Oh, great. Now she was spicing up her Be-All-That-You-Can-Be-So-Long-As-You’re-A-Pilot speech with a pinch of guilt. Though a pilot himself, my father had died in a car accident more than twenty years ago.
I took my energy out on the lasagna as I stabbed the spatula into it and shoveled a large portion, silently daring my mother to say, “Are you sure you’re going to be able to eat all that?” My mother’s lips were pursed and she was staring at my plate, no doubt biting her tongue.
“The point is, Mother, as you seem to keep forgetting, I’m afraid of heights. Airplane passengers tend not to feel confident putting their lives into the hands of a pilot who’s afraid to look out the window.”
“Oh, I wish you would just get over all of that fear-of-heights nonsense. It’s all in your head.”
“So are brain tumors, but I wouldn’t want to fly with a pilot with that problem, either. Mom, when I’m up high and look down, I get vertigo. Everything starts spinning. How exactly do you expect me to be able to steer when my vision’s going in circles?”
“Oh, gosh, dear, I don’t know. By looking at a compass, perhaps? By going up with me a couple of times till the vertigo goes away?” She dished up a portion half the size of mine. She sighed and tapped her plate with her fork a couple of times while staring at my plate. Our eyes met as I took a bite. “Are you sure you’re going to be able to eat all that?”
I chuckled, smiled affectionately at my mother and lifted my wineglass. “Here’s to you, Mom. Cheers.”
“Cheers,” my mother said while we clinked glasses. “Doesn’t wine give you a headache? I only poured you a glass because I didn’t want to be rude.”
I laughed merrily, having to dab at my eyes. Pavlov and Doppler now stood by the back door, Doppler scratching at the glass. I smiled as I got up to let the dogs out into the yard. I wondered if this wasn’t a major function of the family, in general—to allow its members to be crazy within the sanctity of its walls, so that we can present ourselves as normal to the world outside.
“I heard the rest of your broadcast this afternoon,” Mom said. “Are you really working with Hannah Jones’s former dog?”
“Did you know her?” I asked hopefully, quickly reclaiming my chair.
She nodded, taking a sip of burgundy. “She took flying lessons from me.”
Yes! Though a loner, my mother is an exceptional confidante, and thereby had an uncanny ability to know a surprising amount about people within a hundred-mile radius. During the course of flying lessons, my mother managed to extract the entire personal histories of her students, without fail. “Tell me everything you know about her.”
“She owned and operated a vegetarian cooking school and a vegetarian restaurant. She amassed a huge fortune when she sold her business, but she had no heirs. She’d been determined to spend the bulk of her fortune before she died, and was doing a good job at that, which is where my flying lessons came in. What a great tipper. Financially, that is. She kept the wings fairly level.” Mom laughed, then noticed that I was not joining her and added, under her breath, “Pilot humor.”
“I heard she was kind of eccentric,” I prompted.
She shrugged. “That’s what all elderly women with spunk get called. Unless they’re poor, that is. Then they’re termed ‘bag ladies.’”
“Do you think Hannah Jones might have been the sort to train her dog to dislike meat products?”
“What makes you ask?”
“Just a theory,” I said, not wanting to allow Mom to turn this conversation around to make me the subject.
Mom looked thoughtful for a moment. “I suppose that’s possible. She was a strict enough vegetarian that feeding her dog meat might have been repulsive to her.”
Outside, both Pavlov and Doppler were barking. I rose and looked out in time to see a white sedan drive away from the street along the side of Mom’s property.
That’s when it hit me—the memory that had been nagging at me for hours now.
I’d noticed a white car pull out from the curb just as we left Beth’s house. I’d lost sight of it in the traffic on 28th Street, and Pine was a busy road, so there had been no reason to think twice about someone leaving at the same time we were.
Now that I thought about it, I was sure I’d seen a very similar car enter the parking lot at PetsMart.
Chapter 5
Kaitlyn had been asleep last night when Doppler and I returned from my mother’s house. This morning Kaitlyn had—watch me do my happy dance—given me the silent treatment.
I put Doppler in the backseat to ride with me to the O’Farrell-Adams residence where I expected to observe a fox terrier named Mugsy who considered herself top dog. Last night, I had kept an eye out for suspicious white sedans and spotted none. By now, I had almost succeeded in convincing myself that I had not been followed yesterday afternoon. The operative word was “almost.” If I had convinced myself, I wouldn’t have been looking for white sedans in my rearview mirror, as I now was.
It had snowed a little during the night, just enough to make the roads sloppy. The temperature now was well above freezing—mid-forties, perhaps. I balanced my thoughts between how to jockey for position among the cars on Folsom and how to squeeze house hunting into my busy schedule.
The O’Farrell clan lived on a street perpendicular to the South Boulder Rec Center, in a two-story colonial. I rang the doorbell, and a thin-faced, thirtyish woman with a remarkably pointy nose introduced herself as “Sarah Adams, John’s wife,” and ushered me inside. From somewhere in the back of the house came the sounds of TV cartoons.
“John had to run to the store, but he’ll be here in a moment,” Sarah said, unsmiling. “Let me introduce you to the rest of the family.”
“Kids?” Sarah hollered over her shoulder, “Shut that thing off and come say hello! The dog doctor’s here!”
I smiled at the thought that, from their mother’s description, her children might well expect me to be a dog wearing a white lab coat and stethoscope. She arched an eyebrow and studied me. Wearing my tan cotton twill slacks and favorite striped shirt, I may not have looked as professional as I had yesterday, but I was infinitely more comfortable.
“Let’s go sit in the living room,” Sarah said, leading the way into a small room where an enormous sectional sofa left almost no space to walk. “Where the kids go, Mugsy goes, so I’m sure she’ll be here momentarily.”
To my surprise, not a fox terrier but rather a Scottish terrier bounded into what little floor space was left. The terrier was the classic solid black with pointy upright ears, a muzzle that I think of as sprouting a goatee, and those stubby legs that, truth be told, always struck me as disproportionately short. Not that I was anyone to talk. A split second later, a chubby, redheaded boy appeared around the corner, swinging into the room while gripping the door trim. He had a wooden gun in his hand that fired rubber bands. He pointed it at me and said, “Pow!”
“Pow yourself,” I replied, eyeing his gun. The dogs of my youth had been lucky. We didn’t have rubber-band guns back then, just air-propelled popguns that could spit corks all of five feet.
“Benjamin!” his mother scolded. The Scottie, in the meantime, began to bark, planting herself firmly in the center of the room between Benjamin and me, next to Benjamin’s mother.
“Hi,” the boy said confidently, meeting my gaze. He walked over to stand directly beside his dog. “My name is Benjamin. I’m six-and-a-half. My little sister’s shy.” He turned and shouted with excess volume, “It’s okay, Emmy! She’s kinda pretty and she doesn’t look mean!”
A little girl peered into the room. I caught a quick glimpse of carrot-colored curls. She immediately ducked from view. Maybe she disagreed with her brother’s assessment of my looks.
“Hi, I’m Allida Babcock,” I said to the children—or at least to the boy and to the doorway Emmy was hiding behind. “I thought you said you had a fox terrier,” I said to their mother. “Mugsy’s a Scottish terrier.”
“Di
d I?” She clicked her tongue and shook her head. “John’s always correcting me. Yes, Mugsy’s a Scottish terrier. Terriers all look the same to me.”
That was a bit hard for me to understand; not unlike claiming that all mountains look the same. Besides, Scottish terriers were quite popular. Their owners tended to name them “Scottie,” just in case anyone missed the point.
“Yep,” Benjamin said, grabbing the poor dog’s head in a hammerlock which instantly forced me to bite my tongue, this being too early for me to offer advice. “Mugsy’s a Scottie dog!”
It was not, however, too early for one of my patented, paint-peeling glares. Benjamin took one look at my face and released his grip on the dog. I love children, but my utter intolerance of pet abuse takes priority. Mugsy whined a little and backed away from Benjamin, but bravely maintained her post in the center of the room, looking in all directions as if she were a sheepdog whose flock was so scattered she didn’t know which one to rein in first. Judging from her bearing and the graying fur around her mouth, I guessed her age at seven or eight—just past middle-age for a dog this size.
“I take it Mugsy was your husband’s dog before you two met?”
Though I phrased the question to his mother, Benjamin immediately answered, “Our real dad lives in Oregon. Mugsy is my stepdad’s dog.”
“Oh, I see.”
“Benjamin,” Sarah said through an embarrassed smile. “You needn’t bore Ms. Babcock with our family business.”
“Actually, that’s very much part of Mugsy’s personal history, which I need to learn in order to get at the cause of her behavioral problems.” I had to say this to Sarah’s back while she left the room, but she soon returned with a diminutive little girl clinging to her leg.
“This is Emmy,” Sarah said in baby tones. “We’re a little shy, as you can probably see.”
“Hi, Emmy.”
The girl’s eyes widened, then she buried her face in Sarah’s dress.
“To tell you the truth, I h-a-t-e d-o-g-s,” Sarah spelled out.
No surprise there. I looked at Benjamin, who was mouthing the letters to himself, probably deciphering the words as fast as I was.
“If it were up to me, we’d put M-u-g-s-y to s-l-e-e-p.”
This remark caused the hairs on the back of my neck to rise. Put a dog to sleep just for nipping at heels a couple of times? I knelt and stroked Mugsy, thinking there was more than one bitch in the room.
Just then, the door opened, and a large, muscular man entered. He had a broad, appealing smile, and a receding hairline. “Hey, there. You must be Miss Babcock. I see you’ve already met my monsters,” he said, ruffling Benjamin’s hair. Mugsy leapt a good two inches or so, and he scooped her into his arms, let her lick his face, then gently set her down. He pumped my hand. “So, how bad are we doing here, Allida? Any fur flying?” He released my hand, then rubbed his stepdaughter’s back with a beefy hand and gave Sarah a kiss on the cheek.
“Mister John?” Benjamin asked. “What does ‘put Mugsy to sleep’ mean?”
John immediately shot a furious glare at his wife and then at me. Before I could respond, Sarah cringed and said, “Nobody’s saying a thing about that, Benjamin.”
“But you spelled that and—”
“That’s why you should never listen when Mommy spells!” Sarah retorted. “It means she’s having an adult conversation that you won’t be able to understand!”
Benjamin stomped his foot. Personally, I was on his side in this particular argument and wanted to stomp my own foot. He said, “But Mommy, you spelled ‘put Mugsy—’”
“Hush!” She grinned sheepishly at her husband and wrapped her hands around his arm. Over her son’s protestations, she said to her husband, “I was merely trying to voice a concern to Allida about Mugsy without upsetting the children.”
Emmy was now saying, “Mom?” and tugging on her mother’s dress so hard only one tippy-toe was left on the ground, and Benjamin’s objections were continuing in a grating, high-pitched whine.
“Doesn’t look like you succeeded,” John said sternly.
“Could we all sit down for a few minutes?” I asked, wishing I could join in with Mugsy and bite these people’s ankles till order was restored. “I need to ask some questions about Mugsy’s background and your daily routine with her.”
“What routine?” Sarah quipped. “It’s always a zoo around here.” As she spoke, she took a seat on the sectional and hoisted Emmy onto her lap. John sat down beside her and Mugsy took an uneasy seat between the big man’s feet, but Benjamin immediately climbed over the sectional, firing his rubber band at the wall in the process. “Benjamin! Sit down!” Sarah ordered. Mugsy instantly hopped up and punctuated Sarah’s words with shrill barks.
“Quiet, Mugsy!” John cried.
For the first time since I arrived, a silence fell over the room. My ears were ringing. I sighed, forced a smile, and said to John, “I’m just going to take a wild guess here and say that Mugsy hadn’t been around children much until you and Sarah got married.”
“That’s true.”
I turned my gaze to Sarah. “You and the children had no pets at all until you married John?”
“That’s right.” Sarah asked meekly, “Are we doing something wrong?”
I very much wanted to laugh at the obviousness of that answer, but didn’t. “Benjamin?” The boy was squirming around behind the couch section nearest the wall.
He raised up and said, “Yessy?”
“Can you tell me about the last time that Mugsy bit you?”
“Mugsy bit me.” He averted his eyes and started fidgeting with the wooden gun in his hands, reloading a rubber band.
“Where were you at the time?”
“Don’t remember.”
“Were you in your room?”
He shook his head. “This room.”
“And what were you doing?”
“Nothing.”
“Did you have anything in your hands at the time?”
Benjamin dropped the gun on the couch as if it were red hot and said, “No.”
“Benjamin!” John said. “Were you shooting rubber bands at Mugsy? Like we told you over and over again not to do?”
“No, I wasn’t!” Benjamin got to his feet and stuck his lip out. “I was shooting past her! We were playing cowboy and Indian.”
John rolled his eyes and let out a chagrined puff of air. “I told you so, Sarah. Mugsy was just defending herself.”
“This doesn’t explain why she bit Emmy, though,” Sarah said to me, stiffening. “I saw the whole thing, and Emmy didn’t do a thing to the dog. Emmy is always completely gentle with everything. Aren’t you, Emmy?”
Emmy nodded. She chanced a smile at me, then again buried her face against her mother. She was very cute with those big eyes and that glorious Irish-setter red hair.
“Were you scolding Emmy at the time?” I asked the mother.
“Why, yes. She’d made a mess, and I was sending her to her room for a time-out. But how could that have anything to do with the dog’s behavior? The incident had nothing whatsoever to do with Mugsy.”
“Was Mugsy nipping at Emmy’s heels as she went to her room?”
“Yes, and like I said, Emmy wasn’t doing a thing to her.”
“Mugsy was trying to help you discipline your daughter by helping to hurry her into her room.”
Sarah scoffed. “Oh, come on, now! Aren’t you anthropomorphizing here? How can a dog want to help discipline a child? Emmy’s still bigger than she is, after all, so she can’t possibly know the difference in authority between us and a child.”
“Sarah,” John said, “you’re underestimating Mugsy. She’s a smart dog. Right, Mugsy?”
Mugsy barked.
Sarah looked away in disgust.
“Could we let the children go back to their television show for a minute?” I asked.
Benjamin needed no other excuse and shot out of the room calling, “Bye,” behind him. Emmy waited a
moment, then ran after her brother. Mugsy, who’d briefly settled down once again at her master’s feet, got up and trotted to the hallway after the children, then stopped when she saw John wasn’t following. She watched him for a moment, then settled down in the hallway, within eyesight of John.
I waited until the children were out of earshot. John put his arm around his wife and stared at me as if bracing himself for some serious bad news.
“There are some things I can do to help you to get Mugsy to behave better. I have no doubt that we can make some adjustments and train her not to nip at the children, with the caveat that all dogs have sharp teeth and are capable of biting. Most importantly, you both have to start by training your son to be gentler with the dog.”
I leaned forward and lowered my voice. “However, Sarah, none of this might change the fact that you’re not happy living with this dog.”
Sarah squirmed in her seat a little, but said nothing.
I continued, “Before we can start, I need to know that you’re all truly committed to keeping Mugsy. Otherwise, I’ll be working with my hands tied. Dog ownership is a big responsibility. You don’t need to feel guilty if it doesn’t fit in with your lifestyle.” I turned my gaze to John. “You need to ask yourself whether or not Mugsy and your family would be happier if Mugsy were re-homed.”
“You think I need to give up my dog?” John asked.
“No, I think the first step is going to be for you and your wife to decide if you need to give up your dog.”
“Of course we don’t want to give her up. Do we, honey?”
Sarah shook her head and said, “No,” but her body language and facial expression showed ambivalence at best.
I rose. “Please call me at my office after you’ve had some time to think about this and to discuss it. Let me know what you decide. Either way, I can help.”
Sarah sprang to her feet and shook my hand, saying, “Thank you so much.”
“You’re welcome.” I gave her a smile as close to reassuring as I could muster. Some of my best friends are dog haters. I consider this their loss, but not a personality flaw. On the other hand, none of my friends had threatened to put a dog they didn’t happen to like to sleep. “I’ll send you a bill for this visit, as we discussed on the phone.”
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