“If he makes a sound,” Bernie said, speaking real low, “or looks like he’s going to, whack him with this.”
“I don’t know if I can do that, Bernie,” Suzie whispered.
Bernie smiled, a quick little smile. “Then just wave it at him.” He turned to me. “Ready?”
What a question! We hurried into the lodge, Bernie in a sort of half run he has when we have to be quiet, me in a trot, although I can be quiet at any speed. I pulled slightly in front, which in low-light situations usually gave us better results. We went up the wide, lopsided staircase—no railings, but railings didn’t mean much to me, and came to the next floor.
A broad sort of gallery spread into the gloom in both directions. But not quite as gloomy in one of them: faint light glowed from around a distant corner. We headed that way, side by side, silent partners. Hey! I’d heard that expression so many times and now I understood it. And what a great expression it turned out to be! The silent partners crossed the gallery, entered a hall, came to the corner where the light showed, and peeked around it.
Around the corner, the hall narrowed to a corridor that ended at a half-open door, which was where the light was leaking from. And also voices.
One was Mack’s: “Hurry it up.”
And then the other deputy, Claudie: “We have to tie him up?”
Mack said, “Just do it.”
And after that, a new voice, one I’d never heard, the voice of a kid: “Where are you taking me?”
I heard Bernie inhale a sharp little breath and at the same time my fur rose up from the back of my neck to the tip of my tail. We crept along the corridor, quiet and controlled, but I could hear Bernie’s pounding heart, and mine, too. What was our plan? I didn’t worry about that the slightest bit.
We reached the doorway, most of our view blocked by the door. I saw part of a small room, a gas lantern standing on a table, a backpack lying at the foot of a metal bed frame with just a bare mattress, and sitting on that mattress: a kid, and not just a kid, but the missing kid, Devin. I recognized him from Anya’s photo, although his face seemed thinner than I remembered, and he also looked older.
Devin had his eyes on something across the room, where we couldn’t see. Claudie, wearing a black Halloween mask, came in view, a roll of duct tape in his hand. Halloween is the only human holiday I can do without. In fact, I hate it. And all of a sudden that hatred surged through me. I saw red, whether I can do that or not.
Claudie tore off a strip of duct tape, and said, “Stick out your hands.”
Devin wriggled back against the wall. “Don’t,” he said.
“Do what I fuckin’ tole you,” Claudie said and he raised his hand like he was about to clip the boy.
A bit of a blur after that. Bernie hit that door so hard it sagged off its hinges. The looks on the faces of those deputies!
Bernie drew the sheriff’s gun. “You move, you die,” he said.
For some reason, they both moved. Claudie clutched at Devin, at the same time going for his gun.
BLAM! Bernie fired, a huge sound in the small room. I was aware of Claudie crying out after that, but then I got busy with Mack.
He’d been sitting in a chair, trying to sip coffee under his bandanna, but now the cup was in midair, coffee slopping over the rim, and he was rising, hand reaching for the gun on his hip. His fingers closed around the butt at about the same moment my mouth closed around his wrist. My jaws are strong. I let Mack know just how strong. He screamed and dropped the gun, tried to wrench his arm free, tried kicking me, tried everything, and ended up flat on his back with me standing over him, teeth at his throat, his bandanna ripped off and possibly a bit bloody. How fiercely I growled, actually thrilling myself, and if I was letting my teeth break through Mack’s skin a bit, that real thin skin at the human throat, well, no one’s perfect.
“Don’t let it kill me,” he cried. “Don’t let it kill me.”
“Him,” said Bernie, and then came a hard and heavy thump and Claudie landed beside Mack on the floor. Claudie’s shoulder was bleeding, but there was way too much moaning for the amount of blood, in my opinion.
“Real good job, Chet,” said Bernie, standing behind me. “That’s enough. That’s enough, now. Really—plenty and then some. Let’s not gild the lily. Okay, that’ll do it. Chet? Big guy?”
All right, all right, I got the message, although that lily part was baffling. I let go of Mack, backed up half a step, or just about.
We stood over the deputies, me and Bernie. Devin was on his feet now by the bed, mouth open. Bernie still had the gun, pointed at the floor. Mack’s and Claudie’s eyes were glued to him.
“Help me find a reason not to shoot you,” Bernie said.
At that moment they both pissed themselves, no hiding that kind of detail from me. Mack took a deep breath, twisted his head toward the window, and shouted: “Sheriff! Sheriff!”
“Dream on,” Bernie said. Mack went quiet. Claudie kept on moaning, the bleeding down to a slow trickle, hardly noticeable. We’d dealt with plenty of perps tougher than Claudie.
“It’s all over,” Bernie said. “Either of you smart enough to realize that? Now is where one lucky guy gets to try for a deal, just one and only now.”
“What do you want to know?” Claudie said.
Mack turned to him. “Shut your yap.”
“Chet?” Bernie said.
I went closer to Mack, stuck my face right in his. He cringed and tried to writhe away.
“Freeze,” said Bernie.
Mack froze.
“What I want to know, Claudie,” Bernie began, “is who killed Turk—”
“The sheriff, I swear—”
“And who—” Bernie cut himself off. He glanced at Devin.
“You okay, Devin?”
Devin nodded, a very small movement. Did he look okay? I didn’t know. He wasn’t crying or anything like that, and I saw no marks on him.
“Come over here a sec,” Bernie said.
Devin came over. He wore shorts and a T-shirt; his eyes were blue, like Anya’s, but not so bright, and there were deep dark patches under them. Was he supposed to be fat? More like a bit pudgy, to my way of thinking, with a nice strong chest. I liked him right away.
“My name’s Bernie. This is Chet. Your mom asked us to find you, and now we’re going to take you back to her. Okay?”
Devin nodded, a little more vigorously this time.
“First, there’s something you can do for us. See that duct tape? Cut off some strips about yo big.”
Devin cut off some yo-big strips. I kept watch on Mack and Claudie. So did Bernie. He wanted to do something real bad to them: I could feel it.
Devin came over with the strips. “Good job,” Bernie said. He held out the gun. “Ever fired one of these before?”
Devin shook his head.
“There’s a first time for everything,” Bernie said.
“Jesus Christ,” said the deputies, both of them. They were trembling now.
Devin took the gun, real carefully. “Go stand by the door,” Bernie told him. “Keep us covered.”
Devin stood by the door.
“Maybe better if you just point it down at the floor for now,” Bernie said.
Then Bernie got to work with the duct tape. Did we need Devin to cover us? Not at all: covering was one of my specialties. But for some reason I didn’t mind, just this once.
Bernie started with Mack, duct-taping his arms behind his back from the shoulders down to the tips of his fingers, and then taping his legs together from above the knees to the ankles. Same thing to Claudie. Claudie made some noises, and Bernie told him to zip it. He zipped it.
After that—and this was one of those nice Bernie touches— he lay them on their sides, back to back, and wound duct tape around their two necks, round and round so they were taped together. You don’t see that every day.
He rose. “Thanks, Devin.” Bernie took the gun. “There’s a very nice woman named Suzie waiting
outside. How about you going down with Chet while I say good-bye to these gentlemen?”
“Okay,” said Devin.
“But first I want you to look at something.” Bernie pointed toward the pool of piss on the floor. “Whenever you think about all this, remember that part, too.”
Devin looked. “Okay,” he said.
I walked over beside him and wagged my tail. Bernie gave him Mack’s flashlight. We went downstairs. I had the boy, right there beside me.
THIRTY-TWO
Devin and I walked out of the old hunting lodge, me keeping real close to him. I led him past the sheriff’s cruiser—passenger door open so the inside light was on as well as those little front lights, nice and bright outside—and over to the bushes. The sheriff lay on the ground where we’d left him and Suzie stood nearby, holding the nightstick by the middle, not how it’s done.
The sheriff’s eyes were open and he was saying something like, “… got it all wrong.” He shut up when I gave him a long look, my face almost within touching distance of his. The sheriff had pissed himself, too? This was turning out to be quite an evening.
Suzie came toward us. “Devin?” she said.
“Are you Suzie?” he said. “I’m supposed to wait with you.”
Suzie gazed at him. The look on her face at that moment: hard to describe. Let’s just mention again that Suzie was a gem, and it all came from deep inside her. She held out her free hand, very steady in the space between them. After a bit of a pause, Devin took it. She—how would you put this?—kind of reeled the boy in, slow and gentle. Suzie hugged Devin, not the tight squeezing kind, but just a nice hug. From where I was, I could see his face, eyes open and staring.
“We’re going to get you to your mom as fast as we can,” Suzie said.
Devin’s eyes closed. His arms reached up and circled around Suzie’s back.
Bernie came outside, Devin’s pack in one hand, the gun in his belt, and a hard look on his face.
“Everything under control?” he said.
Well, of course! Controlling them after the cuffs were on wasn’t much of a challenge.
“And you, Bernie?” Suzie said. “What was that shooting?”
“No casualties,” Bernie said. “All secure.”
The sheriff’s eyes shifted.
Bernie gave him a quick glance, the sort of glance you might give to a not-living thing. “Looking at a double murderer here,” he said. He popped the trunk of the black-and-white, bent down, grabbed Sheriff Laidlaw, and hauled him to his feet, not gently.
“Whose idea was wiring my car?” Bernie said.
Sheriff Laidlaw did not reply. His mouth made a funny little movement, like … like he was thinking of spitting in Bernie’s face. I’d seen that once before and won’t describe what happened after. But in this case, no spit flew, the sheriff maybe changing his mind.
“Nothing to say?” Bernie said. “Makes sense—you have no cards.” He picked up the sheriff’s hat, crammed it on his head, and slung the sheriff in the trunk and slammed it shut. Then he turned to Devin. “Did they feed you all right? Hungry or thirsty?”
“I’m a bit thirsty,” Devin said.
“Any water, Suzie?” said Bernie.
She moved toward her pack, lying by the bushes. Out of the blue, I was suddenly kind of thirsty myself, but at that moment, from over by those bushes, came wafting that strange locker-room-laundry-hamper scent. I sniffed my way over there, and kept sniffing, the scent growing stronger and stronger. It’s possible Bernie spoke, saying something like, “Chet? Chet?” but it’s not for sure. Very soon I found myself all the way around the back of the hunting lodge, following the scent toward a falling-down shed, a crooked shape in the darkness. But not complete darkness, on account of the moon, or a slice of it—don’t ask me what’s going on with that—rising in the night. And what was this? Two sort of chubby little figures seemed to be playing near the shed, bumping into each other, falling down, running around, that kind of thing. It looked like fun. I went closer and saw they were … wow! Bears! More specifically bear cubs, which I knew from Animal Planet.
What a time they were having! Who wouldn’t have wanted to join in? Once Bernie had said something about what we’d do if we ever stumbled upon bear cubs. Was it play with them? While I was trying to remember, I trotted a bit closer. They heard me, turned, went still. They looked at me. I looked at them and wagged my tail. Friendly little guys, no doubt about it. I took a few more steps and gave the nearest one a friendly bump, the kind that said, you can give me a friendly bump back. And maybe the little guy was about to do that, but before he got the chance, an enormous figure shot straight up behind the bear cubs, and it came to me: The mother bear will be close by. Do not get between the mother bear and her cubs.
Yes, this was the mother bear. She had her mouth open: the size of her teeth! And her front paws were raised high: the claws on them! The moonlight gleamed on all those huge sharp things, teeth and claws. But the truth was I didn’t happen to be between her and the cubs—I was on the other side of them—so no reason for alarm on her part. I barked to let her know just that.
The message didn’t get through. The next moment she roared—a roar unlike any I’ve ever heard, deep and loud and growly and—I don’t want to admit it—scary. I barked my loudest, making my no-reason-for-alarm point as strongly as I could. She roared again, kicking it up another notch to a notch I don’t have, also sending waves of locker-room-laundry-hamper scent my way, and then she charged. There are times, hardly any, when booking is the best policy. I booked.
Booked my very fastest, wheeling around and racing back in the direction of the lodge. When I came to the corner, I glanced back and there she was, bounding after me and maybe even closing the distance—how was that possible?—her eyes mad with fury. I picked up the pace, hit a speed of faster than my very fastest, skidded around to the front of the lodge and dashed for the car.
There it was, Devin already sitting in front, Suzie in the back, Bernie standing by the open driver’s-side door. I dove right in, landing somewhere in back.
“Chet? What the hell?” And then Bernie saw. He dove in, too, backed the cruiser in a wild fishtailing turn and zoomed down the lane. The mother bear chased us halfway to the track that led out of Jackrabbit Junction.
When we reached the track, Bernie glanced one more time in the rearview mirror and stopped the car.
“Everybody okay?” he said. He glanced back. “Chet? Could you get off Suzie, please?”
“It’s all right,” Suzie said. “I think he’s had a fright.”
Whoa. What a suggestion. I moved as far as possible from Suzie, sat straight and still, got the panting under control. Fright was not part of my world, amigo.
We were back in the spot where Miss Rendell had dropped us—at the top of the crest where the track started zigzagging down toward Durango, its distant glow even more apparent to me than before—but now we had our own wheels, namely this black-and-white. That was how things went down in our business: we rolled with the punches.
“Headed for home?” Suzie said.
“Soon as we finish up,” Bernie said.
What did that mean? I wasn’t sure, but if Bernie said there was finishing up to do, then that was that. He put the car in gear, and just as he did, lights appeared, bobbing slowly up the track from Jackrabbit Junction.
“Still got that flashlight, Devin?” Bernie said.
Devin handed Bernie the flashlight. Bernie got out of the car, switched on the flashlight, and set it down in the lane, the beam pointing in the direction of the hunting lodge. He got back in the car.
“Civic duty,” he said.
“Helping the FBI?” said Suzie.
Bernie laughed. Suzie smiled and touched the back of Bernie’s neck through that little gap under the headrest. We started bumping our way down the ridge.
I’d been on bad roads before—and also on no roads at all—but this road was almost worse than no road, if that made any se
nse. It got no better when we came down off the ridge, pothole after pothole, streams streaming across it every now and then, and once Bernie and I had to get out and drag away a whole tree. But eventually, down lower, it started to smooth out a bit. It seemed almost quiet, and not long after the beginning of the almost-quiet period, Devin spoke up.
“What happened to me?” he said.
It went still in the car. Suzie’s eyes seemed very liquid in the darkness.
“How about you tell us what you remember?” Bernie said, his voice not particularly soft and gentle—what I’d expected—but more businesslike. “I’ll try to fill in the blanks.”
“Okay,” said Devin. Then came a long silence. The moon was rising in the sky and stars were shining all over it. Otherwise: darkness everywhere, and rough country gliding by outside my window. After a while, Devin said, “Where do you want me to start?”
“Stiller’s Creek,” Bernie said. “Where you all camped that last night.”
“You want to hear about pitching the tent, getting all set up?”
“Sure.”
“Um. We pitched the tent and Turk built a fire and we had these Spam burgers and then it was dark … so that’s about all.”
“You bedded down for the night?”
“Uh-huh,” said Devin. There was another long silence. Some silences are just no sound happening. Others are like something heavy is in the room. This was one of those. It got heavier and heavier, and then Devin said, “I … uh, didn’t feel like sleeping in the tent.”
“No?” said Bernie.
“It gets kind of crowded,” Devin said. Another silence, but not so long. “And it’s nice under the stars.”
“Right about that,” Bernie said.
“So anyway I took my sleeping bag outside and went to sleep,” Devin said. “Turk sleeps under the stars, too—I forgot to mention that. He was over by the fire pit. But he woke me up during the night. And he said, ‘Hey, did I want some Coke.’ I sat up and he had this Coke. We hadn’t had any Coke on the trip—there’s no Coke at camp, no sweet drinks at all. So I said yeah.”
The Dog Who Knew Too Much Page 25