show Rowdy in breed instead of showing

  him myself. As I'd suspected in the store, the outfit really brought out the shine in his coat, and vice

  versa. Too bad I'd had to leave him home. A stunning dog makes the best accessory.

  People were pushing their way upstairs as I went down, and the front entrance hall, bigger than

  my kitchen and study combined, was jammed with people, most of whom I didn't know. I felt

  awkward until I pretended that Rowdy was with me. I only imagined him — I didn't talk to him or

  pat him or anything — but as soon as I did that, I felt self-confident and realized the thing to do was

  head for the food, just as he'd have done. Ray and Lynne Metcalf had already beat me to the

  shrimp, which were jumbo, like giant-size Nylabones, only not ham-flavored, of course. I wondered

  whether my donation had been big enough and whether I could afford to have any more. That was

  the idea, I guess.

  “Hi, Holly," Ray said. "Just arrive? Can I get you a drink?”

  "Sure. What is there?"

  "Red or white."

  "Red."

  He pushed his way through the crowd and, after Lynne and I had talked and eaten shrimp for a

  while, he made his way back and handed me a glass of red wine. The glass was the kind I have, but

  it was real, not one of those plastic things with the stems that fall off, and the wine was jug

  Burgundy. You don't believe me? I saw the bottles later. The white was Chablis. If I'd given a party

  like that, I wouldn't have ought good wine, either, but then I wouldn't have served shrimp or hired

  what must have been the entire staff of Harvard Student Agencies, which is the Cambridge solution