The Case of the Shipwrecked Tree

by John R. Erickson

  And with that, we left Drover’s personal problems and went streaking over to the yard gate. There, we set up a Forward Position and began monitoring the sounds and so forths that were coming from the porch.

  Little did we know or even suspect—but we mustn’t get the horse in front of the donkey.

  We listened and watched, is the point. Little Alfred was busy, tearing at the paper that was wrapped around the box and in which the box was wrapped. Alfred was good at this sort of thing—tearing and wrecking. And you could tell that he loved his work. His eyes were sparkling.

  Just then, the door opened and out stepped—oops—out stepped his mother. Sally May. And all at once I felt myself consumed with . . . well, uncomfortable feelings. A wooden smile came to my lips, I cut my eyes from side to side, and my tail . . . well, it started tapping on the ground, almost as though it had a mind of its own.

  Do you see what she does to me? There I was, a model of perfect dog behavior . . . a sincere dog, a dog who did his job and tended to his business, a dog who had done nothing wrong and who had never even thought about doing anything wrong, and yet . . .

  When she came onto the scene, I began to fidget and grovel and grin, and suddenly I felt consumed by terrible feelings of guilt, almost as though . . .

  She saw us there at the gate, but I knew she wasn’t looking at Drover. She was looking at ME—looking at me, into me, through me with those . . . those heartless eyes of hers, the eyes that see into the souls of dogs and little boys and always find . . . NAUGHTY THOUGHTS.

  And the crazy thing was that I didn’t have any naughty thoughts! Hey, I’d just gotten out of bed. I hadn’t done anything yet. I hadn’t even thought about—okay, maybe I’d barked at the mailman, but that was part of my job, right? But other than that, I was as innocent as the driveled snow.

  But that didn’t matter. Her eyes walked into the house of my soul and began . . . looking under the beds, lifting the lids on all the cooking pots, peering into the closets of my mind . . . and suddenly I was squirming with horrible feelings of GUILT.

  In the glare of her eyes, I squirmed and fidgeted and tapped my tail and squeezed up a desperate smile which said, “Hey, Sally May, I can explain everything. It wasn’t me. I didn’t do it. Honest. No kidding.”

  Whew! It must have worked, because at last she let me off the forks of her gaze and looked down at Little Alfred. Only then did I dare relax.

  “What is it, sweetie?” she asked.

  Alfred was still ripping his way through the paper. “It’s my costume! It finally came.”

  Sally May smiled. “Let’s take it inside. I don’t want those papers blowing all over the yard.”

  They went inside. I heaved a huge sigh of relief and noticed that Drover was staring at me.

  “Why are you staring at me in that tone of voice?”

  “Well . . . you were acting kind of funny.”

  “For your information, Drover, I wasn’t acting, and it wasn’t funny. Perhaps you weren’t paying attention and didn’t notice that Sally May was frisking me with her eyes.”

  “I’ll be derned. I feel kind of frisky myself. I guess it’s this nice fall weather.”

  I glared at him. “Drover, it’s not fall. It’s May. It’s spring.”

  “I’ll be derned. I guess I’m not as frisky as I thought.” He yawned. “In fact, I’d kind of like to take a little nap.”

  “Sorry, no naps. You might recall that we’re in the middle of an investigation. Were you listening when Little Alfred said what was inside that mysterious box? Did you hear what it contained?”

  He rolled his eyes around. “Well, let’s see here. A costume?”

  “Exactly. Now put the clues together.”

  “Okay, here we go. Box. Costume.” His eyes popped open. “Oh my gosh, you don’t reckon . . .”

  “Yes, Drover, now we know where Murphy’s getting his disguises. That box contains a turkey costume!”

  Drover let out a gasp and shook his head. “Oh my gosh! So you think Alfred’s part of Murphy’s . . . I think I’m confused again.”

  I cut my eyes from side to side. “It is confusing, isn’t it? But let me remind you, Drover, that we must have the courage to follow the evidence to its logical conclusion, no matter how ridiculous it seems to be. The final proof will come soon.”

  “You mean—”

  “Exactly. If Little Alfred appears on the porch, dressed as a turkey, we’ll know the awful truth.”

  Drover gasped and covered his heart with a paw. He just couldn’t bring himself to face the possibility that Alfred, our little pal, might be part of a huge conspiracy that involved . . .

  The door opened. Drover and I swung our eyes around, as each of us tried to prepare our respective selves for . . .

  HUH?

  What we saw coming out of the house wasn’t Little Alfred. It wasn’t even Little Alfred wearing a turkey disguise. It was . . . a total stranger, a man we’d never seen before! And unless I was badly mistaken—hang on, this will come as a terrible shock—he was a . . .

  PIRATE!

  Oh, I know what you’re thinking. “It couldn’t have been a pirate, not on a ranch in the Texas Panhandle. Pirates sail ships and the ranch just didn’t have enough water to support a huge three-masted sailing ship. So it couldn’t have been a pirate.”

  That’s what you were thinking, right? Go ahead and admit it. Well, you’ve raised a few good points, but I’m sorry to report that you’re wrong. That guy was a pirate, no question about it, and Drover and I were staring, bug-eyed and terrified, at the evidence. Here, check this out.

  Evidence #1: He was dressed in pirate clothes, including one of those funny-shaped hats that pirates wear.

  Evidence #2: In his right hand, he carried a sword. And in fact, he was slashing the air with it.

  Evidence #3: He had a black patch over one eye.

  Evidence #4: Finally, and most shockingly, the guy had . . . a wooden leg!

  Now, you add up all those clues and tell me he wasn’t a pirate.

  Chapter Five: Attacked by a Whole Gang of Pirates

  It was one of the spookiest, scariest things I’d seen in my entire career, and I’m sorry that I can’t reveal any more information about it. I absolutely can’t. Wild horseflies couldn’t drag it out of me.

  Do you know why? Because of the kids. You know where I stand on the issue of scaring the kids, right? I don’t mind giving ’em a little scare now and then, but when we get into the darker, really scary stuff . . . I just can’t bring myself to do it.

  It could have a bad effect, cause the kids to have nightmares in the night and even wet the bed. We don’t need that. I mean, this world is wet enough without . . .

  What? You think you can handle the scary part? You think you’re tough enough?

  Yeah, but what if you’re wrong? What happens then? Who’s going to take the blame if you wake up screaming in the night and find a wet spot on your sheets?

  Okay, tell you what. I’ll go on with this, but if you get in trouble, don’t blame me. I’ve got enough problems of my own without . . .

  I guess we’ll find out. Hang on, here it comes.

  Drover and I were so shocked, neither of us could speak nor move. We just sat there, frozen in our tracks, staring at this horrible pirate that had come slouching out of the house.

  And then we heard him speak. Here’s what he said, word for word. “All wight, you squids, waise the mainsail! We sail for Hispaniola on the morning tide!”

  See? What did I tell you? The guy was a pirate, no question about it, and . . . well, have we discussed my Position on Pirates? Maybe not. I have no use for pirates, none at all, and I go out of my way to avoid them whenever possible.

  I mean, what kind of person wears a patch over his eye, walks on a wooden leg, and goes around swinging a sword? That’s exa
ctly the kind of guy I’ve always wanted to avoid, so it should come as no surprise that I . . . that Drover . . . that we . . .

  For a moment I was frozen by the sheer terror of the moment. I heard a gurgling sound in my throat­alary region—a growl that was trying to make its way out of the dark dungeon of my . . . something. And then, in the eerie silence, I heard the sound of . . . uh . . . running water, and I realized . . .

  “Run, Drover, run for your life!”

  I needn’t have bothered telling my nincompoop assistant to run. He was already gone, I mean, he’d vanished in a flash of white and a cloud of dust. The little—I don’t know how he does that.

  And so it was that, with the pirate’s haunting laughter in my ears, I went to Turbo Five, launched all dogs into the morning breeze, and got the heck out of there.

  I went roaring around the south side of the yard, bending that big cottonwood tree almost to the ground in the wake of my rocket engines, and set a Speed Course for the gas tanks. Up ahead, I caught a glimpse of something four-legged and furry walking across my path.

  “Out of the way, Pete! I can’t stop this thing!”

  By making a few quick adjustments in my Trajectory Program, I was able to, heh heh, bulldoze our local cat and send him rolling across the gravel drive. Heh heh.

  Don’t get me wrong. I was much too busy to waste time wrecking cats, but . . . well, on the other hand, opportunity knocks but once, and when it knocks, a guy should . . . do something.

  Answer the door.

  Run over the nearest cat.

  The point is that a dog should never get so busy and preoccupied with the Big Picture that he passes up a chance to bulldoze a cat. Especially Pete. If it had been any other cat, maybe I would have tried to avoid him, but since it was Pete . . .

  Heh, heh.

  I loved it!

  But rolling up Pete into a little furry ball and causing him to hiss and yowl was just a momentary pleasure, and it did nothing to change the terribleness and seriousness of my situation. I blew past Kitty Kitty, streaked up the hill, and made a safe landing in front of the Security Division’s Vast Office Complex.

  There, I switched off the Rocket Dog Program, cut all engines, darted into the building, and took the elevator up to our office on the twelfth floor.

  Maybe you find it hard to believe that our gas-tank office had twelve floors, and . . . okay, maybe it didn’t, but nobody’s impressed when you tell ’em that your office is nothing but a couple of gunnysacks beneath the gas tanks.

  On the other hand, if you tell ’em “I rode the elevator up to the twelfth floor,” it sounds a whole lot more important. Feeling important is a very important part of being Head of Ranch Security, so I see nothing wrong with . . . well, adding a little color to the, uh . . .

  Okay, so maybe there was no elevator and no twelfth floor. When I burst into our first-floor office, I saw no signs of Drover. And the place was a mess! It appeared that someone had broken into our office and torn it apart!

  Suddenly a pattern began taking shape in my mind. The pirates had broken into the office and ransacked it, looking for . . . something. There’s no telling what they’d been looking for. Secret blueprints of the Jellyfish Weapon? Our codebooks? Maps that showed the locations of every buried bone on the ranch?

  They might have been looking for any of those items, or all of them. But the really scary thing about this situation was that Drover might have been . . . kidnapped!

  “Drover?” No answer. “Drover?” No answer. Little termites of fear began crawling up my back­bone. “Drover, I know you’ve been kidnapped and maybe you’re already on a pirate ship! If you can hear me, make some kind of sound, and I’ll try to save you!”

  In the eerie silence, I cocked my ear and listened. At first . . . nothing. Then . . . in the far, far distance, I heard a tiny voice: “Help!”

  It was Drover, and yes, my worst fears were confumed. Confused. Confirmed.

  My worse fears were confumed. He’d been kidnapped by a gang of blurdthusty pirates—bloodthirsty pirates, I should say—and now . . .

  “Drover, listen carefully. Continue emitting sounds and I’ll try to find you. Be brave, son. If it takes all day, I’ll find you! If it takes all week—well, I’ll probably give up, so hurry!”

  “Help!”

  “Good! I’m on the trail now. Again.”

  “Help!”

  “That’s right, good, fine. I feel I’m getting closer. One more time.”

  “Help!”

  Using all my instruments, I locked in on the sound and followed it to the source, until at last I saw . . . his stub tail sticking out from beneath his gunnysack. I heaved a huge sigh of relief.

  “Thank goodness! There you are, and Drover, I’m proud to report that you weren’t kidnapped after all.”

  “Help!”

  I kicked him on the bohunkus. “Hey! I’ve found you. You’re safe. You can come out now.”

  The sack wiggled and I saw one big eye peeking out. “Is that you, Hank?”

  “Of course it’s me. Against incredible odds, I tracked you down and found you. Come out, we have many things to discuss and very little time.”

  Drover poked his nose out from under the gunny­­sack and glanced around. “Hank, that was the scariest pirate I ever saw! What was he doing in the house?”

  I glanced over both shoulders, just to be sure we weren’t being watched. “I’m not sure, Drover, but we must prepare ourselves for the worst. It’s possible that they’ve captured the house.”

  Drover gasped. “They! Oh my gosh! You mean . . .”

  “Yes, Drover. They’ve stormed the house and taken captives. At this very moment, Sally May and Little Alfred are probably tied and gagged.”

  Drover vanished beneath the gunnysack. “Oh my gosh! I think I’ll stay in here!”

  I seized a corner of the sack in my enormous jaws and gave it a jerk, exposing a quivering white ball of dog hair. Drover. “Come out at once, and that’s a direct order.”

  He glanced around and sat up. “Where are the pirates?”

  “We’re not sure, but it’s obvious that they ransacked the office. Look at this place! It’s a mess.”

  “Yeah, but it’s always a mess. I guess we’re just messy dogs.”

  “We don’t have time to argue.” I began pacing, as I often do when my mind is racing. “We’ll have to assume the worst, Drover. They’ve stolen all our cipher books, so we’ll have to change our codes and give you a whole new code name. From now on, you’re no longer Buckwheat.”

  “I thought I was Ringworm.”

  “Your new code name is Jitterbug, and I’ll be Laughing Gravy. How about that?”

  He laughed.

  “Drover, that’s not funny.”

  “Oops, sorry. I just thought . . .”

  “Please don’t think. Just listen.” I resumed my pacing. “They’ve stolen all our classified material, so we must assume that they know everything. They’ve got our battle plans, codes, blueprints—they know all our secrets, Drover.”

  He let out a moan. “Oh no! Do you reckon they know about . . . my leg?”

  I stopped pacing and studied the runt. “Your leg? What about your leg?”

  “It’s my deepest, darkest secret, and I’ve kept it hidden all these years!”

  “Yes, yes? Go on. We must know the extent of the damage.”

  He was almost in tears. “Well . . . okay. All these years I’ve had this deep, dark secret . . .”

  “Drover, please get to the point.”

  He took a deep breath, and then blurted out, “There’s nothing wrong with . . .”

  Drover wasn’t able to finish his sentence. At that very moment, I heard a sound off to my left . . . right . . . I heard a sound, is the point. I whirled around and saw . . .

  It was wors
e than I could have imagined. It was awful. It made every hair on my backbone stand straight up.

  And it wasn’t a turkey.

  Chapter Six: We Run for Our Lives!

  Creeping toward the gas tanks was the biggest, bloodest-thirsty pirate I’d ever seen! He was hobbling along on his wooden leg, staring at us with his one good eye, grinning an evil grin, and waving his sword. Holy smokes, he was coming to get us!

  Did pirates eat dogs? I’d never heard of such a thing, but . . .

  Can you take anymore of this? I’m not sure I can. I mean, I was there, I lived it, I saw it all with my very own eyes, but I’m not sure I can bear to tell about it. And don’t forget about all the little children who might be listening and watching.

  What do you think? We could quit this story and go to another one. I’ve got many other stories, and they’re not nearly as scary and terrifying as this one.

  Keep going? Okay, you asked for this.

  There we were, scared out of our wits and livers. I managed to fire off one squeak of bark, in hopes it might slow down the pirate, and then I shifted into gear and highballed it out of there.

  “To the machine shed, Drover! The cowboys are up there and maybe they can save us!”

  Fellers, we ran for our lives! If we could make it to the machine shed, maybe our cowboy pals could fight off this horrible villain. I mean, they had hammers and stuff in there, and maybe if all four of us mounted a defense, we could . . .

  Holy smokes, I could hear the pirate’s blood-chilling laughter behind us! And even worse, when I dared to throw a glance over my shoulder, I saw that . . . he was coming after us! I could even hear his wooden leg thumping on the ground!

  “Faster, Drover! He’s coming!”

  The little mutt was pumping his legs as fast as they would go. “Help! Murder! My leg’s killing me! Oh, the pain!”

  Drover had practically confessed that there was nothing wrong with his leg, and yet—well, we sure as thunder didn’t have time to stop and discuss his so-called bad leg.