“I would never get sinister vibes from those two,” Levi said.
“Yeah, vibes, right,” Yoda murmured. “I suppose the next thing you’re going to tell us is that you have eyes in the back of your head.”
“No, don’t be silly, Yoda,” Levi laughed as he trotted off with the others following. “I don’t like walnuts.”
Chapter 7
As the operatives of the Three Dog Detective Agency headed toward busy Fourth Avenue, they kept a subtle watch on the police building, but there was no indication they were being observed by any of the K-9 Unit. They carefully crossed the street and headed west on the south side of F Street.
“Hey, guys!” a voice bellowed from out the mazy depths of the Centre Park Apartments. “Hey, Three Dog Detective Agency! Yo, Levi! Yo, Sunny! Yo-yo-yo, Yoda! Yo! Hey!”
Sunny grinned.
Yoda sighed.
“Subtlety, thy name is not Ajax,” Levi murmured.
“Hey, guys, wait up!” a Mastiff yelled as he barreled up the long drive that sloped down into the complex. “Hey, hold up!”
They moved off the walkway to the wide grassy area fronting the massive apartment complex. After a morning filled with heady doses of confrontation, intrigue and high strangeness, an encounter with the well-meaning but eternally bewildered and befuddled Mastiff likely portended a much-needed departure from the ordinary stress of life.
“Hey, how are you guys doing?” the widely grinning Mastiff asked as he joined them on the sward. “I was hoping to see you.”
“We’re doing fine, Ajax,” Levi replied, as all the protocols of sniffing were carried out by the four dogs.
“How are you, Ajax dear?” Sunny asked. “Been keep out of trouble?”
“Oh yes, Miss Sunny,” Ajax replied enthusiastically. “I have learned my lesson but good!”
The three dogs smiled secretly as they recalled how Ajax’s lesson was brought home to him, with him on his back, trotters flailing in the air, and Levi planted oh his chest, barking in the bigger dog’s face.
“I’m no bully!” Ajax exclaimed. “Not me! No more of that!”
“Why were you hoping to see us, Ajax?” Levi asked.
For a long moment, the Mastiff looked thoroughly confused, but enlightenment eventually dawned on him as he recalled what he had just said.
“Oh yeah,” he said. “There’s this cat, and things are strange.”
The three detectives waited for Ajax to explain.
The silence lengthened.
“Great Anubis, Ajax!” Yoda finally exclaimed. “Tell us what’s going on! We’re dealing in dog-years here!”
“Huh?”
“What is so strange about the cat in your complex?” Sunny asked patiently. “Is there some reason you need us?”
“Oh, sorry, guys,” Ajax said quickly. “I get a little flustered at times, I guess. Still getting used to this not being Tonganoxie, you know.” The big fellow sighed wistfully. “Getting used to all the cars and all the other animals…we got more in my apartment complex that we had in all of Tonganoxie, including all the outlying farms; and then there are the dognappers.”
“What dognappers?” Sunny asked.
“The ones who go around in vans looking for dogs to put in their combat camp,” Ajax explained. “They really go for big boys like me, you know.”
“They’re not around anymore,” Yoda reminded him. “We shut them down months ago. Remember? It was on television?”
“Oh yeah, I remember now,” Ajax said in that thick Midwest drawl that he had brought with him from the plains of Kansas, and would likely never lose. “It was on television, wasn’t it?”
“Yes, yes it was,” Yoda said, evoking a favorite cartoon trope.
“We think you and all the other dogs are safe for now,” Levi said. “But always keep a look out for trouble and never get into a strange vehicle.”
“You bet, Levi!”
“Now,” Levi continued. “You said something about a cat in your complex and that something strange was going on. What’s that all about? How can we help?”
“I’m really worried about a friend. She’s a cat named Swoon,” Ajax said. “Do you know her?”
“No, dear, we don’t,” Sunny replied in a consoling tone. “Tell us about her.”
“After all,” Yoda added in a mildly caustic voice, “you’re not in Kansas anymore…everybody doesn’t know everyone else here.”
“Tell us about Swoon,” Levi urged. “Is she someone who needs our help?”
“I think she needs help; I don’t know – I haven’t seen her all morning, and that’s really unusual,” Ajax explained. “Swoon is a friend of mine. She’s not scared of me like some are. I like her.”
“And you haven’t seen her this morning?” Levi asked.
Ajax nodded.
“That could be serious,” Sunny commented, but without much conviction. “We should check up on her.”
“Please show us where she lives, will you?” Levi suggested. “I am sure things are okay, but it would be best to make sure.”
As Ajax led the way into the apartment complex, he told the three detectives about his friend. Like Ajax, she came from a rural background, but in her case she had been born on a farm where too many cats already lived and food was in short supply. By the time she was rescued, she was sick and underfed, with no dam to care for her. The road to health had been a long one, and though she had recovered fully, the ordeal of her youth had left her undersized, or, as she preferred to call herself, petite.
“She’s a cute little thing, for a cat that is,” Ajax said with a dopey grin. “Has the biggest eyes you’ve ever seen, and right above them is a kind of pyramid marking.”
“What breed is she?” Sunny asked. “Do you know?”
“She told me she’s a British Shorthair, which means she’s from Britain originally,” Ajax replied. Then he frowned. “She also said she is a Tortie, but I don’t know where that is.”
Swoon
They were by now deep into the complex, not far from the high rear fence, beyond which was a wasteland, a remnant of old Chula Vista, when citrus was king. Most of the warehouses had been torn down, but one remained, forlorn and weathered, well advanced toward crumbling under its own weight. One day the area would be transformed by a land developer’s greed and imagination, but for the time being it remained a swath of urban blight, hidden behind more developed land, all but forgotten by residents.
“She lives up there on the third floor,” Ajax said, indicating the corner apartment in the last bank of buildings. “I’ve knocked on the door lots of times, but I don’t hear anyone inside, though my ears are not really that good; I tried sniffing, but I’m not really too good at that either.”
“What exactly is a Mastiff’s strong suit?” Yoda asked.
“Fighting, I guess.”
“At least we know why Rome fell,” Yoda quipped.
“Huh?”
“Be nice, Yoda,” Sunny cautioned. “Don’t tease Ajax when he is so worried about his friend.”
“Sorry, Ajax,” Yoda murmured, chastised but unrepentant.
“Okay,” Ajax replied, not sure what Yoda was apologizing for, but accepting it with good grace anyway. Earlier in his once-pugnacious life he might have taken offense simply because he had felt a duty to breed, but that was before experiencing an epiphany with a barking Dachshund-mix planted on his chest.
“Let’s go on up,” Levi suggested. “Be careful on the stairs.”
Cautiously they ascended flight to flight, landing to landing until they reached the third floor walkway. It was very quiet, too quiet, with not a sound coming from behind any of the doors lining the passage.
“Are there any other pets along here?” Levi asked.
“Not that I know of,” Ajax replied. “That was how we became friends. She was lonely and saw me walking around the complex one day.” He stopped before the last door. “Here is it.”
Levi hit the door three times wi
th his paw, the heavy pounding causing reverberations within but no answering sounds. He tried once more, but, again, there was no reaction from within.
Yoda stepped forward and aimed his ears at the door. After several tense moments, he stepped back and shook his head.
“Could they have moved, do you think?” Sunny asked. “That happens quite often with apartments.”
“I don’t think so,” Ajax said. “At least there’s been no moving van, not even a pick-up truck. And they were here yesterday.”
“Is there another way in?” Levi asked.
“Not that I know of.”
“How did she get out that first time?”
“I don’t know,” he admitted. “Maybe the door opened.”
Levi trained a gimlet eye on the green door. “It does not appear anyone is at home.”
“I hate to be the one to state the obvious,” Yoda said, “but has anyone checked to see if the door is unlocked?”
The dogs looked at each other, then at the door.
“Sunny, if you please,” Levi invited.
The Golden Retriever nodded and moved to the door. The American doorknob – round, smooth and metal – has always been a thorny canine problem. European levers, easier to manipulate, are making inroads in new buildings, but the Centre Park Apartments were definite not new. Because they could not always rely on a door being opened, Sunny had practiced for hours on doorknobs, the obvious choice for a doorknob specialist – her massive jaws could exert the greatest force but she was also the tallest, with no danger of her either snagging a tooth or being left hanging, so to speak. She closed her teeth upon the cold metal, making sure the relatively flat surfaces of her molars made secure contact, then cautiously rotated her head. At first nothing seemed to happen, then the latch clicked and Sunny let go. The door swung silently open.
Levi uttered a small inquisitive bark.
The silence in the unlighted apartment remained unbroken.
“Swoon,” Ajax called softly, his voice trembling. “Are you there, Swoon? It’s me. Ajax.” His voice dropped to the faintest whisper. “Swoon?”
Wary, Levi entered the apartment, the others following close behind. Once inside, Yoda pushed the door to, but did not close it all the way. The dogs spread out, searching through the rooms for some explanation of the vacancy.
“No one has moved out because possessions and clothing are still here,” Levi observed. “The food and water bowls are mostly full, so pet care seems to have been carried out as normal. No litter box it seems.”
“Swoon does her business outdoors,” Ajax said, then added quickly: “She never told me how she gets out for that.”
“Well,” Levi said, “it does not appear she was abandoned, even though the companion is away.”
“But where is Swoon?” Ajax asked.
“Levi, come into the bedroom,” Yoda called.
They found the Pomeranian standing atop the made-up single bed looking out the window. They followed his gaze saw the pane had been slid back and that the screen was curled up at the lower corner. The opening was not very big, but it was more than large enough to accommodate a petite cat.
“But the fall…” Ajax cried in distress.
“No, Ajax, I’m sure she got out safely,” Yoda said. “It’s probably how she goes and comes.”
Sunny leaped up and placed her forepaws on the sill, edging her big head out the opening in the screen.
“Yoda’s right,” she said. “There’s a line of trees between the apartments and the fence, and one of them is directly below us.”
“But why would she leave the apartment and not visit me?” Ajax asked. “And why haven’t I seen her? Where can she be?”
“Yoda, why don’t you and Ajax head on downstairs and start looking along the fence,” Levi suggested. “We’ll join you after I sniff the apartment more thoroughly.”
Yoda nodded and led the distraught Ajax outside.
When they were alone, Levi turned to Sunny. “Looking down into the tree, can you see…well, you know what to look for.”
After a long moment, Sunny pulled her golden head back inside and smiled. “Not in the tree, but I did see where a cat climbed down the tree, but not all the way to the ground. Scratch marks.”
“Where then?” Levi asked.
“Along one of the limbs that…” She paused. “I think she may have gone over the fence into the old storage and processing area.”
“We know what we need to do then,” Levi said. “Let’s go.”
Levi and Sunny found the other two dogs walking slowly along the back fence, sniffing as they went, but neither of them had picked up the scent of the missing Swoon.
“We need to find a way beyond the fence,” Levi said after he told them what Sunny had seen. “It may be that Swoon got over the fence using the tree but cannot find a way back. From what we saw over the fence from the apartment, it’s not only a pretty rough area but there are plenty of places a cat could get trapped.”
“Trapped?” Ajax cried in distress. “Not Swoon!”
“Take it easy, big boy,” Yoda advised. He looked at Levi and said: “If we go around on Fourth, there’s a small break in the fence at the rear of the Doctor’s Park Medical Center. We could get in that way.”
“That would bring us in at the far eastern end of the abandoned lot,” Levi pointed out. “I would rather we found a way in here, near where she entered.” Levi thought a moment. “On the other paw, we don’t want to waste any time. Sunny and Yoda, you guys head on up to Doctor’s Park and go through there while we look here; if we cannot find a way in, we’ll join you.”
The Pomeranian and the Golden Retriever headed out of the apartment complex as fast as they could run. Sunny did not slow down to accommodate Yoda’s much shorter legs, and he did not ask her to. They remained neck-and-neck the whole way.
Levi and Ajax prowled along the base of the wooden fence. The ground was hard-baked, very difficult to dig through, and they could not find any place where the base of the fence did not go all the way down to the ground. However, the fence was quite old, very weathered in places
All the while Levi searched and sniffed and prodded, Ajax grew more agitated and fretful. He whimpered piteously.
Levi pressed his shoulder against one these places where the smell of rotted wood was very strong, but though the wood gave a little when he pushed he did not possess enough mass to make it give way.
“Levi, get out of my way!” Ajax suddenly yelled. “I’m coming through!”
Leaping and turning, Levi just missed being struck by a Mastiff running faster than one might think possible. Ajax smashed into the portion of the fence Levi had just tested, lowering his head like a bull at the charge and hunkering down to make himself as compact as possible. For an instant it seemed as if the fence would win in the battle between barrier and Mastiff, but in the end the fence proved not to be as much an immovable object as the Mastiff proved to be an irresistible force.
“Well, that works,” Levi muttered.
Levi scampered through the good-sized hole and helped Ajax up from where he had sprawled.
“You okay, Ajax?”
“Yeah, I think so.” The Mastiff looked about frantically. “Do you see Swoon anywhere?”
Ajax started to call out loudly for his friend, but Levi cautioned him to silence. “Let’s not be rash. This is not a good place.”
“Yeah,” Ajax agreed, looking around. “I think it’s haunted.”
Levi surveyed the sere land and gaunt structure dominating the area of urban blight, hemmed about by developed tracts and all but forgotten by Chula Vista’s residents. There was an aura of despair and hopeless that penetrated to the soul’s center like a icy knife.
“Haunted? Why do you think that?”
“Sometimes when I go out for my last outing I hear sounds on the other side,” Ajax said. “Whispers. Screams. Rattling. Scary.”
“Ghosts, you think?” Levi asked.
“Don�
��t know, Levi,” the Mastiff replied, shaking his great head. “I think there are things in the world lots scarier than ghosts.”
“So do I,” Levi agreed, wondering what terrors might hide in such a lost and forgotten place. “Let’s look around and see if we can find out where Swoon went.”
The long-legged Dachshund-mix lowered his nose to the dirt. Starting toward the fence nearest the tree down which Swoon had apparently come, Levi slowly widened his search, seeking the same scent he had smelled in the apartment. Ajax maintained a respectful distance. About seven yards out and right from fence and tree, Levi suddenly stiffened; his body quivered slightly as his sniffer pulled up Swoon’s scent molecules.
“What is it, Levi?” Ajax asked. “Have you got the scent?”
“Yes,” Levi replied, not raising his head. “Stay behind me as I follow the scent and keep a look out for danger. I’m depending on you to watch over me.”
Ajax gulped as he realized the enormity of the responsibility being placed on him. In all his life, whether back in Kansas or here in this city so strange to him, he had never been held responsible for anything. Happy-go-lucky Ajax, that had been him, content to play all day long. And now Levi was putting his safety and life in Ajax’s big paws, trusting him to be his eyes while he followed the scent. The Mastiff gulped again, then set his jaw resolutely and nodded.
“You can count on me, Levi,” he said evenly, drawing upon the strength of will and service bequeathed by his Roman ancestors. “You and Swoon both.”
Levi made no reply. He concentrated on following the cat’s trail, trusting Ajax to rise to the occasion. Levi moved as quickly as he dared. It was a confused track, requiring his best efforts to trace it. Not only was it very faint, not unusual in short-haired breeds, but it had been crossed many times by others; while some traces were expected, the kinds of animals always in abundance when companions were scarce – raccoons, skunks, opossums, mice and squirrels – dogs had passed this way as well, some of them close to the same time Swoon had. Dogs and…
Levi stood stock still.
“What is it, Levi?” Ajax asked softly.
K-9 Blues (Paws & Claws Book 3) Page 10