by Jon Katz
Then he heard a low, rumbling growl. He turned and tried to locate it. It came from the northeast corner of the barn, from a room he used to store tools and batteries and halters. The young soldier heard it, too. Together, they rushed toward it, kicking away the snow and stepping over the body of the frozen hen. Sam noticed fox tracks in the snow, and he was not surprised.
It took them several minutes to get to the far corner of the barn, through the debris and the snow, the overturned buckets and frozen hoses.
The door to the little storeroom had broken open. It was dark, and when the Guardsman, who was ahead of him, pulled out a flashlight, the growl became more distinct, a bit more menacing. He flashed his light around the dark room.
“Hey,” yelled the Guardsman to Sam, “I think I found your dog.”
Sam rushed up and looked over his shoulder. “That’s not Rose,” he said, his heart filling again. But he knew the dog; it was the wild dog, the dog once called Flash. He struggled to his feet, stood, and growled at them, showing his teeth, but there was no real menace in it. Sam knew he was trying to protect something.
He had a sudden memory of the dog riding around in McEachron’s battered pickup, and wondered at this creature’s long and strange journey, which had ultimately brought him here. He remembered the dog’s exhaustion after he’d helped dig Sam out of the snow. He had seen the connection between him and the normally standoffish Rose. Sam dropped to one knee, and the poor old dog nearly collapsed on the ground.
Now that he recognized Sam, he wagged his tail, whined, and offered his nose to Sam’s hand. Sam thought he looked more like a skeleton than a dog.
The Guardsman’s hand rested on the pistol in his holster, but Sam quickly stepped up and told him it was okay, leaning forward as the dog wavered. The old dog let Sam take his head in his hands.
“You’re tired and weak, old man, aren’t you?” he said softly, reassuringly. “And you’re protecting something. I bet you had a hell of a time here. Let’s have a look.” He leaned forward, and there, behind the old dog, in the glinting light from the Guardsman’s torch, he saw her.
Lying on a pile of rotting old hay was Rose. There was matted blood clotted on her neck and shoulder, and on two of her legs. Her paws were shredded and crusted in blood, her eyes closed, her body still. He couldn’t tell whether she was breathing or not.
“My dog, my poor girl,” said Sam, and he could not help himself, letting out a sob at the sight of his border collie.
The Guardsman pulled off his gloves and told Sam to wait, then ran out to retrieve his medical pack. While there, he got on his walkie-talkie and asked to be patched through to the local veterinary clinic two towns over.
Sam reached over and touched Rose, stroked her head, felt her body, which was warm, not stiff. She wasn’t conscious, but she might be alive. “What happened, girl? What happened here? Be okay—please.”
The Guardsman returned and began attending to her.
“There’s a heartbeat,” he confirmed. “She’s alive.”
He took out two syringes, injected one, a shot of adrenaline, then the other, a painkiller. He said he’d already gotten clearance to take Rose to the clinic in the chopper when it flew back past this way to pick him up. He said she needed to go, and quickly.
“She’s lost a lot of blood, and she’s very weak,” the Guardsman told Sam. “She got some awful deep wounds.” The clinic was right on the way back to their base, he said. Rose’s heartbeat was weak, but distinct. There might still be time.
The Guardsman made a litter out of feed sacks and gently lifted the dog into it. She opened her eyes at one point, her tail moved a bit when she looked up at Sam. She leaned forward as if to lick his hand, and Sam put out his one good arm to touch her. “Hey, there,” he said, softly, not wanting to excite her.
The Guardsman gave her a mild sedative shot to relax her for the chopper ride. She closed her eyes again, and for a moment Sam thought she was gone.
ROSE HEARD ONLY the breathing of the wild dog, and that only now and then.
She felt disconnected from her body. Different images had been floating through her mind—her mother, the farm, Sam, Katie, the sheep, the wild dog—in a constantly moving blur. She couldn’t focus on any one. She was swimming in a pool of darkness, deeper and blacker with each passing minute.
She felt the spirit draining from her. She was beyond exhaustion, the intervals of wakefulness growing shorter, weaker. Day and night had fused into a dank, harsh gray.
Dimly, she heard the wild dog bark and growl, and it awakened her, and then she had another dream, only this time it was of Sam’s voice, nearby, quiet and soft and gentle. And then she smelled his hand and knew he was there.
Sam had come back.
She tried to find him, to lick his hand, to wag her tail, but could not move. And she thought of the sheep, and listened for them, but could not hear them.
The painkillers were starting to take hold but she felt great pain all over her body, and then felt herself in motion, which brought on a great wave of dizziness, and then calm.
Sam had returned.
And then she slipped into the darkness.
THE TWO MEN moved her gently out the back, and it wasn’t long before they heard the whomp of the chopper returning. The pilot lowered a harness, and they hauled Rose up and secured her in it. She was clearly no longer conscious now, and both men watched as she made the same eerie ascent Sam had made. This time, he was the one to watch her go, perhaps for the last time. This time, he was the one left behind, to manage the farm on his own.
“I can’t imagine what went on here,” said the Guardsman, as curious as Sam.
The Guardsman also said he could fix up the old dog’s wounds, which didn’t seem life threatening.
They got more hay out to Brownie and the handful of surviving cows, and then brought feed to the remaining chickens. They put up some temporary boarding to keep out foxes and other predators and tossed hay over the fence of the goat pen, where the goats were all alive and calling out loudly for food.
The Guardsman brought them a bucket of water from the pump, which had finally thawed and was now running. He told Sam all three goats seemed shaken but were fine, complaining with belligerent but healthy voices.
It was the Guardsman who noticed Carol’s hooves sticking out through the snow. Sam had been looking all over for her and was not surprised to hear that she was dead. The Guardsman said it did not appear that she had been killed by coyotes, and Sam was almost grateful for that.
“Poor old girl,” Sam said to the Guardsman. “She had a rough life. I’m glad she had a few good years here. I hope she died easy.”
The Guardsman paused uneasily, but he didn’t rush Sam along.
“My father would have been horrified to see me feeding a useless donkey,” Sam said. “But I was fond of the old girl, and it was my wife, though—Katie—who really loved her. She brought her carrots every morning, and when Carol was sick and had to have medicine and hot poultices on her legs, Katie came out and played Willie Nelson for her on the boom box. She loved that donkey.”
He smiled, and looked over at what he could see of the body.
“And the donkey loved Willie Nelson. Just loved him.”
Then he walked away.
The two men climbed up to the pasture as far as they could get, though for Sam that wasn’t far. He was in dread pain, and he didn’t want to take many painkillers, as he wanted to see what had happened on the farm, and help, if possible. The Guardsman wouldn’t let him do much. He reached into one of his kits and gave Sam two pain pills. “My dad was a farmer,” he said. “We even had a border collie like yours. Look, I know you’re hurting, and nobody can tell you to take it easy. But take it easy.”
He held out a hand. “By the way, my name is Kevin,” he said.
Sam took it with his good arm. “Sam.”
Kevin hauled some hay up on a makeshift sled. The mounds of snow were over their heads in some places
, and layers of ice and crusted snow testified to the power of the wind and the cold. Sam saw where an avalanche of snow had fallen off the pole barn roof.
Almost all of the sheep were still alive, even a few weak lambs, some of them new, still trying to nurse off their exhausted and emaciated mothers. For now, Kevin gave vitamin shots to the lambs. Sam had powdered lamb’s milk in the farmhouse, which later they planned to bring out in bottles.
Kevin opened the crate where the generator was, dragged it to the barn, poured oil into it, and cranked it up. It chugged and sputtered to life, and the Guardsman hooked it up to the frost-free hydrant, and to a hose in the barn, as many of the water pipes were cracked and broken. He attached two deicers to it as well, and in a few minutes there was water in the troughs. The animals did not rush to the water, but came slowly, almost one by one, to drink.
Sam was still marveling at having found Rose alive, hoping she survived, and there was almost too much for him to take in, especially with a stranger around. He felt strange without Rose, as if the farm had lost part of its soul. He kept looking around for her, and had to remind himself that she had been taken away. The farm seemed especially desolate without her.
About half an hour later, the pilot radioed to say that Rose was in surgery at the veterinary clinic, and that her condition was “extreme.” They would do everything they could, but she had lost much blood and suffered from broken bones, bite wounds, and hypothermia.
KEVIN WAS an experienced hunter and tracker, and Sam knew every inch of the farm. Between them, the two men pored over all the ground around the pole barn, as well as the way back to the farmhouse, piecing together what they could of what had happened on the farm during the last day of the blizzard. It wasn’t much.
What astonished the Guardsman were some of the tracks he found. “They’re enormous—definitely wolf tracks. I can’t figure that part.”
Sam was skeptical. Few wolves had been seen around Granville for generations, he said, and what would one be doing on the farm in a storm? Wouldn’t it have killed Rose and the wild dog?
Kevin was baffled. He was sure they were the tracks of a single large wolf; he had seen them before out west, and there was a dead coyote with enormous teeth marks on its neck and shoulders. The wolf tracks and dog tracks ran alongside one another, suggesting the two had stood together somehow.
Kevin took out his digital camera and got some close-ups of the prints in the snow. He would send them to the state university for analysis, he said, and maybe they would give him a definitive answer.
Beyond that, both men agreed, it appeared as if Rose was injured defending the barn and the animals. They couldn’t be sure of much else. There seemed to be evidence of foxes, and of something breaking down the big barn door, perhaps a panic of the steers and cows.
Kevin carried the wild dog from the barn into the farmhouse, and put him down gently. The old dog put up no resistance. Sam brought him food and water. The Guardsman sedated him, cleaned and dressed his wounds, and gave Sam some antibiotics that were meant for humans, but which would also work on the dog.
“I think he’ll make it,” said the Guardsman.
“Yeah,” said Sam. “He’s been through a lot. But he has a home here now—if he’ll stay.” That was the least he could do for Rose, he thought.
“He’ll stay,” said Kevin. “He’s had enough.”
* * *
THE GUARDSMAN couldn’t stop talking about the wolf. The odd thing, he said, is that there were no wolf marks on any sheep, or on Rose or the wild dog, only on the coyote, which had been slaughtered quickly, a clean kill. And then the wolf seems to have left.
How could that have happened?
“He was up by the pole barn …” he said, almost to himself. “Why wouldn’t he have taken one of the sheep? Maybe he dragged one off?”
But he could find no tracks away from the spot where the coyote lay, no tracks leading in or out of the pasture. It was almost, he said, as if he came out of the sky, and left the same way.
Sam said nothing. He would need time to try to sort this out.
Kevin dug out a space around the back door, helped Sam settle into the farmhouse, and cranked up the other emergency generator they had dropped for heat, then radioed that he was ready for the helicopter to come pick him up.
When the chopper arrived, Kevin said he wished the best for Rose, and promised to come back and visit when he could. “You can call the vet and figure out how to bring her back. She’ll be there a bit, I guess, and the roads will be better by then. Good luck, sir. Take it easy, okay?”
He shook Sam’s good hand.
“Thank you,” Sam shouted over the noise of the rotor. The Guardsman was pulled up into the chopper, and it roared away.
Sam felt a wave of loneliness—for Katie, for Rose, for the farm as it was. He felt the strange absence of Rose, always there with him, always ready. He wondered if she would be coming back.
He was also glad, in a curious way, to be alone, except for the company of the old dog. He didn’t know what to make of what he and Kevin had found. He couldn’t put it together. He wasn’t old, or as set in his ways as his father. He was willing to change, to try new things, but he was still a farmer, and there was nothing in his life or experience to help him understand what might have happened.
He had always believed that dogs were dogs, and should not be seen as anything more, but now he didn’t know what to think. It seemed to him as if Rose had somehow saved most of the animals, saved the farm, and that was an idea that was simply beyond him.
He’d already heard about most of the other farms, barns wrecked, almost all of the livestock dead. That was what he expected to find here, what he had prepared himself for.
Sam returned to the house and sat down in the living room. The generator hummed outside the kitchen door, and he was glad to be back at his farm, as awful as all the damage was. He had some insurance, and the government had already promised to help the farmers knocked out by the storm, although he knew that politicians loved to make promises, and government help could be more trouble than the storm itself.
He was almost afraid to think about it. He looked down at the sleeping old dog, and felt a surge of affection for him. He was glad to have him nearby. He’d been a part of whatever had happened.
Sam prayed Rose would survive, but he didn’t dare get his hopes up. He would have trouble forgiving himself for leaving her there to face coyotes, and maybe even a wolf.
Sam was exhausted and in pain. The whole year had been draining, and he was still reeling—from the loss of Katie, the farm’s troubles, the grinding responsibilities of running it alone, and now this disaster. What else could happen? But he shook off his self-pity, like his father had always told him to do. Shake off feeling sorry for yourself, like a dog that just came in from the rain.
The sun streamed into the farmhouse through the big living room windows, stronger than ever thanks to the vast reflective whiteness of all that snow. The house itself, he saw, was intact, okay. There was no major damage inside. He was, for a moment, hopeful. He might get his life back, or at least some of it. He might even get his dog back. He prayed it was so, thinking of Rose undergoing surgery, wishing her strength and safe passage, steeling himself for the worst. He wished he had someone to talk to about it, but he didn’t. And most likely wouldn’t.
He looked down again at this equally exhausted old dog and again was surprised at the affinity he felt for him. He hadn’t wanted another dog, had always resisted the idea.
“Hey,” he said. “You have a home here if you want one.”
Flash stirred, clambered to his feet, his tail wagging, and ambled over to look at Sam. He put his forelegs on the sofa beside him, too weak to pull himself up all the way.
“I bet it’s been a long time since you slept on something soft,” Sam said, as much to himself as the dog.
With his good left arm, Sam leaned over and pulled him up. The dog sighed deeply, and sank into sleep
. He spent the night with his head in Sam’s lap.
Sam, however, kept tossing and turning, expecting Rose to come in and check on him. But she wasn’t there.
FIFTEEN
A WEEK AND A HALF AFTER ROSE WAS LIFTED OUT, SAM GOT A call from the vet saying Rose could come home. But the vet was adamant: Even if she had to be tied up or crated, Rose had to rest. And not just for days, but months. She needed quiet. She had undergone extensive surgery, blood transfusions, stitching, and bone repair. She had pins in one leg.
She had to be walked on a leash and given her pills—painkillers and antibiotics. No running, no working. Sam smiled when he heard that. Rose had never been on a leash in her life. And had never rested either that he could remember.
Like most farmers, Sam was wary of vets, and paid little attention to their recommendations. What did they know, except how to mail out bills?
But he reassured the vet—yes, he would be careful. He was too excited about getting his dog home to worry about the rest of it. After Rose was airlifted to the hospital, things had been up and down with her for several days. The doctor had been so guarded on the phone that Sam had been preparing himself for the worst.
When the day finally came, the vet said he was heading out to tend to some cows on a nearby farm and he would drop Rose off on his way.
It was a crisp, clear day. The signs of the storm were still everywhere—mounds of snow and ice, crushed barns and outbuildings, potholes in roads, fallen trees and downed wires, holes in roofs, drainpipes and gutters hanging askew, twisted gates and bowed fences.
But the skies could not have been calmer or prettier, and it even felt a bit mild. Standing on the porch, Sam listened to the drip of melting snow everywhere, contrasting this day with the awful days of the blizzard. “Nature can really swing both ways, can’t it, dog?” he observed to Flash. The old dog looked up at him, tail wagging.