The Patron Saint of Lost Dogs: A Novel

by Nick Trout

  “Oh my God, like, oh my God.” For a second I think the old Denise is back and breezy until I notice how she still looks as anxious as before, as though she simply cannot believe that Tina did it, that she avoided the C-section, that it’s all over, that Mom and kitten are doing fine.

  I reach out to squeeze her hand and realize too late, this is all me, nothing to do with Lewis.

  “I know, I know,” I say. “It’s going to be okay.” Although my heart is racing, I’m beaming with genuine delight.

  “No,” she says, stepping back from the table. “You don’t understand.”

  I look down and see Denise standing in a massive pool of fluid and for a second I’m confused.

  Where could that puddle have possibly come from?

  “My water’s broken,” says Denise. “I’m going to have my baby … now!”

  9

  “Well, well, if it isn’t the man of the hour,” Doris says the moment I set foot in the packed waiting room. Her audience falls silent as I become the subject of their attention, and I’m totally unprepared. It’s a little after ten in the morning. I haven’t bothered to shower. I haven’t bothered to brush my hair. I’m the disheveled schoolboy who’s late to class, embarrassed and on the spot.

  “These are yours.” Doris negotiates her desk to serve me with a wad of messages. There must be a dozen slips of paper. I look up. Every man, woman, dog, cat, and what appears to be an albino rabbit stares in my direction. I blush, keep my head down, and march through to the back.

  My mood improves the moment I see Tina the cat and her newborn kitten spooning peacefully in a cage. I take note of a bowl of fresh water, a neatly primped and clean towel for them to lie on, an empty food bowl, and a pleasantly distended kitten belly. Though I feel like I just stepped off a turbulent red-eye, when I take in this scene, something bitter inside me fizzles and dissipates, replaced by a strange but agreeable calmness. It’s a relief to know Lewis has looked in on them this morning. I wonder how Denise and her baby boy are doing. I should call the hospital later this morning.

  Over in the examination room I can hear a muted spiel. Lewis is at work, exalting the merits of a high-fiber diet. It’s his morning for appointments, hence the full waiting room. I’ve got a dinosaur-size bone to pick with him for leaving me in the lurch last night, and we still haven’t discussed the best way to handle the mysterious newspaper article, but as I begin flicking through my messages, resolve gives way to a swell of nausea ripping through my guts.

  Based on the many phone calls Doris has already fielded this morning it looks like I’m about to pay a heavy price for delivering Denise’s son in the form of unwanted attention.

  Someone named Ron from the Burlington Free Press called twice, begging for an exclusive interview. A producer from the local NBC affiliate, WPTZ, and a producer from FOX 44 want to run the story on their evening show. There are phone numbers for Vermont Public Radio, AM 620, and The Zone Talk Radio stations. Mrs. Silverman insists I give her a call—Doris bookended URGENT with asterisks for a little extra pep. Someone named Dominique called from the Montreal Gazette. Denise called to check in on Tina and her kitten and last, but not least, a Mr. Peter Greer called from the Eden Falls Gazette. Why does the name Greer sound familiar?

  Everybody knows everybody in this town. Perfect. And there was me, worried about an anonymous extortionist, hoping against hope that he or she might want to trade in private. Why not toss in a little unwanted media attention, improve the odds of a viewer, listener, or reader ratting me out to the state veterinary board? Might as well start packing now.

  Back out in the waiting room, ignoring the stares, I walk up to the reception desk. Doris has her head buried in paperwork.

  “Doris, how many cases does Lewis have left to see?”

  A raised ocher-stained index finger launches toward my face, making me wait until Doris slowly angles her head in my direction and meets my eyes.

  “Half a dozen,” she says, delivering one of her scary smiles.

  I dare to lean in a little closer.

  “Look, I need to speak to him.”

  “I don’t think that’s going to be possible, Dr. Mills. You see he’s already behind, and some of these poor people have been waiting for nearly an hour.”

  Did she just crank up the volume so that everyone could listen in on our conversation? There’s only one thing to do. “Since he’s so busy I’ll help out by seeing a few of his cases myself.”

  Doris gives me the kind of glare she might reserve for a family member trapped behind the bars of a prison cell as she refuses to pay their bail so that they might learn their lesson.

  “That’s kind of you, Dr. Mills, but these clients are specifically here to see Dr. Lewis. We don’t want to disappoint them now, do we?”

  I’m pretty sure that wasn’t a compliment. “Just give me the next file, Doris,” I say, under my breath. “And could you please label it like we discussed yesterday afternoon.”

  Doris knows what I’m talking about, so why is she shrugging her scrawny shoulders? If people are going to talk, let it be about the way this new vet expects to get paid for every visit.

  There’s a theatrical moment in which Doris pretends to catch on. She surreptitiously peels off a yellow Post-it note, scribbles something, slaps it on the inside of a file, and hands it over. I see the patient’s name on the front.

  “Puck,” I call. A seriously overweight, panting black Labrador gets to his feet and trots toward me followed by a woman and a man who is carrying the dog’s leash. The man is small, not quite as short as Doc Lewis but pretty close. He’s wearing a three-piece royal blue pinstripe suit that’s a little long in the sleeves, a white button-down shirt, and a striped tie. The snappy ensemble is finished off with an ungainly pair of black snow boots. As he closes the space between us, I can tell his hair is wrong, the dark brown of the periphery an imperfect match to the toupee up top.

  The woman in his wake has to be ten years his junior and a good three inches taller. She’s wearing sneakers, a designer tracksuit, and her hair is tied up in a ponytail. She looks like she’s going to the gym, except for a fresh, thick layer of bright red lipstick. But what strikes me most is the way she stares at me, as though she can hardly contain her amusement. And that’s when it hits me. She’s the woman I pulled from the snowbank, the one with the black Lab, the eyewitness who saw me out and about with Frieda.

  “Um … please, this way.” I lead them back into the workspace, trying to regroup. “Sorry it’s not the exam room, but I thought we could move things along. I’m Dr. Mills.”

  “Dr. Ken Haggerty, headmaster at Eden Falls Academy.” Haggerty makes his job description sound like a title along the lines of secretary of state. And for a man who should know how to schmooze and work a room, his handshake is surprisingly weak.

  “This is my wife, Crystal, and more importantly, this is Puck.”

  “Actually, we’ve already met.” Crystal, steps in close, and, without her husband noticing, winks as she sandwiches her soft hands around mine. “But I do appreciate the formal introduction.” I have to pull my hands from hers. “So,” she says, “you’re the one who delivered that young girl’s baby last night.”

  “That was pretty special of old Lewis,” says Haggerty, “new in town and already throwing you right in at the deep end.”

  I shrug. “Luck of the draw. I took his on-call so he and his wife could catch dinner and a movie.”

  Both Dr. and Mrs. Haggerty look surprised.

  “Not possible,” says Haggerty. “Mrs. Lewis has been living in a special-care facility for the past few months. It’s my understanding she has very little time left to live. Isn’t that right, dear?”

  His wife nods.

  I don’t know what to say. Why would Lewis lie about such a thing?

  Crystal Haggerty catches my dismay. “But we’re just as happy to see you, aren’t we, Ken?”

  “Of course. Where’s that accent from?”

 
; Will this inquisition ever stop? I hesitate, unsure of how much to share, and I’m reminded of a quote from Lawrence of Arabia.

  A man who tells lies, like me, merely hides the truth. But a man who tells half lies has forgotten where he put it.

  “The Carolinas.”

  “North or South?” asks Crystal.

  I give up. “South. Charleston.”

  “Really,” she says, unduly excited, “I wonder if you know our friends, Martin and Stephanie, breed Tibetan terriers, very big on the Charleston show circuit?”

  “No,” I say, too quickly. “I never had anything to do with dog shows.”

  “Oh, I spoke to Stephanie this morning and she could have sworn your name sounded familiar. Where did you practice?”

  My moment of vacillation must look suspicious, and I can’t say whether Crystal Haggerty is simply curious or letting me know she’s done her homework and she’s on to me.

  Ken comes to my rescue. “Please, if he had said New York would you have asked him if he knew Donald Trump? Can we focus on why we’re here?”

  I try not to sigh with relief. “Definitely,” I say. “So what’s up with Puck?” The name is all it takes for this amiable creature to sidle over, tail working overtime, leaning in for a scratch. “Presumably he’s named after the character in A Midsummer Night’s Dream?”

  I’m trying out the whole relate-to-your-clients thing. I’m thinking, Ken’s a headmaster, an academic type, it’s a reasonable question.

  “You’re joking, right? I mean, look at him. He’s black and chunky. He’s named after a hockey puck!”

  Okay, no more second-guessing the origin of pets’ names.

  “He’s up to his old tricks,” says Dr. Haggerty, mussing his dog’s head. “Aren’t you boy? Throwing up. It happens every so often, puking once or twice a week, but this time it’s once or twice a day.”

  I stare at Puck, doing his impression of a Roomba vacuum cleaner, working his nose around the smells on the floor. On the surface he appears to be absolutely fine—focused, tail wagging back and forth, not a care in the world.

  “What’s normally the problem?” I ask.

  Haggerty glances over at his wife. “Where to begin. When you look at Puck you can tell he loves to eat. But it’s more than that. It’s more than a desire for calories or taste. It’s about having stuff in his mouth, stuff he can swallow. I’m talking about jumping up on a kitchen counter to steal a loaf of bread.”

  I’m not impressed.

  “I’m talking about a whole loaf of bread still in its plastic wrapper. I’m talking about an entire Thanks giving turkey still in its aluminum foil.”

  This time I shrug my shoulders. A dog has over two hundred and twenty million olfactory receptors in its nose. Humans have only five million. If I’m drooling over the smell of a Thanks giving turkey, I can only imagine what it can do to a dog.

  Haggerty is shaking his head. “You don’t understand. It wasn’t even cooked. It’s not about satisfying his hunger, Puck loves the act of making stuff disappear. Leashes, shoes, seat belts, golf balls, bottle caps, if you can think of it, he’s swallowed it. And let’s not forget his penchant for underwear. Not mine of course, oh no. Puck has a discerning taste, a preference for my wife’s extensive lingerie collection. The poor dog has grazed his way through enough thongs and lace panties and stockings to fill a Victoria’s Secret catalog twice over.”

  As her husband talks I cannot help but notice his wife. Crystal is standing behind him, and as he speaks about her frilly undergarments she offers me a single, raised, meticulously plucked eyebrow, her mouth on the verge of a coy smile. I may be wrong, but it’s a look I might expect from a woman half her age, an expression that says, “What’s a girl to do?” I turn away before I blush, fearing she might lick her top lip with a slick salacious tongue.

  “And you think he’s gotten into something more serious?”

  “That’s why we’re here,” says Haggerty.

  I consider asking Mrs. Haggerty if any particular intimate apparel is missing from her notorious collection but think better of it. “And how long has this been going on?”

  The headmaster looks at his wife. “Just over a week, wouldn’t you say?”

  “Possibly,” says Crystal. “It could have been longer.”

  “No,” says Haggerty, “it was definitely after I returned from that weekend conference in Atlanta. Before I went away he was absolutely fine.”

  Haggerty comes back to me, ready for more pertinent questions. Crystal, on the other hand, appears distracted, wrestling with the recollection.

  “Has Puck been drooling?” I ask.

  “No,” says Haggerty.

  There’s a long awkward pause as I try to dig up questions pertinent to Puck’s problem. I don’t know what to say next. Why can’t they leave me alone, let me think without the scrutiny? The silence between us becomes oppressive and embarrassing and eventually I blurt out, “How’s his stool?”

  “Normal.”

  Damn. “No blood, mucus, or excessive straining?”

  Haggerty tries to consult with his wife, but she’s lost to some type of anxious reverie. He shakes his head.

  “Eating and drinking fine?”

  “Same as always.”

  Another awkward pause, and then a classic question floats by and I grab it. “And when Puck throws up, what’s it look like?”

  Haggerty brings a finger and thumb up to his chin, considering how to word his description.

  “I would say yellow, no, buttery, viscous with more than a hint of froth.”

  Crystal is back but agitated. “It’s puke, Ken, not a glass of wine.”

  “I was merely trying to be helpful.”

  I interject before this escalates. “And it was definitely an active vomiting process. I mean Puck had to work his abdominal muscles to get it out. He doesn’t just lower his head and it falls out.”

  Finally, they are unified in headshakes. I’m pleased. No, I’m more than pleased. For the first time in my brief and real veterinary career I have verbally discarded a long list of red herrings and, in doing so, by default, I’m one step closer to a diagnosis. Though Ken and Crystal may not know it, I just ruled out the possibility of passive regurgitation.

  “Good,” I say. “Then let’s take a look.”

  At this point, I’m thinking I can probably handle a gregarious Lab, so I squat down, and Puck barrels in with his head, tongue flopping side to side, twisting his rump around to flagellate me with his tail.

  “I want to know if there’s something obvious stuck in his intestines,” says Haggerty, as though nothing could be simpler.

  Thankfully, Crystal steps forward to distract Puck by scratching his ears as I set about my palpation of the dog’s guts. I take my time, front to back, top to bottom, and Puck is wonderfully relaxed and amenable, his slack belly allowing me to appreciate everything. I’m not exactly sure what I’m feeling but he demonstrates no pain, no wince, no nothing.

  “I don’t feel a thing out of place. No small children or license plates as far as I can tell.” My effort at levity receives dead-eyed stares. Best not try that again. I go with another Lewis tactic—stall. “But there are lots of other things that could be causing him to vomit. At the very least we should think about getting some blood work and some X-rays of his abdomen.”

  “No, no, no,” says Haggerty, waving his hand at me. “I’m sure that won’t be necessary.”

  Did I have dollar signs in my eyes? I pick up the file, carefully open it up, and peek at Doris’s Post-it note: $! What on earth am I supposed to make of that?

  “Puck always passes these things, don’t you boy? I just wanted to make sure he was all right.”

  Puck barks once, as if to confirm that his master speaks the truth.

  “Look, if things don’t sort themselves out over the next few days, I’ll bring him back for more tests, okay?”

  “I’ll be the one bringing him back,” says Crystal, “because my hus
band is forgetting he’s going to be out of town this weekend.”

  I’m not sure whether this information is intended for Dr. Haggerty’s benefit, or for mine. “Very good,” I say. “But if anything changes for the worse, be sure to contact either myself or Doc Lewis.”

  Haggerty steps forward and picks up his dog’s leash. “It was nice to meet you. We must have you over for dinner one night, mustn’t we, Crystal.” But before his wife can reply, Haggerty is heading out the door. “I’ll go and warm up the car?”

  Does he seriously think he can trade a home-cooked meal for services rendered?

  “Doris will be happy to take the fee for today’s visit,” I shout after him. The effect on those in the waiting room is startling, like screaming “I’ve got a bomb” on a plane. In unison, they stare at me with alarm in their eyes.

  “Oh,” says Mrs. Haggerty, unable or unwilling to hide her disappointment, “only Dr. Cobb used to let these ‘little visits’ slide.”

  My smile must look like a ventriloquist’s dummy.

  “Well, it was still a pleasure to meet you.” She stretches out her hand to shake mine. “If Puck doesn’t turn the corner soon I will definitely be in touch.”

  Making to leave, she catches herself and says, “Tell me, Doctor, do you make house calls?”

  “Yes, of course,” I reply, feeling the need to add, “though there’s an extra charge for the service.”

  “Of course,” she says. “And if you’re ever in the area, drop by. The campus is fabulous, even in the winter. It would be my pleasure to show you what’s on offer.”

  I notice a smudge of red lipstick bonded to one of her upper incisors. Is she flirting with me?

  “And I’ll be sure to get back to my friend, Stephanie. See what she knows about our famous Dr. Mills from Charleston.”