The Dog That Saved Stewart Coolidge

by Jim Kraus

  Maybe the Stewart person didn’t even know where Hubert had hidden them. After all, they had been there for a long time, and the Stewart person did not move them or take them.

  Stewart burst into the apartment, panting, gasping for air.

  Hubert tried not to whimper, but he did, just a little. He did not like being hit. Stewart was not carrying a strap or a piece of wood, and for that Hubert was grateful.

  Stewart walked over to Hubert. Hubert lowered his head even farther, his nose almost touching the ground. He let a soft whimper escape. He didn’t want to whimper because that showed weakness and Hubert was not a weak dog, but he couldn’t help it—not this time.

  Stewart took several more deep breaths.

  He knelt down in front of Hubert.

  Then he put his arms around Hubert’s neck. That surprised Hubert.

  No one ever touched him, gently touched him—before they began hitting.

  “Hubert, I don’t know why you went to the store again. But it’s okay. You don’t know that it’s wrong. It’s okay. I’ll protect you. I’ll make sure nothing bad happens to you. I promise, Hubert. I promise.”

  Hubert softened when he realized that there would be no hitting today—only nice, calm words. He wasn’t sure what they all meant, but his Stewart person seemed to be kind, even when bad things happened.

  That’s what a person in a pack would do. Maybe Stewart finally sees. Maybe he is tired of being lost. This is the way it all should be. He has to see that. He has to know that now.

  Hubert looked up into Stewart’s face. He could see worry and confusion and tiredness and…well, he could see peace—or almost peace.

  He must know. Almost.

  Then he leaned his head on Stewart’s shoulder and pressed against him and hoped that this moment would never have to end.

  Even though they both knew that it would.

  Neither Stewart nor Hubert heard the car pull into the driveway. Perhaps Hubert heard it, but he was paying more attention to being hugged by Stewart than monitoring events outside. Stewart and Hubert both looked up as they heard the footsteps on the stairs outside.

  The knock sounded more official, and more firm, than any knock Stewart, or Hubert, had yet heard.

  Stewart sort of, almost, knew who it was and why he was here.

  Who else could it be? Much too loud for Lisa and much too determined to be the landlord.

  Stewart rose and slowly walked to the door. When he opened it, there stood one of Wellsboro’s finest, a portly, older policeman who wore a LT. QUINN nameplate pinned above his left pocket.

  Hubert did not move, but Stewart heard him whimper.

  Stewart stepped back and Lieutenant Quinn took two steps inside. Then he shook his head, almost as if in disbelief at what he was being forced to do that morning.

  “Listen, son, I don’t want to be here, either. Chasing dogs is way down on my list of police priorities—just under chasing skateboarders and hoodlums off the street by the mayor’s house.”

  “Okay,” Stewart replied. “I’m ready to pay any fine that I need to pay.”

  Lieutenant Quinn shook his head again. Stewart imagined that Lieutenant Quinn shook his head often during the course of a standard police shift.

  With bemusement, I bet. Maybe I should become a policeman. They all seem to like their jobs. The ones on the cops shows on TV, anyhow. Lieutenant Quinn —well, I can’t tell.

  “You’re Stewart Coolidge, right?”

  “I am. Do you need to see some ID or something?”

  “No,” the policeman replied. “I think I can trust you on that. I mean, who else would you be?”

  Lieutenant Quinn looked over into the living room, where Hubert was. The dog had not moved and his head was still hung down, avoiding all eye contact with humans.

  “And that’s the bandit dog, right?”

  “I guess.”

  Lieutenant Quinn arched his left eyebrow.

  “I mean…he is.”

  “Okay,” the policeman answered. “You know, son, this is all so stupid.”

  Stewart nodded, agreeing with him.

  “But I have my orders.”

  “Orders?”

  “All this over a bunch of dog toys.”

  “Rawhide bones, actually.”

  “Whatever.”

  Hubert sank lower, as if trying to hide in the carpet.

  “Listen, I have to take the dog with me.”

  And at that, Stewart stood up straighter, and his eyes widened.

  “What? No. Wait. I’ll pay the fine. I said I would pay the fine.”

  “Sorry, son. No can do. There’s a special city council order that requires me to take the dog into custody. Like I’ve got nothing better to do with my time.”

  “Wait a minute,” Stewart said, his voice rising with anxiety. “Taking the rawhide bones is not a felony. It’s a misdemeanor at best. That only requires a court appearance and a fine, probably. Not arrest.”

  Lieutenant Quinn adjusted his belt, the second belt, which held up his holster and pistol and Mace and handcuffs. Stewart later wondered if that was simply a psychological ploy to divert his attention or to draw his attention to who really held the power in this situation.

  “He’s not dangerous. He’s had his shots.”

  Lieutenant Quinn nodded.

  “I know. The vet in Coudersport called me yesterday. Well, left a message for me. Didn’t get it until this morning.”

  Stewart’s face must have reflected his dismay and disillusionment.

  “Vets don’t have doctor–patient confidentiality. Real doctors do, but not vets.”

  “Oh.”

  “And besides, Mr. Arden, that weirdo, called the police eight times in the last ten minutes, demanding that we deal with this issue—in light of the special city council order of enforcement.”

  At that moment Stewart heard a car door slam and a fast rattle of feet on the steps. Lisa burst into the room, as breathless as Stewart had been a few minutes earlier.

  “He’s come to take Hubert,” Stewart said, trying to be calm.

  Lisa turned to Lieutenant Quinn, her face hard and set and nearly angry.

  “You can’t do that. The dog is private property.”

  Lieutenant Quinn turned to face Lisa full on and Lisa shrank back, just an inch or so.

  “Listen, miss, I am and I can. Special city council enforcement order.”

  Lisa rose back up, as if pushing against an incoming wave. Stewart had never seen her in action before, or at least not action like this.

  “That has no legal status. A special order? Come on, now. I don’t think that’s even a legal…law, or legal ordinance.”

  Lieutenant Quinn shrugged.

  “Maybe it is, maybe it isn’t. You have money to get a lawyer to debate the issue?”

  Lisa shriveled back just a bit, but then stiffened and glared at the policeman.

  “Didn’t think so. So let’s all be nice and civil and don’t give me any more heartburn than I already have. Get the dog into my car and we’ll take good care of him.”

  Lisa rose up, and actually seemed to get larger, like a mother bear defending her cub.

  “And what if something unfortunate were to happen to Hubert? What about that?”

  Lieutenant Quinn seemed to grow older, and slumpier, if that were possible, as they talked.

  “The sheriff is up for reelection this year. You think he wants someone to shoot a cute, defenseless dog on his watch? If something were to happen to this dog before the city council votes on it—well, I would be on permanent night patrol at the gravel quarry. And I don’t want to work nights looking at rocks.”

  Lisa had to smile, just a bit.

  “You promise to take good care of Hubert?”

  “I do.”

  “I promised him that nothing bad would happen,” Stewart said, his voice rattling, plaintive. “I don’t want to be a liar. Okay?”

  “Okay, son. But just help me get him into the
squad car—and if you have a leash, that would be swell.”

  Lisa got the leash from her car, and Hubert came quietly, slowly climbing into the back of the patrol car, sniffing loudly. As it pulled away, Stewart and Lisa could see Hubert turning around, staring back at them, with imploring eyes, wondering why they were not going with him.

  As the car drove away, Stewart put his arm around Lisa and she did the same to him, each trying silently to let the other know that this would all work out for the best, even though they weren’t really sure of anything at this moment.

  Lisa called “her” lawyer, Nathan George, on retainer, as it were, from the Wired Rooster, when they got back up to Stewart’s apartment. To her dismay, he agreed with the policeman’s assessment on most major points.

  “He’s right—you can’t afford to pay me to do research on this and there aren’t enough free lattes to make it worth my while. And since the dog could be labeled as a public nuisance, it can be taken into custody by the police. At least on a temporary basis. Until the city council meets next week.”

  So she and Stewart sat in the two chairs in the living room, not really talking, for the rest of the morning, thinking how empty the apartment suddenly felt.

  Once Stewart left for work, Lisa dialed a Pittsburgh phone number.

  “Heather Orlando, here,” came the very chipper reply.

  Lisa launched into a recap of the story so far: how the entire town was literally abuzz with the arrest and capture and lockup of Hubert. Lisa came clean on her involvement in the cover-up—and Heather either laughed or commiserated at the right places.

  Then she provided Heather with the potential bombshell leads: the two women she couldn’t find from the closed animal shelter in Lewisburg. But she was sure that the dog had not come from there and was sure that Bargain Bill had never adopted him.

  Lisa could almost see Heather grinning over the phone.

  “You take it easy, Lisa. And I’ll take it from here. And good work.”

  Lisa thought she would be happier, but she wasn’t.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  WITHIN TWENTY MINUTES of Hubert’s capture, Bargain Bill had altered his reward sign to declare loudly CAPTURED! and JAILED! and BUY A CAR AND HELP ME FIGHT CITY HALL! using a super-wide-tipped waterproof marker.

  Bargain Bill stood back and admired his handiwork as an old and somewhat battered car rattled onto the lot, the driver’s face a mix of excitement and firmness.

  My first customer of the day—and it is only eight thirty. I love this dog.

  Mr. Arden, once he was satisfied that the dog was under lock and key with an armed guard, ordered two stock boys to take down the REWARD sign from the front of the store.

  “You can leave the posters on the telephone poles. Somebody from the city…or the phone company, will get those. That’s what I pay taxes for.”

  As he watched the two young men drag the sign back toward the store, he allowed himself a self-satisfied grin.

  Now I don’t have to worry about paying out the reward money. A policeman can’t claim it. And actually, I’m the one that found him.

  Perched on his chair at his desk in the Gazette offices, Dave Grback pounded away on his keyboard, his old-style corded phone jammed between his shoulder and cheek, getting information first from the police department, then the mayor, then Lisa, and then a few people who called in to say they’d witnessed the last daring daylight robbery that the bandit dog committed—just before being captured, at gunpoint probably, and locked up.

  This is wonderful. Hate to see the end of this story,but we do have the city council meeting next week. That should be a real circus. I’ll have to have a photographer assigned to that. And I’ll go as well.

  After he had the rough draft of the story completed, he sent e-mails to several dozen fellow editors, from Pittsburgh to Erie to Philadelphia, alerting them that another installment of the “bandit dog” series was about to be published in this Wednesday’s edition.

  A little self-serving publicity, that’s all. Everybody does it, right?

  That morning, Joe Witt, the current mayor of Wellsboro, busied himself shuffling papers on his desk at his insurance agency. He had already fielded a call from the police chief telling him that the dog had been captured, from Mr. Arden demanding that the dog be captured, and from the editor of the newspaper asking where the captured dog was incarcerated.

  Joe did not like these sorts of phone calls. He had run for mayor thinking that it might be good for visibility, and, thus, good for business, but he had not experienced any mayoral bump in insurance customers.

  In fact, he thought, there were just as many people angry with him for some civic reason as were happy with him for the same civic reason.

  “It’s a zero-sum game,” he told his wife, although he wasn’t sure what a zero-sum game entailed, exactly.

  And now the infamous dog bandit of Wellsboro was behind bars and a special meeting of the city council had been called for the following week, two weeks ahead of schedule.

  Maybe then the phone calls will stop.

  He did have a most troubling thought, and it had actually kept him up most of the night before—something that rarely, if ever, happened.

  What if we have to put the dog down? Maybe it has rabies or something. Or mange. If that happens, the animal lovers will be incensed. And they’ll want me put down as well.

  He reached into his top drawer and, without even looking, found the familiar bottle. He unscrewed the top and spilled out three antacid tablets, popping them into his mouth and carefully and thoroughly chewing them up, hoping that the third tablet would put him over the top and return his stomach to normal.

  But I doubt it.

  Jerry Mallick slammed his palm against the front fender of his truck and a small dusting of rust and dirt trickled down onto his boots like dirty snow. He scowled and adjusted his camouflage baseball hat, leaving another small streak of dirt on the bill of the cap.

  “That dag-blamed dog was right here all along,” he snarled, more for impression than because of actual anger.

  He had noticed the police car when it had pulled into the driveway and had immediately slipped out the front door. Once he’d figured out that the cop was at the back door and on his way upstairs, he’d hightailed it a few blocks over.

  Just in case. I don’t know what he’s here for, but you never know. Old parking tickets, maybe. I’m pretty sure I have a few.

  But now that he had found out that Stewart was hiding his free ticket to a new truck, or a newer truck, he was both relieved that the authorities weren’t there for him and badly riled that he was no longer eligible for the rewards.

  I wonder if hiding a criminal dog is like…grounds for kicking Stewie out of the apartment.

  But he quickly changed his mind.

  I sort of like the guy. And he pays his rent on time. Not like that old lady who used to live here. Always sayin’ her Social Security check was late or stolen or something.

  Lisa moped through her second shift at the Wired Rooster. She begged the manager to let her skip out that morning once she had gotten the news about Hubert, promising that she would take a second shift that afternoon.

  Kevin or Kellan or Carl was sitting at the back table complaining to anyone who would listen about the injustice in the world and how a poor working stiff never catches a break.

  “That cop who nabbed the dog—now he gits the reward. I tell you, the whole thing wuz rigged from the git-go.”

  Kevin or Kellan or Carl was wearing a wide-brimmed leather hat indoors—a practice Lisa found most uncivil.

  But this is Wellsboro and he’s one of those pretend mountain folk, so what do I expect?

  To make it more “real,” Kevin or Kellan or Carl had attached a real squirrel tail to the back of the hat, so whenever he turned his head, it looked like he was wagging his tail in excitement.

  “Listen, the police can’t claim rewards for doing their job,” Lisa explained as she ste
amed a pitcher of whole milk. “So nobody gets any reward.”

  Kevin or Kellan or Carl did not appear to be mollified by that fact, not in the least.

  “Well, that’s what I mean, then. No one gits nuthin’ around here. None of it’s fair, I tell you what. The little guy always winds up gittin’ the shaft.”

  Stewart was stunned as he picked up his phone and saw a text from his grandmother.

  When did she learn how to do that? And when did she get a smart phone?

  “Stewart,” the text read, “I understand they caught that dog. And the newspaper said that you are the owner. Is that true? Were you lying to me all this time? And what else have you lied about? And, by the way, they found someone for the pool job. Don’t bother applying. Your Grandmother.”

  Stewart wanted to delete the text right then but thought better of it.

  I’ll call her tonight and explain. Maybe.

  “So you talked to that Heather reporter from Pittsburgh?”

  “I did, Mom. Just to let her know what’s going on. She said she wanted to do a follow-up story.”

  “Well, that’s nice. Are they going to offer you a job, then?”

  Lisa closed her eyes and wished her mother was more aware of how things actually worked—or at least how the current process of finding a job worked.

  Maybe when she was young it was different.

  “No, I don’t think so. But she did invite me down to the city and she said she would introduce me around. That’s a really good thing.”

  Lisa was pretty certain her mother didn’t really get what that entailed, but she was positive and encouraging nonetheless. “Well, that’s so nice. And how is it between you and that young man…Stewart, right?”

  Lisa had known she would ask and had an answer prepared.

  “Yes. Stewart. We’re still friends.”

  She was not about to tell her of the magical kiss they shared or the hugs or the hand-holding.