The haunted hound;

by Robb White

  ''A while anyway."

  "So I guess ril have to go back home now."

  Judy jerked around in the saddle to look at him. Then, her shoulders slumping, she said, ''I guess so, Jonathan."

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  he Little Bird had taken Mr. Worth to the hospital in the pickup truck and Judy's mother was waiting for them with the jeep.

  While Judy took care of the fox and the horses, Jonathan got cleaned up. Then they all got into the jeep. Pot Likker tried to get in, too, and Jonathan had to push him down. 'Til be right back. Pot,'' he told him. ''You stay here. Tm not leaving you, boy. Don't you worry."

  As the jeep pulled away Jonathan looked back and saw Pot Likker standing in the road. He looked forlorn.

  In the hospital, Mr. Worth was lying propped up in bed. He smiled a little when they came in.

  ''Dang doctor says I've got to stay here for a week," he growled. "A week! Don't see why I can't go on home now."

  "Dan," the Little Bird said.

  "Well, dang it." Then he smiled at Jonathan. "Doc says you did some nice slicing on my leg. But right now I wish you'd gone ahead and cut it off. Look at the doggone thing." Mr. Worth pulled the sheet back.

  Jonathan was shocked. Mr. Worth's leg had swollen until it was enormous. Just to look at it made Jonathan hurt all over.

  "How do you feel?'' Jonathan asked.

  'Toolish/' Mr. Worth declared. ''Here I am, forty years old and lived around rattlesnakes all my life. So I go and let one plug me. But I tell you what Tm going to do if the Little Bird will ever let me get out of here. Tm going to get two pieces of stovepipe and wear them on my legs the next time I go around rattlesnakes. Then let one of them rear back and hit me. Ping! Those stovepipes will break his danged tushes for him."

  ''Dan/' the Little Bird said. "The doctor told you to keep quiet."

  Mr. Worth nodded but went right on. "Did Pot Likker trail that fox all the way?"

  "Most of it," Judy said. "We rode to meet him."

  "First thing I do when I get out of here is take you all to a real fox race so Pot Likker can tell 'em all about it."

  ''Dan," the Little Bird said.

  "Come on, kids," Judy's mother said, laughing. "You just lie there and keep quiet, Dan," she ordered. "It'll do you a world of good."

  "Aw, shucks," Mr. Worth objected. "Listen, Jonathan, if your dad will let you, I want you to stay with the Little Bird w^hile I'm in this danged place. Keep her company."

  "All right," Jonathan said.

  Back at the jeep Jonathan said, "I believe I'll go around

  and tell Dad what's happened. He can drive me back all right."

  Judy's mother said, 'Til drive you there/'

  In the jeep again, Jonathan said, "You tell Pot Likker ril be right back, will vou, Judy?"

  "All right."

  "If you have to go to your house, tell him to wait."

  By the time they got to the apartment it was fi'e o'clock. Jonathan said good-by and watched the jeep drive away.

  When he opened the door of the apartment and looked in it seemed curiously strange. He recognized everything, but it no longer looked like home to him.

  Nobody was there. Not even Mamie. There wasn't any supper in the oven or any sign that his father was going to eat there. Jonathan got his toothbrush off the top of the refrigerator and went into his father's den.

  No one answered the phone at his father's office and suddenly he remembered that it was Sunday.

  Jonathan felt foolish. He could've called up the apartment from the hospital and found out all this. And he could have gone on back with Judy and her mother.

  For a moment he stood in the middle of the living room, thinking.

  Maybe Mr. Duncan was down in the freight yards.

  Jonathan locked the apartment and hurried out. It was going to be dark in a little while, so he spent fifty cents on a taxi to take him to the yards.

  Mr. Duncan was standing beside his engine with a long-spouted oilcan. "Hi, Jonathan/' he said.

  ''Whew!'' Jonathan said. ''Hello, Mr. Duncan. Are you going past the Farm tonight?"

  Mr. Duncan looked at his watch. "I leave here in precisely eighteen minutes, provided the engine will run and the crew shows up."

  "Can I ride with you?"

  "Sure." Mr. Duncan climbed up into the cab of the engine and put the oilcan in a rack.

  Jonathan climbed up, too, and told Mr. Duncan what had happened to Mr. Worth.

  They talked about that for a while, then Mr. Duncan said, "You and Judy really stirred up a row last night on Widow's Hill. Every one of those fox hunters claimed that that beautiful voice was his own hound's. And, secretly, don't a one of 'em really know whose hound it was."

  Jonathan felt warm with pride.

  "I tell you, Jonathan, you've got to sneak old Pot Likker in there again tomorrow night. They've got a big race coming up."

  Jonathan shook his head. "I couldn't, without Mr. Worth."

  "You got to do it, Jonathan," Mr. Duncan insisted. "A man from Georgia is bringing over some Walker hounds. They'd show old Pot Likker how to run a race."

  Jonathan bristled. "Pot Likker can outrun any hound in Georgia."

  ''Maybe. Slip him in, Jonathan. You and Judy. I tell you what ril do. If you'll run old Pot, Til take both trips tomorrow night, ril take you out to Widow's Hill and then Til bring the other train back so's I can pick you up. And, by goll\ if the race isn't over when I get there Til stop and wait for you."

  Jonathan was scared, but at the same time he wanted to hear Pot Likker run with a pack again. 'Til have to find out/' he decided. "I'll let you know tomorrow when you come by."

  "All right," Mr. Duncan said. Then he looked at his \atch and yanked the whistle cord.

  By train time the next night everything had been settled. But not the way Jonathan wanted it.

  In the first place, Judy couldn't go. Her mother was taking her to Jacksonville to see about her teeth. "I might even have to wear braces," she wailed.

  Then Mrs. Worth was planning to go into town to see her husband.

  And Judy's mother had telephoned a man she knew and gotten permission for Jonathan to enter Pot Likker in the race. She had also arranged for the man to look out for Jonathan.

  Jonathan almost didn't want to go, especially without Judy or Mr. Worth, but everybody had gone to so much trouble about it that he practically had to.

  Mr. Duncan slowed the train for him and he swung up

  into the caboose. Then Pot Likker came, making that long leap all the way from the cinders to the floor of the caboose. Dollar Bill was glad to see them.

  By the time the train slowed near Widow's Hill it was pitch dark. Jonathan and Pot Likker got out and climbed the fence.

  Pot Likker must have known what was going to happen for he was excited and tense.

  When Jonathan got close to where the cars and horses were, he slowed down. He was supposed to find a Mr. Sedgwick and arrange with him about putting Pot Likker in the race.

  Jonathan caught Pot Likker and tied him to a tree. 'Tou stay here and keep quiet, Pot Likker. Til go find Mr. Sedgwick, then ril come back.''

  There were many more men this time than there had been before and they were all busy either talking to each other or keeping the hounds together. Jonathan began to feel out of place and shy. He was the only boy there and they were all acting so busy and grown up. He wandered around among them, hoping somebody would call Mr. Sedgwick by name, but nobody did.

  Suddenly Jonathan made up his mind. After all, he argued, he would only be a nuisance to Mr. Sedgwick. There was no use bothering him. As soon as the race got started he could let Pot Likker go just the way he and Judy had.

  There was another reason, too. He was a little afraid that Pot Likker wouldn't be able to run with the hounds the man

  was bringing from Georgia. Mr. Duncan had said they were the fastest hounds in the world. Jonathan just didn't want all those men to know about Pot Likker.

&nbs
p; Jonathan sneaked back and untied Pot Likker. ''We'll stay bv ourselves, Pot," he told him. ''No use getting all messed up with so many."

  Pot Likker just shivered.

  "There're some hounds from Georgia here. Walkers. They're hsty Pot Likker. But don't you bother about them. You just strike and run."

  The men were beginning to go up Widow's Hill. Jonathan hugged Pot Likker one more time. "This is a big race. Pot. You run it right, hear? Don't speak until you're sure. But when you are, tell 'em. Pot."

  The dog was trembling all o'er when Jonathan at last let him go.

  The men had already built the fire by the time he got there. There were so many men that some had to stand up. He spotted the senator's white hair and he could tell which one was the man from Georgia by the way he talked.

  Jonathan settled with his back against the pine tree and waited.

  Over around the fire he heard som.e men arguing. "I tell you," one man said, "that mouth we heard Saturday night didn't belong to any hound we saw when thev treed that fox. I've heard ever- one of these hounds and not one of 'em eer had a tongue like that."

  A man laughed. "Just a ghost dog, Charhe?''

  ''CouldVe been," the man said, serious. ''Because no hound is going to just walk away from a treed fox."

  "And I guess that was a ghost horn we heard a-blowing?"

  The man was more serious. "You know that no hound can be horned away when he's got fox scent strong in his nose."

  Jonathan wanted to go over there. He wanted to stand and say, "Mister, my dog Pot Likker comes when I call him. IVe got a good dog." But he stayed against the tree.

  "It was a ghost horn, too," the man said. "It was the voices of all the great hounds that are dead now, and the horn was the cry of all the gone hunters."

  The other man was serious now, too. "Maybe so, Charlie," he said quietly. Then he turned to the man from Georgia. "If that hound we were talking about was here tonight, mister, those Walkers of yours wouldn't get in the race. But you wouldn't care, mister. The music that dog made would cause you to forget every other dog you ever heard."

  The man from Georgia laughed. "Good thing he isn't here. I'm kind of partial to those hounds of mine."

  A hound giving tongue cut off the talk like a knife.

  There was nothing else in the world like it. It came booming up out of the big chest and went rolling, filling up everything around there. The men around the fire forgot the pipes in their mouths and sat as though they were growing there, listening to Pot Likker speak to the line.

  caboose. The brakeman kept saying how sorry he was for holding the lantern too low, but Jonathan hardly heard him.

  Then, in the late night, Mr. Duncan drove him to the apartment.

  Jonathan turned the key in the lock and slowly pushed the door open. No lights were on so he turned some on and went up the stairs to his father's bedroom. At the door he knocked, but when no one answered, he opened the door and went into the dark room.

  "Dad,'' he said softly. ''Dad."

  He knew then that no one was there, but he turned on the light anyway. The bed was still made up.

  Jonathan slowly leaned back against the wall while the world fell down on him.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Jonathan didn't know how long ^^ ^ lJ he had been walking along the

  lonely moon-white road. A long time ago he had stopped trying to hitch a ride because the cars just swerved far around him and went on.

  It didn't make much difference how long it had been. Nothing made any difference to him. Somewhere, far down the long road, the Farm was lying under the moon, the big house empty and silent. A good place, he thought, for him. There, he might be able to cry some; might be able to get over this feeling he had.

  It surprised him when the truck stopped, brakes sighing in the darkness. It was a huge truck—tractor-trailer rig— and lit up like a Christmas tree. The driver leaned out of the high window and said, ''Want a lift?''

  'Thanks,'' Jonathan said, climbing up into the seat.

  "Where you going, kid?" the driver asked, shifting the gears silently and getting the truck rolling again.

  "Just down the road a few miles."

  "Shucks," the driver said. "Wish you were going some-

  where. I get lonesome in here all by myself/'

  *'No, just a few miles/' Jonathan said. 'Til show you.''

  The truck went fast. Jonathan watched the speedometer needle go up as high as seventy on the down grades, and it cruised at around sixty all the time.

  At the Farm, Jonathan thanked the truck driver and got do\n. The dry smell of Diesel exhaust swept around him as the truck ground away.

  At last Jonathan could see the house among the pines. As he walked slowly toward it, his feet dragging, his arms limp at his sides, he knew that soon the death of Pot Likker was going to hit him. It was going to knock him down. It was going to be terrible.

  He thought for a moment of just sitting down in the moonlight on the wide porch steps, but then he changed his mind. He wanted to go inside the house. He still had the key, he remembered.

  He worked the key the wrong way the first time and had to unlock it all over again. At last the tall grav door swung open, letting the moonlight flow down the empty hall all the way to where the staircase started curving upward.

  Jonathan could feel his grief coming closer and closer with each slow step he took.

  The moonlight made the bare floor look almost as though there was snow on it. Because of this it was a long time before Jonathan noticed the slit of yellow light under the library door. When at last he did see it, he stopped short, staring at it.

  27^

  I

  There was something in the hbrary making hght. For an instant Jonathan was scared, thinking of burglars, then he reasoned that burglars would not make a steady light like that.

  It must be Judy, he thought. For some reason she was here in the house.

  Jonathan walked on slowly to the door. It swung open silently and he saw one of the eandles Judy had left for him. It was in a saucer on top of the desk.

  The light of the candle was feeble, for moonlight streamed through the tall windows, filling the whole room with its paleness.

  When Jonathan looked past the candle, he saw a man standing in front of the empty fireplace, his back to him.

  ''Dad,'' Jonathan said.

  His father turned around.

  Then something broke inside Jonathan. Like a dam or a storm which he could not control. With his hands over his face he stumbled forward toward his father.

  Hands caught his shoulders, steadying him, and Jonathan dropped his own hands to his sides. 'Tot Likker's dead,'' he said.

  "No!"

  "The train ran over him."

  The hands on his shoulders were strong and gentle, too, and he leaned a little against them.

  "Oh, son," his father said quietly, "I'm sorry."

  Another storm of crying swept Jonathan and passed. "He

  won the last race he ran, though/' Jonathan said, memory of Pot Likker's voice warm in him.

  ''I heard him/' his father said.

  Jonathan looked up at his face.

  "I was on W^idow's Hill/' his father said. ''I saw you behind your tree, son/'

  ''Did you?"

  'Tot Likker ran a race that will be remembered for a long, long time. He was a great hound, Jonathan, and for him to love you is a thing you can always be proud of."

  "I will be/' Jonathan said. Then, slowly, he raised his head and looked at his father's face, clear in the moonlight. ''I guess he had to die, didn't he?"

  ^'What?"

  ''As long as he lived there wasn't anything I could do but take care of him, was there?"

  ''No, son, there wasn't. It took me a long time to understand that, but I do now."

  "Now that he's dead it doesn't make any difference where I live any more. Nothing makes any difference."

  His father's hands tightened for a moment on his shoulders
, then dropped away. "It's late," his father said. "Will you come back to the apartment with me, son?"

  Jonathan nodded. Then he turned and walked back toward the door.

  His father followed him, picking up the candle as he came. "Can you help me in the morning?" his father asked behind him.

  "Yes. What do you want me to do?"

  "Help move. The vans are coming in the morning."

  "Move where?"

  "Here," his father said.

  Jonathan spun around.

  His father was smiling a little, the candlelight flickering on his face.

  "Really, Dad? Really?"

  His father nodded. "You were right, son. Memories don't just wait for you to find them in these woods and fields and

  in this house. Memories are only in your mind. I wish Vd found that out a long time ago.''

  ''You won't be sad here?" Jonathan asked.

  ''No, son. We'll both be happy here."

  "Will Mamie come, too?"

  His father laughed. "She's already packed and ready."

  Jonathan turned toward the front door, but his father said, "Wait a minute, son, I want to check the kitchen."

  Jonathan followed him to the kitchen. When he opened the door, Jonathan heard something stir.

  Then the candlelight fell on a dog lying beside the stove. She was a Trombo hound and around her there were five little puppies. They were all black and white.

  "This is our dog Maude, son," his father said. "Who do the pups look like?"

  The storm broke in Jonathan again as he wailed, "Pot Likker!"

  "He's their father. So he isn't really dead, son. Like Blue Moon and Blue Streak, who live in Mister Blue, Pot Likker lives in these children of his."

  Jonathan went down beside Maude, rubbing her head gentl}' and touching the puppies. The hound licked his hand and wearily put her head down.

  When he stood up at last the crying was o'er, for good.