by J. D. Robb
I wasn’t technically allowed on the couch, but I had perfected the art of the stealthy creep, the discreet, painfully slow advance whose key element is patience. It almost always worked, and sometimes, when he noticed it in progress, it even made Sam laugh. Tonight I’d been especially successful by ending up between him and Benny, not curled in the smallest ball I could make on Benny’s far side, for invisibility. Ahh. This was the life. Everybody touching. Fidgety Benny on one side, warm, steady Sam on the other.
Sam let a lot of time go by without answering Benny’s question. Something in the newspaper seemed to have him enthralled. Did he think Benny would forget? What a dreamer.
“Daddy, what does ‘spayed’ mean?”
Sam put the paper down. “Spay. It’s an operation they perform on a girl dog so she can’t have any babies. Any puppies.”
“Why?”
“Why what?”
“Why can’t she have any puppies?”
“Because they fix her so she can’t. They tie things up in her stomach. No puppies can come out. Say, how many more days till your birthday?”
“Does it hurt?”
“No.”
“But Sonoma would make good puppies. She’d make great puppies. How did she get out?” Benny veered, dropping the puppy question. “How’d she get out of the house?”
“I guess she got out while we were leaving this morning. That’s all I can figure—she slipped out the door and we didn’t notice. We’ll have to be more careful from now on.”
Sam had checked every window and door in the house—I went with him. He found the open casement window over the oil tank and closed it, but not once did it cross his mind that it might’ve been my escape route. No dog could be that clever or that dexterous, he was thinking. I felt so proud.
Back to puppies. “What if Sonoma got so many puppies inside her stomach and they couldn’t come out and she exploded! She could blow up. She could—pwow!”
“No, that wouldn’t happen. Are you getting excited? The big six is next Sunday.”
“Why not?”
“Because it just wouldn’t. They tie things up so she doesn’t even make puppies.”
Whoa, edging over into dangerous territory there. I perked up my ears.
But for a change, Benny missed a grown-up reference and went back to “Why?”
“Because . . . it’s better to have just one dog than six or seven dogs.”
“Why? No, it isn’t.”
“Because six or seven dogs would be too hard to take care of.”
“I would take care of them!”
“So we have to fix Sonoma so she’s our one and only dog, our main dog. She gets all the love and attention.” Oh, very nice. But then Sam went too far. “Like an only child.”
“Like me?”
“Right.”
“But I don’t want to be an only child!”
Sam blanched, but I don’t know who that hurt worse, him or me. “It’s different for dogs,” he tried. “Sonoma will be happiest with just us. She’ll have a good life, a much better life, if she’s our one and only dog.”
“How old will she get?”
“I don’t know. Pretty old, though. We hope.”
“Will she die?”
“Someday. A long time from now, we hope.”
My son put a very gentle hand on my neck. Sam rubbed my back softly. At least talk of my eventual demise had gotten them off the puppy subject. I imagined Sam’s relief.
I lay my head on his thigh. We used to talk about having another child. We both wanted one, and then . . . I don’t know what happened. He’d bring it up every once in a while, and I’d stall. “Oh, I can’t take off work right now to have a baby, the market’s too good” or “the market’s too bad.” I’d say, “Don’t you like things the way they are right now? I’m only thirty-two,” or thirty-three, or thirty-f our. Well, now I’m thirty-fi ve (five in dog years). What would I say to Sam if he brought up the baby question today? My reasons always sounded sensible, but maybe I was just being selfish. I knew it was there, but I never let myself feel Sam’s disappointment. And now it was so much clearer—as if I could see him through his skin. Or as if I’d taken myself out of the picture, so I could see Sam in perfect focus. Unbiased. My motives and ambitions and vanities no longer in the way.
This must be how dogs saw us all the time.
What had I been thinking? Of course I wanted more children! I loved babies. In a flash—this was very peculiar, and powerful for the instant it lasted—I pictured myself lying on my side, nursing six or seven at the same time. Not nearly as disturbing an image as it might’ve been, and it cleared my head.
Getting myself back was more vital than ever now, and it had to be soon. Soon, before Sam made an appointment with the vet.
After he put Benny to bed, Sam went into the den and called Ronnie Lewis.
“I’m looking at the bid, Ron, and I think we should take it.”
I knew it! He’s so naïve about money. He’s a dreamer, not a schemer. Fine, I love that about him—but Sam, for Pete’s sake, don’t take the first offer!
Ron told him the same thing.
“I know, Ron, but I don’t want the hassle. I can’t deal with it right now. Let’s just take it and get it over with. I’ve thought about it, and that’s what I want to do.”
Ronnie talked for a while.
“Okay, that all sounds fine. One thing, Ron—you said there was a check with this stuff? Hand money?” He fanned out the envelope and papers in front of him on the desk. “Um, well, no, I’ve looked and it’s not here.” Ron’s voice got higher; I could almost hear his words. I didn’t need to, of course; I could easily imagine them. “No, I’ve looked,” Sam said again. “Well, I guess, I don’t know; maybe it got—maybe you . . . Nope, not here. Yeah, I guess you’d better call him and see if . . . Okay. I’m here. I’ll sit tight.”
Sam hung up. I felt his eyes on me, and pretended to be asleep.
May I just say, escaping through a high basement window is child’s play compared to sliding a check out of a paper clip on a three-page stapled document without disarranging the papers or leaving any drool. Eating the check was even harder because for some reason it tasted like gasoline. But a dog does what she has to do.
I felt bad for Ron. You couldn’t lose a ten-thousand-dollar deposit check without seriously queering the deal, even if the buyer was reasonable, and this one didn’t sound like he was. How did I know? Instinct and experience. Luckily Ron was the boss, so at least no one could fire him.
He called back faster than I expected. Spoke very softly; I couldn’t hear a thing. Sam kept apologizing, trying to make him feel better. “Geez, I’m sorry. I don’t know how it could’ve happened. So even though he could put a stop-payment on it, he doesn’t . . . ? Honest to God, it’s not here. I’ve looked several times, gone through the whole . . . Well, hell, it’s not your fault. Don’t worry about it, seriously. It’s okay, we’ll just start over. Forget it, Ron, I mean it. It’s just one of those things. It’s a mystery.”
Maybe it was my guilty conscience, but after he hung up I thought Sam looked at me strangely. Suspiciously. I thunked my tail and grinned at him. We had a staring contest, Sam’s gaze squinted and searching, mine blinky sleepy and innocent. I won.
“Let’s go for a walk,” he said, standing up. “Want to go for a walk?”
Outside, I noticed a new spring in his step, a lightness on his end of the leash. It wouldn’t last forever—Ron Lewis was too good a salesman—but for the time being, there would be one less thing for Sam to feel sad about. Because of me.
Good dog.
In the week that followed, escape was the last thing on my mind. Instead I was a model of courtesy and decorum. I sat, lay down, and shook on command, I came when called, and at all open doors I halted, ostentatiously waiting for an invitation to proceed. Butter would not melt in my mouth. By Sunday, Sam’s trust had rebounded so completely, without a second thought he granted me the
thing I wanted most: permission to attend Benny’s birthday party. Free, untied, walking around in the yard just like another guest. Only furry and better behaved.
The afternoon was perfect. Good thing, because eight sugar-saturated six-year-olds stuck in our small living room on a rainy day would’ve been a disaster. (We learned that last year, on Benny’s fifth birthday.) The theme was crazy hats—everybody had to wear a crazy hat, and sweet Benny’s was the red and white striped stovepipe from Dr. Seuss. He looked adorably goofy. He was—and I was not one bit prejudiced—absolutely the cutest, most adorable child at the party. But strangely—I liked them, of course, but I’d never been indiscriminately wild about other people’s children—strangely, on this day I found myself in love with all of them. I can say I’ve never had as much fun in my life as I did running and chasing and romping and playing with Benny and his friends. I loved being mauled, tackled, yanked on, ridden. It was as if we were all six. Or all dogs. I don’t know, but I’ve never felt such a sheer blending of—of creatures, just species-l ess beings intent on nothing but delight.
Lunch at the picnic table was a judicious mix of healthy foods disguised as junk and junk, and the games afterward were fun but also thoughtful and creative, the kind you read about in parenting magazines but never quite pull off in real life. Sam deserved some of the credit, but it was clear to me who the real brain behind this party was. Not that it took a genius to figure it out. Monica had arrived an hour early with bags of tasteful party decorations and a homemade—what else?—three-l ayer yellow cake with chocolate ganache and toffee chips spelling out BENNY. Sam set the table, and Brian Kimmel’s mother stayed to help out with the present-opening, but at my son’s sixth birthday party Monica Carr was obviously the co-host. And official photographer.
“Boys and girls! May I have your attention? Let’s come to order, people!” That didn’t work, so she picked up the whistle around her neck and blew it. “Everybody, we need to take our seats at the table again! So the show can begin!”
The show? Ah, so that’s what that curtain thing was—I thought it was for some new educational game. It was a circular, upright contraption, like a very small shower enclosure, surrounded by a colorful patterned curtain made from a sheet. Was Sam in there? I couldn’t smell him, but my senses were overloaded. He’d disappeared into the house a few minutes ago, so I really should’ve known.
Hmm. Was this a good idea? Benny wasn’t five anymore. What if, instead of making him proud, his magician father embarrassed him? And Sam always said magic was 10 percent technique, 90 percent presentation—how was he going to present himself as anything other than the neighborhood guy most of these children had known all their lives? How could he make magic out of what he’d always been to them: Benny’s dad?
Monica was the emcee. After she got everybody settled, a magic trick in itself, she launched into a rousing introduction to whip up excitement, winding up with, “And now . . . I present to you . . . the amazing . . . the incredible . . . The Great Sambini!”
She pulled the curtain back with a flourish to reveal—nothing. She gasped, looked horrified, tried it again. “The Great . . . Sambini!” Nothing. Third time’s the charm, and I had to admit she had the kids going by now—worried but not too worried. “The Great . . . Sambini!”
A puff of smoke, and Sam appeared—from behind a second colorful patterned sheet, I assumed, but the effect was too fast to see. Out he strode, coughing, waving his hands at the smoke. He didn’t look like himself. He’d moussed his hair into alarming tufts and spikes that shot out all over, making him look beyond eccentric, possibly insane. He wore turquoise and gold striped pants and a gold vest, high-top sneakers, a polka-dot tie. One shirttail hung out under the vest, and a pair of horn-rimmed glasses kept slipping down his nose. Okay, he was a sort of wizard nerd, but the image didn’t gel. He was still Sam, until he started talking.
“Mmm, good afternoon, ladies and germs,” came out in a nasal, adenoidal drone, followed by more coughing and silly noises like “Bleh! Haw. Brak.” “Allergies,” he explained, pulling a yellow handkerchief from his pocket and waving it at the smoke. “I mmunderstand it’s somebody’s birthday? Who would that beee? Who is the birthday mmperson today?” he wondered in the tenor nerd voice, nervous and sweet, a sound I’d never heard come from his mouth before.
“Me.” Benny raised his hand, grinning, blushing.
“Me? No, oh, no, mine’s in April, I’m almost sure.”
“No!” said Benny, laughing with the others. “It’s my birthday.”
“Oh, you. Well, I knew that—I am, mmm, the Great Sambini! Now, don’t tell me—your name is mmm . . .”
“Benny!” the kids shouted.
“No, no, starts with a Q. Mmm, I mean J, starts with a J. It’s . . . Joaquin?”
“No, Benny!”
“No, no, that’s not it. Don’t tell me; the Great Sambini knows all. Mmm, your name is . . .” He pressed his fist to his forehead. “Montague.”
“No,” they shouted, “it’s Benny!” giggling but spell-bound. Like me, they knew it was Sam, and yet it wasn’t Sam. It didn’t hurt that while he talked he kept making wild efforts to get rid of the scarf, but it seemed to be glued first to one hand, then to the other.
“Benny? Really? Mmm, if you say so. Happy birthday, Benny. How does it feel to be thirty-n ine?”
“Six.”
“Six!” The Great Sambini went closer, squinting at Benny through the horn-rims. “Here, hold this.” Benny took one end of the scarf, and when Sam backed up, a dozen more came with him, like a string of yellow sausages between their two hands. “Hey,” Sam exclaimed, “how’d you do that?”
“You did it!” the children shouted.
“I did it? Oh, I seriously doubt that. Here, I’ll, mmm, take those.” He reeled the silks back, stuffing them into one closed hand and opening it to discover, in more apparent amazement, they were gone. “Why, you, you scarf thief,” he blustered. “Luckily the Great Sambini knows where you hid them. Aha!” Little Justin Carr jumped in delight when Sam yanked another long parade of scarves out of his ear. “Thieves and pickpockets, mmm, tsk tsk tsk, what are they teaching our young people these days?” He kept stuffing scarves into his pants pocket—but of course, the more he stuffed, the longer the string grew. “Quit it,” he ordered Justin. “Quit that, I say,” which cracked the kids up. His fussbudgety irritation tickled them, and they loved being in on the joke that his incompetence was feigned. They knew they were, literally, in good hands.
Sam made more scarves appear and disappear, multiply and divide, he made a blue and white scarf turn into a blue and white striped scarf, on and on, and somehow each trick was a conspiracy against him. The kids were doing them, not the Great Sambini, who was getting more and more steamed. Suddenly his aggravated face cleared. “No wonder! Of course!” He slapped his forehead. “I forgot my magic hat! Can’t do a thing without it.”
Out came a flat red disc from an inside pocket. He took a deep breath. “Magic air,” he peeped in a squeaky voice, then blew on the disc. It inflated into a red felt homburg. Which fell off his spiky-h aired head as soon as he stuck it on. Much hilarious hat schtick ensued, Chaplin-i nspired, and tricks with a wand-cane I’d never seen him do before.
In fact, this whole act was new to me. Sam had done gigs at trade shows, adult parties, once a cruise ship, where he appeared variously as Sam Summer, Magician; Milo Marvelle, Master of Mystery; The Prodigious Presto, Prince of Prestidigitation (“but you can just call me Your Excellency”). I’d seen bits and pieces of all of them, and occasionally the whole act in front of a live audience. And I never really got it. Magic was silly, wasn’t it? Because there’s no such thing. Not that Sam wasn’t good. Prospero the Prince of Magic was smooth, suave, sexy, confident, everything you could want in a magician—if you wanted a magician. I never had.
Now I was starting to get it. He hadn’t picked the persona of a blowhard or a clown or a doofus for these kids. He was more of a d
isgruntled Peter Pan, a grown-up child as enchanted, under the aggravation, with the wonderful things he could do as they were. As the act went on even his face changed, lost years, lost strain, and his body seemed to grow suppler and more agile. As a result, eight six-year-olds became rapt and obedient, no jeering or mouthing off, not a single wise guy. Just laughter and wonderment.
I couldn’t laugh, but I could wag my tail when Sam botched the coin vanish, and especially the disappearing egg. The kids laughed so hard, Kayla Logan fell out of her seat. I stopped wagging, though, when Sam pulled two yard-l ong pieces of cord from a pocket and announced he needed two volunteers for his final and extremely difficult trick, Magic Handcuffs.
He picked Allen Hansen and Ethan Carr, Justin’s twin. “Watch carefully! Don’t blink!” he instructed as he tied knots with the cords around four little wrists, stringing the cords together in the process so that, when he finished, Allen’s rope hung in a loose loop around Ethan’s.
“Are you stuck? Try to get away from each other. Nope, they’re stuck. But! Mmm. If they’ve got magic, mmm, mojo, they will miraculously break free! We’ll give them one minute! You have one minute to get free. You can do anything but you cannot untie the knots. Ready? One minute, starting . . . now. Go!”
They started out self-consciously, testing the ropes with tentative moves like putting their arms around each other from the back, the front. But frustration, crowd laughter, and Sam’s constant countdown—“Thirty more seconds! Twenty-fi ve! Twenty-f our!”—soon had them in a heap on the ground, thrashing and wrestling like kittens, arms and legs tangled. Allen lost a shoe. Everybody thought it was a riot, everybody but me. I knew where this was heading.
“Time!”
Spent, the boys lay flat in the grass, red-f aced and still giggling, while Sam undid the knots around their wrists.
“Too bad, nice try, but now I, the Great Sambini, shall demonstrate, before your wondering eyes, the mystery of Magic Handcuffs. For this difficult trick I will need a mmm partner. A magic partner, it goes without mmm saying. Anyone?” All hands shot up. Sam covered his eyes and pointed to, surprise, surprise, Monica. “Monica the Marvelous!”