“Okay, them was Ivory Dog Bars,” I said. “The question here is, why would they use Ivory Dog Bars for cleaning the pen?”
Ralph stuck his nose against the chain link fence. “Because it was soap, ya dope.”
“HUH?”
“You ain’t got hydrophobia. You ate a bar of soap, is why you was foamin’ at the mouth.”
“Wait a minute, hold everything!” I sprang to my feet and began pacing. “It’s coming clear now, all the clues are pointing in the same direction. At last the pieces of this puzzle are falling into place. I was duped into eating a bar of soap, which explains why it tasted so awful. I knew something wasn’t right. Ivory Dog Bar indeed!
“It was soap, Ralph, don’t you understand? They gave me soap, knowing it would produce the symptoms of hydrophobia. So all at once this case is leading in a new and startling direction, for you see, Ralph, they not only duped me, but also my sister, Maggie! Which brings us to the crux of the matter, the throbbing heart of the mystery.”
I whirled around and faced him. “The question now is, who are THEY and why did they want . . .”
Ralph was asleep again.
Chapter Eleven: Another Case Is Solved
Hey, wake up!” Ralph’s eyes fluttered open. “It was soap.”
I paced back and forth in front of him. My mind was racing. “Of course it was soap, but that’s only the tip of the ice cube. What we have here is a by-George conspiracy that could very well lead all the way to city hall! Do you understand what this means, Ralph?”
“Uh-huh.”
“This could . . .” I stopped pacing and stared at him. “What do you mean ‘uh-huh’?”
“I mean uh-huh, is what I mean.”
I walked over to him. “Uh-huh meaning yes? You understand what this means? You’re trying to tell me that you’ve figgered it out?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Who’s Head of Ranch Security?”
“You.”
“And who’s just a sad sack, jailbird hound?”
“Me.”
“And you expect me to believe that you know who poisoned me?”
“Yup.”
“All right, smart guy, I’ll listen, and it better be good.”
“Well,” said Ralph, “sounds to me like your sister gave you some soap to eat.”
“We’ve already established that, Ralph.”
“Because you gave her daughter fleas.”
“Huh?”
“And because she wanted you to go home.”
“Go home? Me?” I studied on that for a while. “There’s only one thing wrong with your theory, Ralph. It’s a house of cards built on the idea that I’m not welcome at my sister’s place. Remove that one card and the entire structure comes crashing down. No, Ralph, your theory is not only wrong, it’s incorrect.”
He shrugged. “Okay, whatever you think.”
“It wasn’t a stupid idea, Ralph, and it shows that you’re trying.”
“Well . . .”
“I’m sorry.”
“Yeah, I’m sorry too, ’cause tomorrow morning they’re gonna cut your head off and send it to Austin, all because you ate a bar of soap. That’s sure too bad.”
I cut my eyes from side to side. “You’ve got a point there. It doesn’t do much good to solve a case if you lose your head in the process. Which brings us to another matter.”
“What’s that?”
I ran my eyes over the steel and cement. “I’m going to bust out of here tonight.”
“It’s made perty stout.”
“Pretty stout but not ralph enough, Tout . . . uh Rout . . . uh Ralph. When you get to know me better, you’ll learn that I have my ways of escaping.”
“Well, okay. Reckon I ought to move out of the way?”
“That might be a good idea. Move to the back of your cell, just in case. There’s no sense in taking chances.”
He pushed himself up and yawned. “It sure was nice meetin’ you, Hank, and best of luck.”
“And the same goes for you, my friend. We’ll see you down the road.”
We waved good-bye. I watched him amble off to the back of his cell and I felt a lump in my throat. I mean, there’s something special about friendships made in prison. You just don’t forget the guys you’ve met on Death Row.
I gave Ralph time to take cover and made a few warm-up runs around my cell. Then I turned to the south and focused all my attention on the chain link fence.
Destroying a chain link fence with steel posts set in concrete wasn’t going to be easy, but then life itself wasn’t easy and being Head of Ranch Security wasn’t easy and getting my head cut off and sent to the state lab wasn’t easy, so there you are. What’s easy in this life isn’t necessarily . . . I’ve lost my train of thought.
I jogged in place for a moment, took three deep breaths, and glanced up at the stars. The time was approximately 1:34 a.m. With any luck at all, this nightmare would be over in fifteen minutes and I would be on my way back to the ranch.
All at once my highly conditioned body stiffened from nose to tail, as I concentrated on being an arrow, a battering ram, an artillery shell, a guided missile. And then I sprang forward, gathering speed with every step, and by the time I reached the fence I had attained maximum velocity.
I crashed into the fence and suddenly the night silence was filled with the sounds of destruction—the snap and groan of steel under stress and also the snap and groan of various parts of my body.
When I regained consciousness I was lying on the floor of my cell. A new day was dawning in the east and Ralph was in the cell beside me, looking down with drooping eyes, drooping jowls, and drooping ears.
I sat up and shook the vapors out of my head. “Where am I?”
“You’re still on Death Row.”
“What happened?”
“Oh, you hit the fence and it didn’t tear down.”
“And I’ve been unconscious all this time?”
“Yup.”
I looked closer at Ralph. “How did you get into my cell?”
“Oh, just opened a couple of gates and came on in. I didn’t figger you’d mind.”
“No, I don’t mind at all. In fact,” I tried to roll the stiffness out of my neck, “I appreciate it. Thanks.”
“You’re welcome. It wasn’t much. I figgered you might want some company, this being your last day and everything.”
I pushed myself up and walked around. “Yes, this is the last day, isn’t it? I tried to escape and failed, and now I must pay the price of failure.”
“Perty expensive, ain’t it?”
“Yes, very expensive. Well, it’s all come down to this one day, hasn’t it, Ralph?”
“Yup.”
“My entire life, my career as Head of Ranch Security, my adventures, my friendships, the many women I’ve shared my heart with. And all the crazy little incidents along the way, Ralph, they come rushing back to me now. Do you have any idea how I must feel at this moment?”
“Nope.”
“Well, thanks for trying. And thanks for being a true friend. And thanks for sharing these moments with me. And thanks,” I choked up a little bit, “and thanks for being a dog.”
“You’re welcome.”
I had to turn away from him. I didn’t want him to see me . . . well, you understand. I looked off to the east. “Just look at it, Ralph. Have you ever seen a bigger, redder sun or a more beautiful sunset?”
“I think it’s a sun rise.”
“That’s what I meant. Did I say sunset?”
“Yup.”
“Well, whatever. The point is that it’s beautiful, but an even deeper point, and the one I want to emphasize . . .” I stared at Ralph. “You walked into my cell, through that door?”
“Yup.”
&
nbsp; “How did you do that?”
“Just pushed the latch up with my nose. It was perty easy.”
I had to sit down. “Wait a minute. You opened your cell door and . . . why didn’t you escape?”
He scratched at a flea on his ear. “Oh, I got no place special to go. I been stayin’ out here for two years. It’s kind of like home now.”
“You’re not condemned? You’re not on Death Row?”
“Well, sorta, but me and Jimmy Joe get along all right, and I never had hydrophobia.”
“Well, I never did either but . . . what time does Jimmy Joe come out here in the mornings?”
“Oh about ten minutes from now, maybe less.”
“All right, Ralph. I have one last question, and I want you to think about it very carefully before you give me an answer.”
“Okay.”
“Is there some reason why I can’t walk out my cell door and escape?”
“Let me think about that.” He closed his eyes and went into deep concentration.
I waited for five minutes. In the distance I heard a pickup motor, and suddenly I realized that Ralph was asleep.
“Ralph, wake up!” His eyes floated open. “Hurry, give me your answer before it’s too late!”
“What was the question?”
“Is there any reason why I can’t walk out that door and escape?”
He rubbed his chin with a paw. “No, by gollies, it ought to work.”
“That’s all I wanted to know.” I sprinted to the door, gave it a push with my nose, and it swung open. The pickup was coming closer. I looked back at Ralph. “Just one more last question.”
“Okay.”
“Why didn’t you tell me you knew how to open this door?”
He frowned and squinted one eye. “Well, you didn’t ask. And I guess it just slipped my mind. Don’t that beat it all?”
“Yes, Ralph, that beats it all and it almost got my head cut off. Well, this is good-bye, and thanks for nuthin’.”
“You’re sure welcome, Hank. So long.”
Just as the dogcatcher’s pickup pulled up, I shot out of my cell and headed for freedom. This would have been a natural place to bring the story to a close with a happy ending, only Jimmy Joe Dogcatcher saw what had happened and took off after me.
You see, no happy ending is real until the end has ended happily.
Chapter Twelve: The End Ends Happily After All
The dogcatcher must have been pretty unhappy when he pulled up to the dog pens and found his old pal Ralph sitting in Death Row. As I dashed off across the pasture, I heard him squall and beller.
Then he jumped into his pickup, spun the tires, and came after me.
I had supposed he would follow the road, see, and that would give me a little advantage and a head start. Nope. He came right behind me, and off we went across the pasture.
I ducked under a barbed wire fence and thought that would slow him down, since he would have to hunt for a gate. Nope. He built a new gate, just by George rammed it and drove right through it.
Then I came to a draw that ran through the pasture. It was kind of steep on the sides and bumpy in the middle, and I figgered that would slow him down. Nope. He derned near tore the axles off the pickup, but he made it through and kept coming.
And then he started shooting! That’s right, had a pistol out the left window, drove with one hand and fired with the other. That seems a little radical, him shooting at me right on the outskirts of town, until you stop and remember that he still thought I had hydrophobia, and then it still seems a little radical.
It appeared to me my best lick was to get over to the highway. Surely if I got around cars and people, that nutty dogcatcher would hold his fire. Then all I would have to worry about would be him running over me with his pickup.
So I changed course and headed west and struck the highway right in front of Waterhole 83, the place where Loper and Slim bought their soda pop and chewing tobacco. I’d been there a time or two.
Sure nuff, once I got around the highway Jimmy Joe had to put away his artillery. I dashed across, a step or two ahead of a semi-truck, and made a run for the Waterhole. I went around the back side just as Jimmy Joe roared into the parking lot. He screeched his tires and followed.
My plan at this point was to run around the Waterhole until Jimmy Joe ran out of gas, but when I came around the south side I saw a familiar faded red pickup sitting out front. Just as Slim opened his door and touched the ground with a booted spur, or a spurred boot I guess I should say, I dived in and hit the floorboard.
“What . . . where . . . good grief, it’s you again!”
There wasn’t a great deal of warmth in Slim’s statement. “Good grief, it’s you again” sort of recognized the basic facts of the situation but was a long distance, emotionally speaking, from “By golly, Hank, it’s great to see you again!”
But of course you have to remember that I had left the ranch under the shadow of controversy, so to speak.
Well, I whapped my tail on the floorboard and gave him one of my most pitiful looks. I couldn’t tell if it was working or not, and just then the dogcatcher came roaring through the parking lot and screeched to a halt.
I made my best attempt to melt into the floormat. I mean, I was by George hugging the floor.
“Say,” Jimmy Joe yelled, “you see a sorry looking dog go running through here?”
Slim shot me a glance, slammed the door, and walked over to the other pickup. “Yalp.”
“Where’d he go?”
Slim leaned his elbow on the pickup and pointed off to the north. “See that milk truck there, says Nowlin’s Dairy?”
“Right, yeah, okay, thanks, I’ll run him down.” And he roared off after the milk truck.
Slim went into the Waterhole and came out with a sack of sunflower seeds. He got in and looked down at me. “I didn’t lie to him. He asked if I’d seen a sorry looking dog and I said yes. I didn’t say you were in that milk truck, didn’t even mean to suggest it. He just jumped to conclusions.”
He gave me a wink and we headed south toward the ranch. After we’d gone a few miles, I worked up the courage to sit in the seat and, you know, let the wind blow across my ears. Always did enjoy that.
When we crossed the cattleguard that put us back on the ranch, Slim pushed his hat back on his head, looked at me and sighed.
“Hank, Sally May’s gonna scalp me when she finds out I brought you back out here. In fact,” he slammed on the brakes and opened the door, “why don’t you walk in to headquarters alone. I’ve got enough trouble without being associated with your lousy record.”
Lousy Record! I couldn’t believe my ears. What about all those long nights on patrol, all the years . . . oh well.
I jumped out into the road. Slim didn’t drive off right away but sat there looking at me. He even grinned. “Hank, I’m kind of glad you’re back, and I’ll be derned if I can find a reason for it. You’re as dumb as any dog I ever met and you cause more trouble around here than you’re worth.”
All at once he started laughing. “Broke into the house and ate the T-bone steaks right off the table! You sorry devil, we should have shot you while we were mad.” He shook his head. “See you to the house, old pup.”
And he drove away. Well, what can you say about that kind of welcome-home? On the one hand, I think Slim meant every word he said. On the other hand, his words weren’t entirely flattering, so there you are.
He’d let me out on the country road, just north and west of the house, right there by Spook Canyon where the road runs through the horse pasture. I started to the house and ran into the horses. Must have been twelve of them right there in a bunch.
I was feeling pretty good—I mean, who wouldn’t? I had survived a case of Soap Hydrophobia, I had escaped from a cell on Death Row, and I had smuggled
my bad self out of town just one step ahead of the posse. And I was home again!
Shucks, it was a great day. I was full of vinegar and oil and the other spices of life, I wanted to run and play and rejoice, and just by George tell everybody that it was great to be alive and home.
So I marched up to the horses. Thought it might be fun to put on a little demonstration of cowdog skills—you know, round ’em up into a bunch, head ’em down toward the corrals, stop ’em, loose-herd ’em, in other words a little practice run, just for the pure fun of it.
“All right, you crowbaits, the chief executive is back on the ranch! Form up into a group and move out to the corrals, and stand by for further orders.”
They formed up into a group all right but they went in the wrong direction. Instead of heading down toward the corrals, the scoundrels came running toward ME. I retreated a couple of steps and they kept on coming. I broke into a run and they kept coming. I ran all the way to the corral with them horses right on my tail, kicking and bucking and snorting.
Which just goes to show that we cowdogs have many tricks in our bags. Oftentimes the best way to move horses into a corral is to make them think you want to drive them, see, then let them drive you.
We call this “Reverse Psychology” and we use it a lot, especially on horses because they’re very ornery and stubborn and willful, also dangerous, and I never did get much pleasure out of messing with a bunch of stupid horses.
But it was still a great day, so good that even horses couldn’t mess it up. I marched through the corrals, noticed there were a couple of steers in the sick pen so I made my rounds there, got ’em up on their feet, stirred ’em, checked their noses and eyes and other technical medical stuff that most ordinary readers wouldn’t understand—well, just for an example, I had a steer once that had eardroopus, redeyestacosis, and drynoserosis.
Handling heavy technical terms is something a good cowdog does every day, but as I say we don’t expect the ordinary reader . . . I think I’ve already covered this.
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