Ghost Dog Secrets

by Peg Kehret

  Mom showed her the completed foster parent application. “It says on the application that I’ll need to attend an orientation session, and they’re only held every two weeks.”

  “I’ll talk to the Humane Society’s director in the morning,” Heidi said, “explain the situation, and have your application approved right away. You’ll still need to attend the next orientation but we’ll get Ra legally placed with you quickly.”

  “Do foster parents ever get to adopt the animals they foster ?” I asked.

  “One step at a time, Rusty,” Mom said. “Right now, we need to be sure that Mr. Myers has no claim on Ra.”

  “That’s right,” Heidi said. “Of course, people like Mr. Myers don’t pay attention to what’s legal and what isn’t. Even if we win a case against him and Ra is no longer his, he might still cause trouble.”

  Oh, great, I thought. Mean Man Myers is going to be coming after Ra no matter what happens in court.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Mom took the next afternoon off. She needed to be home when the repairman came to fix the window and install our new door, which was complete with a new dead-bolt lock. After he left, she went to the Humane Society to meet the person in charge of volunteer foster parents.

  When I got home after school, Mom said, “It’s official. Ra is now our foster dog.”

  I pumped both fists in the air and danced around the kitchen. Ra barked, and danced, too.

  “I bought an ID tag for his collar,” she said. “The Humane Society requires that all of their foster animals are microchipped. Usually they do it while the animal is at the shelter, before it goes to a foster home, but of course Ra wasn’t with me. They said an ID tag is okay until we can bring Ra in to be chipped.”

  “Thanks, Mom,” I said. “I know you never wanted a dog and it’s nice of you to do this.”

  “Oh, Rusty,” she said. “It isn’t that I don’t want a dog. It’s that I worry about our expenses. Ra is a wonderful dog, but he eats a lot and he’ll need more veterinary care. I can barely pay our bills as it is.”

  “Maybe I can get a part-time job,” I said. “I’m old enough to do babysitting. I can hire out to shovel sidewalks.”

  “School is your job,” Mom said. “By the way, Heidi Kellogg called. She’s charged Mr. Myers with animal negligence. There’ll be a hearing tomorrow afternoon.”

  Andrew didn’t come that day to play with Ra. He said he had to clean his room, but I sensed that his room was an excuse, not the real reason. Although I had kept him informed of everything that was happening, I suspected that he felt left out. The situation had changed a lot in the last few days. Before Wendy spilled the beans, Andrew and I had done everything for Ra together. Now Ra lived inside at my house; Mom was Ra’s foster parent; Mean Man Myers had come here; Heidi Kellogg kept Mom informed about the investigation; even the collie’s ghost appeared to me but not to Andrew. Maybe it seemed to Andrew that he had helped rescue Ra but now he wasn’t included any more.

  I e-mailed him to tell him what Ra and I were doing, but he didn’t reply. Then I e-mailed him the two ghost pictures. If he could see the collie’s image, I knew he’d be thrilled. Still no response.

  After I’d fed Ra and played fetch until he was worn out, I put him inside with Mom while I rode my bike over to Andrew’s house. We had been friends since kindergarten; I couldn’t let anything come between us.

  He seemed surprised to see me.

  “Hi, Exalted Exciting Expert,” I said. “I thought I’d hang out with you for a little while, if that’s okay.”

  “Sure. I figured you were busy with Ra.”

  “He’s sleeping.”

  “I just made popcorn,” Andrew said, and I followed him to the den.

  Wendy sat by the window, knitting. “Hi, Rusty,” she said. “I’m making blankets for the homeless cats.”

  I fingered the soft green and tan blanket that dangled from her knitting needles. The large needles made big stitches, so the blanket was loose and porous. I imagined one of the Humane Society cats working his claws in and out of the blanket as he curled up on it.

  “It looks as if you’re almost finished,” I said.

  “Almost done with this one,” she said. “I’ve already made seven others.”

  My jaw dropped. “This is the eighth cat blanket you’ve knit?”

  “Yep. I like to make them and I want to help the cats.”

  “Here they are,” Andrew said, pointing to a stack of blankets. Some were bright primary reds and yellows. Others were pastel pink and one was blue-and-white striped.

  “They’re beautiful,” I said. “That’s really great, Wendy,” and I meant it. I never thought I’d be offering a sincere compliment to Wendy the Whiner but, as Mrs. Webster would say, Wendy had seen a need and was working hard to meet it.

  “Did you get the pictures I e-mailed you? ” I asked Andrew.

  “I haven’t checked e-mail since I got home from school. What did you send?”

  “Let’s look.”

  Andrew opened his laptop and we waited for the photos. Wendy put down her knitting and gazed over our shoulders.

  The two pictures of the collie’s ghost appeared side by side on the screen. “What’s that dog’s name?” Wendy asked.

  “It’s Ra,” Andrew said. “You know that.”

  “No, the other dog,” Wendy said. “The white one.”

  Andrew looked at me.

  “She sees the collie,” I said.

  Andrew squinted at the screen, then shook his head.

  “She’s a funny-looking dog,” Wendy said. “Are you going to rescue her, too?”

  “We can’t,” I said. “She isn’t a real dog.”

  “What do you mean? You took a picture of her.”

  “She’s a ghost,” I said. “She’s a dog’s ghost.”

  Wendy put her hands on her hips and cocked her head. “Are you trying to scare me?”

  “Nope. I see the white dog, too, but I also can see right through her.”

  “I see through her, too,” Wendy said. “That’s why I said she’s funny looking. I can see the yard behind her in one picture and something solid in the other.”

  “My bedroom door,” I said.

  “The ghost came to your room?”

  “She wanted me to follow her. I think Mean Man Myers let her starve to death, and now she’s trying to keep that from happening to any other dog. I believe she was trying to protect Ra.”

  “Oh.” Wendy returned to her knitting. “Then she’s a good ghost, and there’s nothing to be scared of.”

  “That’s what I think, too.”

  “Do you want to shoot some hoops? ” Andrew asked. I got the feeling he didn’t want to talk about the collie’s ghost any longer.

  “Okay.”

  He logged off. We got his basketball and went out to the driveway, where Andrew had a basketball hoop over the garage door. He dribbled the ball for a few seconds, then stopped and said, “It really bugs me that you and Wendy can see that collie, but I can’t.”

  “It would bug me, too, if things were reversed, and I was the one who couldn’t see the ghost. Maybe you’re trying too hard. I’m never looking for her when I see her. She just appears.”

  Andrew shrugged. “Could be,” he said.

  “I was going to print the ghost pictures, to see if she’d show in them, but my printer’s out of ink and I’m out of money. I’m a poor, penniless pauper.”

  Instead of responding, Andrew shot the basketball through the hoop. We played one-on-one for a while, but it wasn’t as much fun as usual. Andrew didn’t make up any threesomes and I felt as if we were only going through the motions of the game, without either of us caring if we played or not. I was relieved when Mrs. Pinella told Andrew he should get ready for dinner.

  When I got home, I found a note from Mom: “Mrs. Gardiner needed a ride to her daughter’s house. Back in twenty minutes.”

  Mrs. Gardiner has lived at the end of our block for fifty y
ears. She can’t drive anymore because her eyesight is too bad, so she sometimes asks Mom or one of the other neighbors for a ride.

  Ra stood by the door, looking at me. I knew he wanted to go out. “We have to wait until Mom gets back,” I told him.

  He whined, and scratched at the door.

  Mom hadn’t put a time on the note so I didn’t know when she’d be back.

  Ra barked. He only did that when he really needed to go.

  When I got the leash out of the drawer he came trotting over, wagging his tail. I snapped the leash on, and he tugged toward the door. He barely made it to the grass. “What’d you do,” I asked, “drink the whole bowl of water?”

  I turned to take him back inside, but he pulled toward the sidewalk. Maybe he needs to go some more, I thought, and decided to walk a short ways. As we walked, I thought about Wendy. When she told her mom about Ra, I was so angry at her that I had vowed never to talk to her again.

  Now I had to admit it was a good thing that Mom and Andrew’s parents had found out about Ra. He could be inside with me instead of being shut alone in the fort, and because of Mom, Ms. Kellogg was investigating possible cruelty charges against Mr. Myers. Mom was not only a foster parent for the Humane Society but she seemed to genuinely like Ra. None of that would have happened if Wendy hadn’t told Mrs. Pinella that Andrew and I secretly had a dog.

  Until now I had Wendy pegged as the most selfish kid in the world but here she was, knitting as fast as she could to help the homeless cats be more comfortable. Maybe I’d relent and tell Andrew that Wendy could come bowling with us the next time we went. If Wendy could change and become a kid who helped homeless animals, I could change my mind about letting her hang out with Andrew and me. Assuming, that is, that Andrew wanted to keep hanging out with me.

  With my thoughts focused on Wendy, I wasn’t paying attention to how far I’d gone, and I didn’t hear the car approach. It wasn’t until it stopped beside me that I glanced from the sidewalk to the curb and saw the mottled blue clunker.

  Mean Man Myers sat behind the wheel.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  I pulled in the leash so Ra was right beside me as I turned around. I walked faster, watching the car out of the corner of my eye. It rolled slowly down the street, keeping even with Ra and me.

  I started to jog.

  The car kept pace. Every few steps, I glanced at it, making sure the driver stayed inside. I had intended to stay in my own yard. How could I have come so far?

  Mean Man Myers leaned toward the open window and said, “I came for my watchdog. You can put him in the backseat.”

  Ra growled when he heard the voice.

  I kicked into gear and sprinted toward home as fast as I could run.

  The car drove along beside me, belching exhaust fumes. Mr. Myers hollered, “You can’t get away from me, boy. You stole my watchdog and if you don’t give him back, I’ll do more than ask politely. I’ll take him!”

  I kept running. My feet pounded on the sidewalk so hard that jolts shot up my legs. Ra loped beside me. He kept looking at the car with his ears flat. Once he barked but mostly he growled low in his throat.

  I could see my house ahead. I wondered if any of my neighbors were home. Should I yell for help?

  The blue car rolled along the curb next to me. “You hear me, boy? You don’t give me my watchdog back, you’re going to wish you had!”

  I stopped running and faced Mean Man Myers. “The Humane Society took custody of Ra,” I said, “because you didn’t take care of him. They placed Ra with us and my mom is his foster parent. He is not legally your dog anymore and you have no claim on him.”

  “Is that so?” His eyes had a wild, unfocused look. “Well, I don’t care what the Humane Society or anybody else says. I bought that dog fair and square, and he’s my property. I don’t take kindly to people who steal someone else’s dog.” He opened his door, stepped out into the street, and came toward me around the front of his car. He looked bigger up close than he had when he was sitting down. “If you keep that dog,” he said, “someone’s going to get hurt, and it won’t be me.”

  I shot forward again. We were only a few houses from home now. Even if he chased us, I thought we could outrun him.

  Mr. Myers didn’t chase us. Instead he climbed back in his car, stomped on the accelerator, sped past us, then turned and drove up over the curb so that his car blocked the sidewalk. I had to run into the street to get around it. As I raced around the back of his car, he leaped out.

  He was too close. I could tell I wasn’t going to make it past him, so instead of continuing around the car I ran across the street and started up the front path to Mr. Conway’s house. “Help!” I yelled.

  Mr. Myers was too fast for me. He lunged forward and ripped Ra’s leash out of my hand.

  “Help!!”

  Mean Man Myers gripped the leash in one hand and opened the passenger side door of his car with the other. He tried to make Ra get in.

  Ra growled louder. The hair on the back of his neck stood on end, and his legs stiffened.

  “Get in there,” Mr. Myers said as he shoved Ra.

  Ra refused to jump into the car.

  “You’ll get arrested if you take him,” I said. “You’ll be put in prison.”

  “They can’t lock me up for claiming what’s mine.”

  He leaned over, grabbed Ra around the neck, and tried to force him into the car. Ra bit him on the arm.

  Mean Man Myers yelped, raised his arm to his mouth, and dropped the leash.

  Ra took off down the street, with the red leash clunking along behind him. I hoped he would run home, but he galloped right past my house and kept going.

  “Ra!” I yelled as I chased after him. “Come! Here, Ra! Come!”

  But Ra seemed to have forgotten my efforts to teach him to come when called. He raced to the corner, turned, and vanished from my sight.

  “Ra!” I shouted. “Come back!”

  “You’ll regret this, boy!” shouted Mr. Myers. “If you had given me my property when I asked, I wouldn’t be on my way to the hospital; I’d be going home with my watchdog.”

  I ignored him. He wasn’t hurt too badly if he could stand around yelling at me.

  I knew I couldn’t catch Ra on foot. I ran up our driveway, hoping Mr. Myers didn’t come after me, and dashed along the walkway to the front door, relieved to see lights in the kitchen. Mom was home. We could take the car to search for Ra.

  I pounded on the door with one hand and fumbled in my pocket for my key with the other, expecting to feel a hand on my back at any moment. Mom opened the door before I could get it unlocked.

  I rushed inside, pulled the door shut behind us, and locked it.

  “Rusty! What’s wrong?”

  “Ra is gone.” I panted. “I was walking him, and Mr. Myers came and tried to take him. He grabbed the leash and tried to force Ra into his car. Ra bit him, and he dropped the leash, and Ra ran away. We have to go look for him!”

  Mom rushed to the living room window and looked out. The blue car was idling in front of our house. Mean Man Meyers sat in it, staring toward our door.

  “We can’t leave the house while he’s out there waiting for us,” Mom said.

  She turned off the TV news and called 911.

  Hurry, I thought. Ra is running farther away every minute. He could get hit by a car. He could get lost.

  Mom made sure all the doors were locked and then we went upstairs to wait for the police. We stood on either side of my bedroom window and peered out.

  Mr. Myers was gone. A new fear rose to the surface of my mind: Mean Man Myers could drive around and find Ra. He could still take him. Or he might be so angry that he would purposely hit Ra with his car.

  “We have to go look for Ra,” I said.

  “We need to wait for the police,” Mom said.

  “I’ll go by myself. I can ride my bike.”

  “No. You’re not going alone.”

  By the way she said it,
I knew there was no point in arguing. The truth was, I didn’t much want to ride around the neighborhood alone right then, anyway.

  The same officer who had responded when the house was broken into came again this time. Mom explained what had happened and then the officer had me tell everything myself.

  “You may have to get a restraining order against him,” the officer said. “Meanwhile, if you find your dog, I wouldn’t take him out of your own yard until this case is settled.”

  Mom gave me her I told you not to go out alone look and I knew I had it coming. Ra had needed to go out and then, once we were outside, I kept walking the same as I always did. What a bozo. I couldn’t even think of a threesome bad enough to describe myself.

  After the police officer left, I expected Mom to chew me out but she didn’t.

  Instead she said, “Let’s go.”

  We drove slowly up and down the streets, going farther and farther from home. I kept my window down and called, “Ra! Here, Ra!” We did not see him.

  When it was too dark to see beyond the headlights, Mom said, “I’m going home, Rusty. We both need dinner. Maybe Ra will come home on his own. If not, we’ll look for him again tomorrow.”

  I looked hopefully at the front door as we pulled into the driveway, but there wasn’t any dog waiting for us. He wasn’t at the back door, either.

  While Mom fixed our dinner, I called Andrew and told him Ra was lost.

  “We should make some flyers, with Ra’s picture on them,” Andrew said. “We can put them in store windows. I’ll put a Lost Dog notice on Craigslist right away. If he hasn’t come home by the time we get out of school tomorrow, I’ll help you with flyers. We can use Dad’s color copier.”