Chapter 26
After a thorough search by everybody present, except Andy who remained on the couch expressing his new found anti-British sentiment, it was official. Bernie was missing and quite possibly kidnapped. Nobody was really sure if kidnapped was the correct terminology for stealing a dog. Vincent argued perhaps dognapping was the appropriate word, while Sylvia suggested petnapping was the more politically correct usage one employed in such circumstances.
“You work in the industry, dear,” Sylvia said to Shauna. “What do you believe is the most proper definition?”
“Yeah, I’m going to have to go with theft or burglary,” Shauna replied. “I’m not sure an animal can get napped by legal standards.”
“Fascinating,” Vincent replied. “I never thought a dog could get burglared. As a matter of fact, I’m not even sure that’s a word. What do you think, deputy?”
“I say go for the biggest crime possible and make the charge aggravated assault and aggravated robbery,” O’Neil responded.
“Who gives a shit what to call it?” Nick said. His mind raced trying to put the puzzle pieces together. A thin bead of sweat ran down his lower back, and he found it nearly impossible to stand still. “Why would a dead albino break into my house, attack my father, and steal my talking dog?”
“Your what dog?” O’Neil asked. Nick looked up and saw everyone in the room staring at him with quizzical looks. “Did you say talking dog?”
“No. No, I….I said, uh…no I didn’t say talking,” Nick stammered in an attempt regain his composure. “I said why would somebody be stalking my dog.” He shuffled his feet on the hardwood floor and sporadically raised his eyes for quick peeks at the others to see if it looked like he sounded believable to them.
Everybody except Shauna gave a collective “ah” and nodded their heads as if that really made any sense. Shauna squinted her eyes and turned her head to the side, studying Nick’s reaction to the unwanted scrutiny garnered from his last comment. She recalled some interesting comments Nick made in the shelter and began to wonder exactly what Nick really meant to say. After all, she really knew very little about him. Plus, his parents were quite a colorful pair, or so it seemed in the short time she’d spent with them.
O’Neil’s telephone rang. He promptly answered when he saw his partner’s number pop up on the display. “Where are you?” he said with a certain degree of impatience. “Wait, what?” he stammered into the phone. “What are you talking about? That doesn’t make any sense.” A pause followed and O’Neil responded, “It’s about time.” He hung up the phone and walked outside through the front door.
When he walked outside, all eyes trailed him to the door. Nick, Shauna, and Vincent exchanged glances and came to a silent, collective agreement.
“Fuck this,” Nick said. “They’ve got answers I need to know.” Nick strode out the door, quickly followed by Shauna and Vincent. Sylvia and Andy remained on the couch. A wave of relief cascaded over Andy’s parents, no longer the number one priority for the local U.S. Marshals Service contingency.
“Maybe next time you might want to explain in advance that we’re on the lam from the federal government,” Sylvia chided. “I am honestly going to have serious reservations if you ever tell me we’re going on a vacation again.”
“Baby, we weren’t running from anybody,” Andy attempted to explain. “I just provided the man with a sense of indifference to their work since it really didn’t involve me. I would have stayed in Vegas and holed up in our house if I knew I’d drive across three states just to get electrocuted in my kid’s living room. I don’t know about you, but I’m ready for a real vacation.”
Sylvia wanted to be angry with him, but her resolve began to weaken as a smile inched around the corners of her mouth. Andy saw the shift in emotion and took immediate advantage of the momentum change.
“You know, this looks more like a case for the humane society than federal marshals. I’ll just sit here on the couch and drool if they come back in and ask any more questions. Nobody likes a slobbering late to middle-aged man. We’ll head back to Vegas through Arizona and spend a little time at the Grand Canyon. What do you say? You want to shack up with a former witness protection program escapee in the southwest desert?”
Sylvia’s reluctant grin spread across her face, and she cupped her hand over Andy’s cheek. “You’re a legitimate, first class bastard, but you’re my kind of bastard. Keep the vacant stare up with the drool, and I’m sure we’re golden.”
As Andy and Sylvia reached their personal reconciliation, Nick drilled O’Neil with questions on the front lawn. The more he hammered at him with his improvised interrogation skills, the more he realized O’Neil knew almost as little as he did.
“My partner’s almost here. He’ll have the answers. I’m in the dark as much as you folks are.” Nick studied his face and looked for the telltale signs of a man bluffing, but detected nothing. He resigned himself that this U.S. Marshal was telling them the truth. They simply stood in the grass and waited for Schwartz’s return. While they stood there, Shauna took hold of Nick’s wrist and led him several feet away from O’Neil and Vincent.
“Do you think there’s something with Bernie that made this wacko take him?”
“There has to be something, doesn’t there?” Nick replied. “But he’s just a dog, right?” Nick fished for a response from Shauna that would in some way assuage his nagging concern that he was gradually losing his mind. Vincent took heed of their private discussion and began drifting that way without being noticed by either of them.
“I guess. I mean, I don’t know,” Shauna said, fumbling for the right words. Nick snapped his head upright and stared at Shauna, who looked at the ground and kicked stray leaves that tumbled through the yard, left behind from last autumn. “You know, Melvin kind of had a different opinion of him.”
“No, I didn’t know that. What did Melvin think?” Nick asked as he took a step closer to Shauna and spoke in a firm, but hushed tone. Vincent buried his fists inside his cargo pants and meandered over the grass, gaining a few more yards.
Shauna grimaced as she collected her thoughts. “I don’t want to sound judgmental, but Melvin can be a little squirrelly. He’s a great worker, but sometimes I think he relates better to animals than people. You know what I mean?” Shauna asked, purposively trying to slow or stall the conversation, clearly uncomfortable with its direction.
“Yeah, I suppose,” Nick replied. “Do you know something about Bernie that you’re not telling me?” Vincent stood with his back to Nick and Shauna and kept an eye on O’Neil and both ears on their conversation.
“O.K., Bernie didn’t exactly just show up at the shelter like I said. Melvin brought him to the shelter under some unusual circumstances.”
“Well, that makes sense,” Nick said with his arms crossed. “Do you and Melvin normally lie about the animals at the shelter to prospective adoptees, or am I the first?”
Shauna’s shoulders drooped, and when she looked up at Nick and he could see tears welling up in her light green eyes. Nick was beginning to feel betrayed, but after looking into her face, his feelings of victimization lessened, and he decided to hear her out.
Nick took a deep breath and looked up into the night sky. The lack of a moon gave the stars a greater brilliance as they twinkled against the black backdrop. He quickly identified the big dipper and pondered whether he was behaving like a big dip, himself. He returned his eyes to Shauna, and his heart melted. He couldn’t help but trust her.
“I’m sorry,” he apologized. “Please, go ahead.”
Shauna sniffled and drew in a long breath. “Melvin’s a good guy, but he went through a rough stretch in his life. He got hooked on some hardcore drugs when he was young and spent a lot of time living on the streets as an addict. There’s a guy who runs sort of a day shelter in downtown Denver. He temporarily takes in these kids hooked on drugs and gives them
someplace warm and safe to stay for a while, no strings attached. To draw them in and keep them there, he’s got all kinds of dogs, cats, hamsters, fish, you name it, he has it at this shelter. He kind of uses them as a way to draw the kids in, keep them there, and keep bringing them back so he can spend time with them to convince them to get clean.”
Shauna paused and gauged Nick’s reaction. He remained stoic, which she took as a good sign. She glanced over her shoulder to see Vincent was now a part of the conversation, which she again took as a good sign. Better to come clean with everyone. Well, maybe not the U.S. Marshals. O’Neil still stood by the curb and kept his attention on both directions of the street, which she, of course, took as the third and final good sign.
“So Melvin eventually ended up going through drug rehabilitation and has been clean for over five years. Because of his connection with the guy who got him off the streets and the animals he used to entice him back every day, Melvin developed a love for working with animals, and he’s been a great addition to our animal shelter.” Shauna paused for a few seconds, gathering her emotions before continuing.
“So when Melvin finished drug rehab, he started attending narcotics anonymous meetings at a church that’s affiliated with the guy with the animals who originally got him off the streets. Last week Melvin was doing his usual NA meeting when something weird happened.” Shauna stopped again, unsure how to proceed.
“Weird?” Nick inquired. “Weird’s beginning to be the new normal. I can’t wait to hear this.”
“OK, so here goes,” Shauna began. “The NA meetings are in the basement of the church, and the people use a side entrance that leads downstairs which doesn’t connect with the main part of the church. At last week’s meeting, Melvin was running late and went in off the main drag and used the front door. When he came in he saw Bernie drinking water out of the baptismal font and the pastor sitting on some steps off to the side, completely out of it.”
“What do you mean by completely out if it?” Nick asked.
“He said the pastor was kind of in a trance when he first walked in, but seemed to snap out of it pretty quick. And this is where it’s gets strange. The pastor insisted that God spoke to him and told him that Melvin was predestined to take Bernie that very night. Of course Melvin asked him what he was talking about. The pastor just said he knew that Melvin was supposed to take Bernie, and that’s all he knew.
“And this was according to God?” Nick asked with growing skepticism. He never attributed the voice he heard with God. After all, some might consider the words he heard irreverent. Would God speak that way? Surely He wouldn’t use a dog. But then again, Moses probably wasn’t expecting God to use a flaming plant as a communication device.
“That’s what the man said,” Shauna replied to Nick. She paused momentarily to let this all sink in.
“Is that what you think? Do you think the pastor heard God’s voice? Did Melvin hear anything?”
Shauna dropped her head and looked at the ground. “I don’t know, and Melvin never said anything to me about hearing a voice. But there’s more.”
“That seems to be the under lying theme here, lately,” Nick said.
“I first attributed it to lack of sleep, not having a social life, too much caffeine, or anything else I could come up with. At least until I met Nick at the shelter and what you just said in your house a couple minutes ago.” Shauna said directly to Nick.
“Holy crap, you heard it, too?” Nick asked, choking out the barely audible words from his parched throat. Shauna’s eyes remained wide and she nodded her head in agreement. Nick’s mouth fell open as he took rapid shallow breaths. Vincent’s eyes darted back and forth between them both.
“I’m sorry, hear what?” Vincent asked. His heart raced in anticipation.
Nick and Shauna never separated their eyes from each other. At this precise moment in time, they were the only two people in the world as they recognized they couldn’t both be crazy with the same delusion. Vincent continued to press.
“Hear what, dammit?” Vincent asked again. “What the frick are you two talking about?”
“It’s the dog, V,” Nick said. Vincent nodded his head, waiting for a further explanation. Nick looked at Shauna and repeated, “Yeah, it really was Bernie, wasn’t it?” Shauna continued nodding her head without blinking.
Vincent threw up his hands and leaned in closer and asked with an increased sense of dismay and urgency, “What do you two mean, it’s the dog? That doesn’t really explain anything, you know.”
Shauna took a few steps toward Vincent so she was inches from his face and said, “Bernie can talk or something or somebody speaks through him. Not aloud, but he definitely communicates with words you can hear in your head.”
Vincent’s eyebrows raised and he maintained eye contact with Shauna, waiting for the punch line.
“I know that sure doesn’t sound like an answer, but it’s the truth,” Shauna continued. “I thought I was crazy thinking it, but now I know it’s true. I’m pretty sure Melvin knows it, too. He’s been acting really peculiar since Bernie showed up.”
Vincent wanted to laugh, but the looks on Nick and Shauna’s faces told him they were indeed serious. He shook his head from side to side and placed both hands on his hips. He turned his attention to Nick. Nick’s ashen face and deadpan stare scared Vincent. He couldn’t read Shauna so well, just having met her, but Nick was his friend. They spent many hours sharing truths, dreams, sad stories, triumphs, and sidesplitting laughter. He knew Nick as well as he knew anybody, and his friend’s face told the whole story. Nick believed everything Shauna just stated.
Vincent cleared his throat before speaking. “I can tell that you both feel quite strongly about whatever this is.” He paused to discern any change in emotion from them, but saw none. “But you’re going to have to explain this a whole hell of a lot more before I can support this fantasy!”
“Of course,” Nick said, placing a hand on Vincent’s shoulder. “Trust me, I know this sounds about as quirky and out there as anything I’ve ever shared with you. So brace yourself and keep an open mind, O.K., buddy?” Vincent slowly nodded his head in agreement, non-verbally expressing that he held major reservations about the news he was about to hear.
Nick started from the beginning at the humane shelter when he first met Bernie, Melvin, and Shauna. He told him about the voice that he heard in his head that clearly seemed to be directed at him and even more clearly to have come from the dog. He also explained the swirling aura that held him in a trance-like state. He rattled off the incident in the parking lot, trying to get Bernie into the truck, how Bernie talked to him at his house, and how he desperately tried to find a rational reason for it all. Until a few minutes ago, he thought quite possibly he was having some type of mental break.
Looking at Shauna, he confessed, “You can’t know how relieved I felt when you said you heard him, too.”
Shauna cocked her head to the side and said, “Yeah, I’ve got a pretty good idea exactly how you felt. But I’ve got to tell you, the freaked out feeling is still there, too.”
Nick smiled at Shauna and said, “Yeah, I’m not sure that’s going away anytime soon. When did you first hear him?”
Shauna told Vincent and Nick how Bernie spoke to her without making any sounds other than in her mind. She elaborated how the voice came through as loud and clear as if spoken by somebody standing next to her, only she inexplicably knew the only audible sound waves registered inside her head. She never experienced the aura, though. She described Melvin’s increased interest in Bernie and his new found proclivity to working extra hours, even though the county budget did not allow for compensating him for his time.
When Shauna finished, Vincent rocked back and forth on his heels, his hands clasped tightly behind his back. His tongue traveled a few laps over his front teeth as he pondered this incredible story. Independent of each oth
er, he could most likely shoot holes through it, citing some kind of life stressor factoring into this bizarre aberration. However, these two people shared the same basic story, independent of each other. He brought a hand from his back and stroked his goat-tee, which Nick immediately recognized as a sign of deep thought.
Before Vincent responded to their stories, car tires screeched to a halt in front of the house, interrupting the silence. Schwartz popped out of the car. He walked around the front of the sedan and banged his hand on the hood.
“I’ve never seen anything like it my whole career, O’Neil,” he shouted. “Hell, I’ve never seen anything like it my entire damn life! This job never ceases to amaze me with its bullshit!”
“Why did Gionelli call you off?” O’Neil asked. “And what does this albino have to do with O’Fallon and the dog?”
Schwartz’s perturbed demeanor gave way to confusion. “What dog?”
O’Neil relayed how the albino hit Andy O’Fallon with a stun gun and apparently stole his St. Bernard.
“Why in God’s name would he take your dog?” Schwartz asked Nick.
Nick shot a quick look to Shauna and replied, “I really don’t know.” Feeling like he deserved some kind of explanation, Nick shot a question back to the U.S. Marshal. “What can you tell me about this albino?”
“That’s classified,” Schwartz said, looking O’Neil’s direction.
Exasperated, Nick laid into the seasoned cop. “Well I don’t give a rat’s ass! This freak breaks into my house, zaps my dad, steals my fucking dog, and you take off like a bat out of hell chasing some ghost from your past, leaving your partner behind at my house. Excuse me to hell, but maybe I should just call the local cops, the FBI, the CIA, or whoever the fuck investigates canine theft, perpetrated by dead protected federal witnesses!”
“What exactly did you tell these people, O’Neil?” Schwartz asked. He eyed his partner like a father ready to chastise his son for some egregious misconduct.
“Hey, I just said that you thought you knew the guy in the Mercedes, and you thought he was dead. I didn’t say squat about the program.” Schwartz bobbed his head, trying to process what was still classified and what was open for discussion. He rapidly decided that he really didn’t care any longer. He looked at Nick and saw him pull a cell phone out of his pocket. Schwartz didn’t think the kid was bluffing.
“Alright, O’Fallon, put the phone down. I’ll tell you what I know since you’ve got a dog in this fight, no pun intended. It’s a matter of public record anyway. At least the parts I know.” Nick eyed Schwartz and placed the phone back in his pocket. He felt satisfied that the bluff worked. He could have dialed 911, but he wasn’t sure they had an operating number for the Central Intelligence Agency readily available for talking dog thefts.
Schwartz sat on the hood of the police car and waved the others to come closer. “O.K. boys and girls, huddle tight around the campfire. Maybe what I’ve got to say will shed some light on things for all of us. You O.K. with this O’Neil?”
“I’ll follow your lead, partner. I’ve got your back.”
Schwartz nodded his head in approval and said, “Well, O. K., then.”
He gave the caveat that he would not use real names, even though the people involved were no longer part of the witness protection program. He danced over certain details, but relayed the relevant facts concerning Surey Whiteside’s apparent death so many years ago. He explained how the young man was so readily identifiable due to his physical attributes, and that he was absolutely certain the man he just chased was one and the same. He declined to comment on Gionelli calling him off, citing it was a matter of national security. He simply relayed he received orders to stand down and refused to elaborate.
“So I don’t really have anything but some background information on the guy who took your St. Bernard. Why he did it, for whom he works, and what’s the next move are unclear to me. I’m open to any insight.”
Vincent was the first to speak. “It sounds like the superiors who told you to stop the chase have the answers.” Nick, Shauna, and even O’Neil nodded in agreement. “What are the chances they’ll be forthcoming with more information?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Schwartz replied sarcastically. “I never thought to ask for an explanation. My boss is on the ground here, and I’m still in the dark. These fuckers aren’t going to say boo to me, let alone civilians.”
Nick leaned over to Shauna and whispered in her ear, “Do we say anything about the voice?”
Shauna furrowed her brow and began wringing her hands. “We’ll just look crazy to them. Maybe there’s no connection to any of this, but if there is a connection, this could be huge. I’m scared, Nick.”
“Schwartz sounds like he had a personal relationship with this guy who took Bernie. I think he might be more willing to look the other way, than most.”
“That’s still a pretty big risk, Nick.”
“What are you two whispering about?” Schwartz asked.
Nick took the initiative and spoke first. “I think there might be something with Bernie that probably doesn’t really answer the questions, but might give us another avenue to consider.” Nick chose not to look Shauna’s direction. “Bernie may have some special skills or training.” Nick paused as he tried to formulate his thoughts into coherent words.
“So, what’s that got to do with my long lost, dead protectee?” Schwartz asked.
“There may be some religious connection with the St. Bernard.” Nick was not prepared to really go any farther with the truth. He decided the rest he would wing and see what stuck. “There may be some unexplained interest in the dog from religious zealots. Nothing necessarily dangerous, but certain factions may believe the dog possess some type of divine capabilities, but I have no idea what that really boils down to. Maybe this albino dude is freelancing for somebody who fits the bill as being interested in the dog.”
“Oh, this gets better and better,” O’Neil stated. Turning to Schwartz he asked, “Can we just get back to Andy O’Fallon and let somebody else work out this mess?”
Schwartz took deep breaths as his eyes darted from right to left. After what seemed like several minutes, but only spanned a handful of seconds, Schwartz came to his decision and looked at O’Neil. “Right now I couldn’t care less if the dog is the second coming, and I’m not asking you to follow me, kid, but I can’t let this albino thing go. I’ve been doing this too long to have the people I trusted pull the wool over my eyes. When you’ve spent the last decade and a half believing what your own agency told you, only to find out you were lied to, it is a punch in the gut. Gionelli knew Surey Whiteside, and I guarantee he’s known all along that he wasn’t dead. Right now the only people I trust are standing right here. As far as Andy O’Fallon, well, I couldn’t care less. We’ve got nothing to hold him on and I’ve got bigger fish to fry.”
“That’s the best news I’ve heard in long time,” Andy said. He and Sylvia had decided to come outside to assess the situation and caught the tail end of Schwartz’s last words.
“What if this really involves some kind of religious fanatics or terrorists?” O’Neil asked, ignoring Andy and Sylvia. “If this involves something that threatens homeland security, we can be jamming ourselves up. Are you ready to risk that?”
“The answer for me is, yes. I understand if this is outside of your comfort zone. I don’t want you doing anything you’re not good with, kid. But if this crap were on the up and up, official protocols would have been followed. As far as I can see, nobody’s going to report anything, because nobody wants their name attached to some shit that’s not supposed to exist.”
O’Neil contemplated his partner’s response. “Do you really think Gionelli has something to do with this?” O’Neil dreaded the possibility of his superior being involved in something that bordered on illegal activity, even if there was some justifiable reason.
I do
n’t know, but I’m going to find out. The gloves are off, and policy be damned. The one thing I cannot tolerate is lies.” Schwartz turned his attention to Andy and said, “Do me and you a big, fat favor,” Schwartz said. “Get yourself together and go back to Vegas and talk with the U.S. Attorney’s Office. Avoiding them really hasn’t been of much benefit, so far, has it?”
“With all due respect, sir,” Sylvia responded, “I think we’re going to stay here with our son until this mess is straightened out. Then, and only then, will we go back home and deal with that nonsense. Understood?” She said it with the definitive authority that only a mother can possess. The silence that followed solidified the fact nobody wanted to mess with Momma. Andy was the quietest of all of them.
Vincent was the first to break the silence. He clapped his hands together and stated with exuberance, “Well, it looks like we got the band back together! How do you want to handle it, Deputy Schwartz?” Pointing to the O’Fallons and Shauna, he asked, “Do we get to be officially called a posse?”
Schwartz got a broad grin across his face. “You can call yourself whatever you want, but if you’re all in, I’ve got a plan.”
The Bernie Factor Page 32
