Dog Drama

by Leslie O'Kane

  He sat up when I called his name, making my heart flutter. He looks adorable when his hair is suffering from bedhead. “Did you find something?” he asked.

  “This is from an article written last year about the outcome of the sheep herding competition at the stock show. It tells about the first three finishers and their owners, then it says, ‘The big surprise was that the odds-on favorite, Flint, owned by Roger Geller, finished second to last. Throughout the competition, Flint was uncharacteristically distracted, almost dazed, in this reporter’s opinion. Afterward the visibly upset owner replied ‘No comment,’ to my questions about what went wrong. A person with close access to Mr. Geller, however, told me confidentially that there was good reason to suspect tampering. Because none of the fellow competitors were considered conspirators, there was little point in airing anyone’s dirty laundry. Of particular regret was that this was Mr. Geller’s and Flint’s final competition, due to Mr. Geller’s declining health.’”

  Baxter held my gaze. “You’re thinking that’s what John was talking about at the hospital.”

  “Exactly. I think John was the one who tampered with Flint’s competition for his own benefit. He drugged Flint or distracted him with a dog whistle. And in order to atone, he hired Sam Geller to work on his play. And now Sam is getting back at John by wrecking Flint’s performances.”

  “So why would John let Sam stick around?” Baxter asked. “Why not pay him off, or settle the matter in court?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe it’s because he figures the consequences for confronting Sam would be even worse.”

  “But how could that be? John basically told both of us that Good Dog, Blue! is his one real shot at the big time.”

  “Yet now he’s all googoo eyes over Sally Johnson.”

  “‘Googoo eyes?’” Baxter repeated, smiling.

  “Head over heels, let’s say. So maybe he doesn’t want Sam telling her how he connived to get Flint away from a dying man.”

  Baxter yawned. “I’ll buy that for now. We’ll see if we can get any information from Sam in the morning. Okay?”

  “Okay.”

  “So you can come back to bed now. Okay?” He added teasingly.

  “Okay,” I said.

  I turned out the lights and let myself be folded into his arms. I could hear the chirping of crickets in the night air, which was normally such a peaceful sound to my ear. Tonight, however, they were ringing like a warning siren.

  Chapter 9

  In the morning, we divvied up six scrambled eggs among ourselves and the two dogs. Flint had been able to eat his kibble as well, but Pavlov waited until Baxter drove all of us to our hotel so we could give her her accustomed brand. With the theater dark on Mondays, this would be my first opportunity to work with Flint on stage. If he was experiencing any lingering after-effects from the tranquilizer, I sure couldn’t detect them.

  The problem now, though, was that John was supposed to let us in this morning, yet his keys, like his pants, were in the dressing room of said theater.

  I located Valerie Devereux’s contact information. Just as I was texting her, she sent me a text that read:

  I talked to John. He’s on the mend. When should I meet you at theater to let you in?

  I erased my own note and sent back:

  10 a.m. Thanks, Valerie.

  She texted:

  Yep.

  At ten a.m. sharp, we entered the theater. We exchanged some small talk with Valerie. She was holding John’s clothes—a pair of jeans and a light-weight brown-plaid shirt, both on hangers as she spoke to us.

  “Did John sound okay to you?” I asked. “He was out of sorts last night. He was saying the stage manager poisoned him. But that might have been the drugs talking.”

  “That’s what he told me this morning, too,” Valerie said, “as well as the sheriff, last night. I’m sure they’ll get to the bottom of it. By the way, I had a building contractor I know and trust come to the theater first thing this morning and make sure the overhead lights are all securely fastened now. He can’t tell, of course, how long ago the extra bolts have been missing from that one fixture, but he assured me everything now is snug and up to code.”

  “That’s good to know,” I said. “And it’s nice that the theater’s dark tonight anyway, so everyone has an extra twenty-four hours to recuperate from yesterday’s trauma.”

  “True.” She smiled at me, then said, “Since we’re both here anyway, why don’t we hold our official introductory meeting right now?”

  Eager to work with Flint, I was of two minds. “It’s fine either way with me. I know it’s your day off, so if—”

  She made a vague gesture in the air. “Come on back to my office, both of you.”

  As she hung John’s clothes on a hook on the inside of her door, she offered to put on a pot of coffee for us, which we declined. We took seats, letting the dogs accompany us as we all sat down in her small, drab office. After Baxter filled Valerie in on John’s physical condition and the visit from the police officer, I asked, “What do you know about bad blood between John and Sam?”

  Judging from her furrowed brow, I should have allowed her to guide the conversation. Nevertheless, she answered, “All John told me about Sam was that he was currently down on his luck, and John wanted to make amends for some bad judgment he used in dealing with Sam’s brother a few years ago. So I hired him. Point of fact, though, I’m not all that pleased with him. We’ll probably never know if Sam was the one who removed the bolts, but he should have checked the entire stage for any safety issues.”

  “Did John ever tell you that his...shady path to acquiring Flint was what he meant by ‘bad judgment’?”

  “No. It didn’t seem germane to ask about John’s behavior, and he never got into any specifics.”

  “I think it’s very possible that’s somehow behind Flint’s problems on stage.”

  She paused as if to let this sink in, then said, “I see.” She tented her fingertips. “And what about the understudy, Pippa, screwing up on stage?”

  “I haven’t worked with her at all, but I’ve seen how she and Felicity are together. My educated guess is her troubles might be due to inconsistent training.”

  “Ah.” Valerie began to rhythmically move each of the fingertips of her hands together and then apart. “Can you resolve Flint’s problems and also train Pippa for the role this week?”

  “That’s the plan, at least. I won’t know how much time either task will take until I get the chance to work with them.”

  She nodded, peering into my eyes. I got the uncomfortable feeling that she was trying to assess my confidence in my ability to succeed. “John and I are both hoping that he’ll be able to return to work tomorrow and direct the show,” she said, still holding my gaze.

  “Will Sam Geller be working during tomorrow’s performance?” Baxter asked.

  She arched her brow at Baxter’s question. “Barring his confession or resignation, yes. I...find it hard to believe it was legitimately attempted murder. This is a small town, where everybody knows one another. When you come right down to it, we’re talking about a pin prick coated with some nasty sap from a wildflower.”

  “They had to give him a transfusion last night,” Baxter said. “It was hardly a ‘pin prick.’”

  Once again, Valerie furrowed her brow. “Maybe I’m just not seeing this clearly, because I’m too close to the situation. Running this theater is my passion. I love this place, and everyone in it. Especially the dogs. But I just can’t believe anyone truly believed putting a dot of sap on a pin could have killed a full grown man.”

  I sighed. Last night, Baxter had told me things could look different in the morning. Indeed they did. I was now worried for Flint’s safety, and I had decided that I couldn’t trust anything anybody at the Creede Playhouse told me. “The policeman...sheriff, rather, who spoke to us said that Flint had seemed half-asleep during a dress rehearsal that was open to the public.”

  She nodded. �
��John lost his patience. He decided the best thing to do, considering it was just a rehearsal, was to put the dog into a sit-stay during the third act.” She spread her hands and stared directly into my eyes. “There was nothing nefarious about it.”

  I bit back the temptation to reply, I didn’t say there was; it served no purpose to get myself into an adversarial position with the manager. “Maybe the poisoned tack was just a warning or something,” I conceded, truly hoping that was the case.

  “Did the sheriff talk to you last night?” Baxter asked.

  “Yes. He asked a few questions. I did tell him I was skeptical about the whole idea of a murder attempt. I’m not—”

  Someone knocked on her door.

  “Come in,” she said.

  It was Sam. “Hey, folks,” he said. He stayed put in the doorway.

  “Morning, Sam. You’re here on your day off?” Valerie asked.

  “Yeah. Wanted to double check all the stage’s ceiling fixtures. Can’t have anything else fall from the ceiling on my watch. Wouldn’t help my resume.” He grinned.

  “That’s true. Although I hired a competent professional to do that for you, earlier this morning. Furthermore, Mr. Geller, you’d best brush up that resume of yours. I’m putting you on notice as of this minute. One more incident, and you’re out of here.” Valerie lifted her chin. “That said, let me accompany you out of the building. Ms. Babcock is expecting to have the theater all to herself today. Clearly the place is going to the dogs.” She gave me a self-satisfied grin.

  I rose, feeling awkward for Sam’s sake; it hadn’t been necessary—or appropriate, in my opinion—to talk to Sam like that in front of us. “We’ll get to work right away.” I said.

  She pulled a set of keys from her pocket. “These are John’s. Lock up whenever you leave, even if it’s just for a minute or two. I’ll leave it to you to arrange returning John’s keys.”

  “Thanks, Valerie,” Baxter and I said in unison.

  “Yep.” She stood in the hallway, waiting for us to get out of her office, and she locked the door with her own set of keys.

  “It was nice chatting with you,” I added. This time, she didn’t even give me a “yep,” but rather strode away with Sam as if she hadn’t heard me.

  ***

  My first order of business was to do some simple aversion therapy with Flint. Although he walked onto the stage with me, he froze and stared at the spot where the light fixture had landed. I walked on a diagonal route across the stage with him in a heel position, distracting him by singing “dee-dah-dah” to the tune of Baxter’s dial tone. We pivoted at the corners to walk from back to front stage, then diagonally across again. Next we walked right across the very spot the lights fell. After fifteen minutes of heeling, sit-stays, and lie downs at various places on the stage, Flint seemed at ease on every portion of the stage.

  The next few hours flew by. Part of me felt guilty for having such a great time, all the while knowing that the person who’d hired me for this job was in a hospital bed. It was so much fun, though, to have an entire theater to Baxter and myself, plus two brilliant dogs. I was probably fooling myself, but I sensed the dogs loved every minute as well. Baxter read the lines for both male leads, and I read for both females, and we moved a pair of folding chairs around whenever “Blue” needed a physical stand-in for the absent actor or actress.

  By the time we called it a day, I felt good about Flint performing as Blue tomorrow night, with John at the helm. We called John and asked if we could bring him a nice dinner, or if that would break hospital rules.

  “You bet,” he replied. “And I don’t care if you have to sneak it here in a bed pan.” He also told us that he’d gotten a slight rash on his abdomen, so the doctors were keeping him there for an extra night, just to be cautious.

  We wound up feeding both dogs and leaving them at John’s house, despite our promise we made when he was paranoid last night. We then splurged on three excellent steak dinners to go, and we all three jammed ourselves atop John’s little bed and ate our sirloin steaks, mashed garlic potatoes, and roasted Brussel sprouts, assuring the nurses that the wonderful pinot noir was cranberry juice.

  Not a word was spoken about Sam, poison, or even Flint. John and Baxter regaled me with tales of their hiking exploits. It was a wonderful ending to a wonderful day.

  ***

  A little after ten a.m. on Tuesday morning, we again brought both dogs to the theater. Someone was whistling on the stage. I leapt to the conclusion that it was John and rushed onto the stage a few steps ahead of Baxter, with a big smile on my face. Instead of John, however, I was greeted with a: “Hey,” by Sam Geller. He was coiling a pair of long black cables.

  “Hi, Sam,” I replied. “It’s nice to see you.”

  “Nice for me to be back at work, considering yesterday morning’s conversation,” Sam grumbled. “Yeesh. The boss-lady must’ve gotten up on the wrong side of bed.”

  I gave Baxter a quick glance. This was an opportunity to ask Sam some questions in private. Baxter met my gaze, which I took as a good sign.

  “I heard about your brother’s death from cancer earlier this year,” I said. “That must have been hard to take. I’m sorry.”

  He stopped working on the cables and stared at me. “Who told you?”

  “John gave us the gist when we visited him in the hospital on Sunday night. Then I researched past herding-competitions at the stock show online. I learned about Flint’s troubles performing at the Denver Stock Show competition two years ago. How Flint was supposed to win. And he lost due to someone’s interference with his performance.”

  “Yeah?” he said.

  “I’m assuming that was John.”

  He gave both Baxter and me long looks. “So you’re probably also assuming I’ve been lousing up Flint’s performance. And tried to kill John, as well.”

  “Should we suspect you?” Baxter asked firmly, squaring his shoulders. He was taller than Sam, although Sam was really muscular. I would hate to see Baxter have to defend himself—or me—against him.

  “Nope.”

  I studied his features. He stared right back at me.

  “My job is simply to get Flint to respond on stage like he does in rehearsals,” I told him. “I merely have to eliminate his distractions, or eliminate his response to those distractions. I’m strictly on Flint’s side. If there is a tug-of-war between you and John, because John cheated you out of owning your brother’s dog, I wouldn’t blame you.”

  No comment.

  “It wouldn’t necessarily mean you loosened the bolts on the light fixture or poisoned John,” Baxter added.

  After another fruitless pause, Baxter asked, “How did Flint wind up in John’s possession?”

  “He bought him.”

  “Fair and square?”

  Sam snorted. “Let’s say that someone got plastered and made a ridiculous, stupid bet at a freaking bar.”

  “When John cheated you in a game of poker?” I asked.

  “Poker? No way. This was a bet about the sheep-herding contest. Not realizing the contest was rigged. And that nothing could be proved about its being rigged.”

  “You bet your brother’s dog on the contest?” I asked in surprise. I couldn’t imagine anyone ever doing that with their pet dog, let alone a working pet that helped increase their wages.

  Sam’s features darkened. “My brother made the damned bet. I was just too drunk as well to stop him.” He shook his head. “Ownership of the dog if he failed to medal, versus ten grand if he medaled.”

  “Then he distracted Flint with a dog whistle?” Baxter asked.

  Sam shrugged. “I was there, watching him like a hawk. Couldn’t see a thing. More likely, he had an assistant doing the actual distraction. But, nobody saw anything. We filed a protest. It went nowhere.”

  “What about the sheep he was trying to herd, though? Did all of them seem normal?” Baxter asked.

  He snorted. “Normal for a sheep, I guess. But one of them w
as skittish and couldn’t be controlled for the life of him. Might have been drugged. My brother was just too appalled with himself over being goaded into making the stupid bet. He decided not to press the matter. And John promised he’d take great care of Flint. He handed Roger five hundred in cash, saying something like ‘so there’d be no hard feelings.’ As if the top sheep-herder in the state was worth a measly five-hundred bucks.”

  “That had to be infuriating,” I said. “It’s making me mad on your behalf, even though that happened a year and a half ago.”

  “Hell, yes. It rankled me plenty. But I sure as sh...ooting didn’t try to poison the jackass. And, at the time, Roger decided it was just as well if Flint went with a theater director. He figured he was going to be dead in another six months, and his top dog deserved a chance to show off his smarts. It was his decision to make, not mine.”

  “But John told us the other night that he’d cheated you in a card game and wound up in a fist fight with you, and you spent the night in jail.”

  Sam shook his head. “That happened to me, but with someone else in the fist-fight. Last month, when I came into town, he asked why I waited so long to find Flint if I wanted him back. I was having legal troubles.”

  My thoughts were racing. I was getting angry at John. I believed Sam. He had no reason to lie about the poker game. Whereas John must have been spinning tales while he tried to make a case so that we would be compelled to defend his ownership of Flint. Even when John knew he had valid reason to fear retribution from Sam. So much so that John wanted us to keep Flint in our sight.

  “John is a friend of mine, Sam,” Baxter said. “He’s a good guy, by and large. Maybe someone else cheated, and John just wasn’t enough of a mensch to admit it. The show-winner’s owners could have been behind it.”

  “That’s what John claims happened. Says he never would have made the bet if he’d been sober himself.”

  “Did you offer to buy Flint back from him?” I asked gently, hoping he would say no.