The Case of the Swirling Killer Tornado

by John R. Erickson

  “Hush, I’m just about to wrap this thing up. You supposed and assumed that he was selling cattle . . .”

  “It’s a funnel.”

  “All right, have it your way. You insist that he was selling funnels but he might just as well have been selling watermelons or horse feed, fence posts or barbed wire.”

  “Hank, I’m getting scared.”

  “Never fear the truth, Drover, even when it proves you wrong. Nothing is truer than the truth . . . and that roar seems to be getting louder and louder, doesn’t it?”

  “Yeah, and that big black funnel is coming closer and closer.”

  “What? Speak up. I can’t hear you over the roar . . . the wind seems to be picking up all of a sudden, doesn’t it?”

  “Hank, that thing doesn’t look natural. It’s HUGE!”

  “What ‘thing’ are we talking about?”

  “Turn around and look over this way.”

  Just to humor the little mutt, I turned around and did a quick scan of the Western Quadrant. “I see nothing, Drover, nothing but darkness and . . .” A spear of lightning cut across the dark sky and . . .

  HUH?

  “My goodness, what is that thing? It looks like a . . . well, a huge black funnel, you might say.”

  “That’s what I was trying to tell you.”

  “Sometimes you have trouble communicating, Drover, and . . . all at once the pieces of the puzzle are coming together. Loper wasn’t talking to a sales­man. He was referring to the CELLAR, going to the cellar! And that fits in perfectly with all the talk about tornadoes, don’t you see?”

  “I thought it was a hurricane.”

  “We were misquoted, Drover, it happens all the time. Yes! The cellar, the roaring sound, the funnel . . . it’s all fitting together, like a great big patchwork quilt. We’ve solved the mystery, Drover. There’s a tornado running loose, and I guess you know what that means.”

  “Yeah, it’s fixing to run over us.”

  “Exactly, unless we stiffen our backs, stand our ground, and bark as we’ve never barked before!”

  “Oh my leg!”

  “Don’t squeak. Bark! Throw your whole body and soul into it. This one is for the ranch, Drover, so give it your best shot. Ready? Commence Heavy Duty Barking!”

  Boy, you should have seen us! Standing alone on that windswept hill, we turned to face the charge of the Deadly Swirling Hurricane . . . Tornado, that is, just as I had suspected all along.

  Yes, a terrible tornado. We snarled and snapped. We lunged and growled.

  Was I scared? Not a bit. There’s something about the excitement of combat that brings out hidden reserves of courage in a dog. The more you bark, the more you want to bark. The harder you fight, the harder you want to . . .

  Okay, maybe we began to feel a little uneasy when the Thing didn’t turn and run. I mean, we’d given it some pretty stern barking and . . . gulp . . . it should have stopped or . . . paused or . . . gulp . . . at least slowed down a little bit.

  But it kept coming closer and closer and . . . you know, that Thing was turning out to be a whole lot bigger than I had . . . we’re talking BIG like nothing I had ever seen before.

  Hey fellers, that Thing wasn’t just as big as a house, it was as big as the whole horse pasture . . . it was as big as a whole entire mountain! It was . . .

  It was time for us to abandon ship, retreat, and get our little selves out of . . .

  Chapter Eleven: Strange Creatures in the Tornado

  You want some good friendly advice? The next time you get a chance to bark at a tornado, go bark at a pickup.

  Tornadoes, we discovered, pay exactly zero attention to barking dogs, even your finest top-of-the-line, blue-ribbon cowdogs.

  So what happened? You’re probably sitting on the edge of your chair, biting your toenails, and wondering what became of us two heroic guard dogs.

  Well, we didn’t succeed in stopping the tornado, but our barking did seem to alter its course. It missed headquarters, but I’m sorry to report that it didn’t miss us.

  All at once, it was upon us—this huge swirling Thing, this towering column of meanness and violence—all at once it was upon us. I shouted the order to retreat, but by then it was too late.

  All around us things were lifting off the ground and flying through the air—dust, sprigs of grass, weeds, straw, and two dogs. Yes, although we tried to make a run for safety, we were swept up into the center of the storm.

  Have you ever seen Sally May catch flies with her vacuum sweeper? Maybe not, but I have. Some­­times she’ll find a bunch of noisy flies around her windows, and instead of smashing them (which is fun but creates a mess that has to be cleaned up), she goes for her vacuum sweeper and sucks ’em down the hose.

  Pretty clever idea, but the point is that the tornado did pretty muchly the same thing to me and Drover. And all at once we were airborne, whizzing through the air and seeing a whole bunch of things you’d never expect to see whizzing through the air.

  Things such as: the head and fan of an Aer­-mo­tor windmill; three galvanized stock tanks; a sixteen-foot stock trailer; a boy’s bicycle; three utility poles that had been broken off like matchsticks; a dozen chickens; several cottonwood trees; and two buzzards.

  That’s correct, two buzzards. They were sitting on a limb of one of the cottonwood trees and . . . well, here was the conversation that unfolded. It was pretty strange. They were just waking up, don’t you see, and Wallace was the first to notice us.

  “Son? Junior? You’d best wake up, son, I’m a-seeing some strange things in the air.”

  “W-w-what?”

  “I said wake up, Junior, ’cause all at once and for no good reason, I’m a-seeing dogs flying around our tree.”

  “D-d-d-dogs? Is that w-w-what you s-s-said, P-pa?”

  “That’s right, son. Two dogs are a-flying around this tree right this very moment, even as we speak.”

  “Oh, y-y-y-you’re just d-d-dreaming, Pa. G-g-go back to s-s-s-sleep, back to sleep.”

  “I ain’t dreaming, Junior, there are two dogs a-swooping around this tree, now you open your eyes and wake up, do you hear me?”

  “Oh d-d-darn. I j-just got to s-s-s-s-sleep, and n-now you’re w-w-waking m-me up.” Junior lifted his ugly buzzard head off his chest, opened his eyes, and stared at us. “Oh m-m-my g-g-g-goodness!”

  “Do you see ’em, son? Do you see them two dogs right out there in front of our tree? Tell me you do, son, because otherwise I’m having terrible hallusitanias.”

  “Oh m-my g-g-goodness, y-yes, I s-s-see ’em.”

  “Two, dogs? You see ’em? Oh praise the Lord, I thought I’d lost my marbles, sure ’nuff.”

  “Y-y-yep, t-two, d-d-dogs f-flying around our t-t-tree, P-pa, j-j-just like you s-s-said, like you said.”

  Wallace craned his neck and stared at us for a long time. “Now Junior, the next question is this: How on earth can two dogs be a-flying around our tree, is the next question.”

  “W-w-well, l-let me th-think. M-maybe they’re b-b-bird dogs.”

  “I don’t think bird dogs fly, son. Bird dogs hunt birds, is what they do, but they don’t fly, and them two dogs are flyin’, sure ’nuff. What do you reckon is going on here?”

  “W-w-well, it b-b-beats me, but one of th-them is our d-d-doggie friend.” He waved his wing, ‘Hi, d-d-doggie.’ “And m-m-maybe we could, uh, ask him.”

  “Good thinkin’, son. I’ll do the talkin’.” Wallace puffed himself up and gave us a hateful glare. “What are y’all dogs doing, lurkin’ around our tree in the middle of the night like a couple of I-don’t-know-whats? This here’s our cottonwood tree, it’s our buzzard roost, and ya’ll have no business being here, but since you are, what are you doing here and I never knew that dogs could fly.”

  Whilst Drover was dog-paddling through the air and tryi
ng to figure how to limp when there was no ground underfoot—whilst he was busy with other matters, I turned my attention to the buzzards.

  “Evening, Junior. Howdy, Wallace.”

  “Don’t you howdy-Wallace me, pooch, just answer the question. What’s a-going on around here?”

  “Well, Wallace, it seems that the four of us have gotten involved in a tornado.” No response from the buzzards. “Hello? Anybody home? Tor-na-do. A powerful storm that can pick up dogs and buzzards and send them flying through the air.”

  “Pooch, if I want a weather report, I’ll ask a groundhog. What are you a-doing around our tree, is what I want to know.”

  “I told you, you bird-brain. We’ve all been swept up in a tornado.”

  Wallace glared at me. “Dog, that is one of the most ignert things I ever heard. In case you didn’t notice, we’re a-roosting in our cottonwood tree.”

  “Yeah, well, your cottonwood tree is flying around in a tornado, and you just happen to be attached to it.”

  “It ain’t.”

  “It sure as thunder is, and if you don’t believe me . . .” Just then a milk cow floated past. “If you don’t believe me, then maybe you’d like to talk about flying milk cows.”

  Wallace’s eyes popped open and his beak dropped about six inches. Then he shook his head in disgust and turned back to Junior.

  “Son, you talk to him. I can’t understand what that dog’s trying to say. Something about a storm somewhere.”

  “W-w-well, I think h-he s-said w-we got s-swooped up in a t-t-t-t-t . . . storm, a tornado storm.”

  “A tornado? Do you mean a cyclone, a terrible swirling storm?”

  “Y-Yeah, only it’s c-c-called a t-t-tornado, tornado, P-pa.”

  “It ain’t. It’s called a cyclone. That’s what my daddy called it. That’s what my granddaddy called it, and that’s what it IS—a cyclone.”

  “W-w-well, whatever, Pa. C-cyclone or t-t-t-tornado, w-w-w-we’re in the m-m-middle of one that p-p-pulled up our r-r-roosting tree.”

  The old man’s eyes darted from me and back to Junior. “Well, why didn’t he just say so?”

  “I th-think he d-d-did, Pa.”

  “No, he never. He was jabbering about . . . I don’t know what-all. Groundhogs and milk cows, and furthermore . . .” He whirled around and faced me again. “And furthermore, puppy, I have lived on this earth for a long time and I’ve never been swooped up in a cyclone before, never even seen one, and . . .” Back to Junior. “Son, do you reckon we really are in a cyclone?”

  “W-w-well, I d-don’t s-see any g-g-ground under our t-t-t-tree, d-d-do you?”

  Wallace looked down. “No, I most certainly don’t, and son, I told you there was something bad in them clouds and we needed to watch ’em close.”

  “Y-y-you d-did not.”

  “Did too.”

  “D-d-d-did n-not, ’cause y-y-you f-f-fell right off to s-s-sleep, to sleep.”

  “Well, I meant to. It sure crossed my mind, and if I didn’t exactly say it, I sure . . .” He whirled around to me. “All right, dog, maybe you ain’t as crazy as I thought.”

  “Gee, thanks, Wallace. Sometimes you say the nicest things.”

  “But don’t let it go to your head. The point is, if we’re all flyin’ around inside a cyclone, what do we do next?”

  “To be real honest about it, I don’t know. This is my first one. I guess we could sing.”

  His eyes widened and his beak twisted into an ugly snarl. “Sing! Why, that’s the ignertest thing you’ve said since the last ignert thing you said. Singin’ never helped anybody survive a cyclone, and besides all that, I don’t like music, never have.”

  Junior’s face broke into a big smile. “Y-y-yeah, but I j-just love to s-s-s-sing, P-pa.” He turned to me. “W-w-we’d j-just l-love to s-s-sing, love to sing, d-d-doggie.”

  Wallace grumbled to himself and turned his back on us. “We would not. It’ll be a cold snowy day in Brownsville when I sing with a dog, for crying out loud, in the middle of a cyclone! I never heard of such an ignert thing.”

  “Oh c-c-c-come on, P-pa, d-d-don’t be s-such a g-g-grouch, such a grouch.”

  “I am a grouch, I’m proud to be a grouch, and I plan to be a grouch for the rest of my life, and anybody who don’t like it can go sit on a great big tack, is what he can do.”

  By then, I had come up with a compromise solution. “Tell you what, Wallace, the song I have in mind has four parts, so we need your voice. But you don’t have to sing pretty. You sing grouchy and we’ll sing pretty.”

  He whirled around. “Now, I might go for a deal like that, but I ain’t going to sing pretty or even try to sing pretty, because I ain’t a dainty little warbler . . .” He whirled back to Junior. “And neither are you, son, and you’d best remember who you are. We’re buzzards, son.”

  “Uh, okay, P-pa.”

  “And buzzards ain’t warblers or little humming­birds.”

  “F-f-fine, P-pa.”

  “Buzzards is buzzards, and we’re proud of our Buzzardhood, and buzzards never sing pretty.”

  “Uh, okay, f-f-fine, y-you b-b-bet, P-pa. S-s-start the s-s-song, d-d-doggie.”

  And with that . . . well, you’ll see.

  Chapter Twelve: Wow, What a Great Ending!

  You ever sing the kind of song that’s called a “round”?

  It’s a song that . . . hmmm, that’s kind of hard to describe, come to think of it. Everybody sings the same verse, don’t you see, but they come in at different times and somehow it all fits together.

  Examples? Okay, “Three Blind Mice” is one, and so is “Row, Row, Row Your Boat,” and so is “Why Doesn’t My Goose Sing as Well as Thy Goose.” And I’ll bet that at some time in your life, you’ve sung one of those songs as a round.

  And that’s what we did, only we spiffed it up. See, we started off singing “Why Doesn’t My Goose” as a round. Then we split up and each of us took a different song and we sang them ALL as a round, at the same time.

  Pretty impressive, huh? You bet it was. Old Mister Sour Puss took the “Goose” song, Junior took “Row Your Boat,” and Drover took “Three Blind Mice.”

  Never in all of history had two dogs and two buzzards attempted such an amazing musical fiasco in the middle of a tornado.

  Furthermore, whilst the other three guys were singing the other three songs in a round, I contributed snippets from . . . you’ll never guess and boy, will you be surprised . . .

  . . . from the “Hallelulia Chorus.”

  I told you you’d be shocked, stunned, speechless, impressed beyond description, and sure enough, you were.

  You should have heard it. In fact, you ought to hear it. It’s on the cassette tape version of this story.

  Anyways, it turned out to be a total knock-out song and we were all thrilled with it . . . everyone but Wallace, that is, who was determined to be unthrilled and unimpressed, but nobody cared what he thought anyway.

  We might have kept right on singing but for one small detail that you probably forgot: We were taking a ride on a runaway tornado, and all at once . . . something changed.

  Maybe the winds slacked off. Maybe the tornado went up or down. Maybe the tornado didn’t like our music. But something happened, and the next thing we knew, the tornado had spit us out, so to speak, and we found ourselves, all four of us, blown into the topmost branches of a huge cotton­wood tree.

  And this was a normal cottonwood, the kind with its roots in the ground on Planet Earth. The tornado went roaring away, and suddenly we found ourselves surrounded by total silence.

  Wallace broke the silence with his hacksaw voice. “Junior, where are we at?”

  “W-w-well, I d-don’t know, P-pa, but I th-think w-w-w-we’re out of the t-t-t-tornado, th-thank g-g-goodness.”

  “It was a cyclone, son.”r />
  “T-t-tornado.”

  “Cyclone.”

  “T-t-t-tornado.”

  “Son, it was a cyclone but never mind because we have survived, which is wonderful news, but I wonder if them two dogs might have suffered a . . . you know, we ain’t had full grub in several days, Junior, and why don’t we check on our buddies and see.”

  “Sorry, Wallace,” I said. “We’re over here and doing fine, and we sure appreciate your concern.”

  He heaved a sigh and gave his head a shake. “A buzzard is always an optimist and that’s why we get our hearts broke so many times. All right, Junior, we’ve had all the fun I can stand, it’s time to get airborne and hunt grub.”

  “It was fun, Wallace.”

  “Fun for you, puppy dog, ’cause you’ve got nothing better to do than to goof off and sing silly songs, but we buzzards get paid by the job, yes we do, and no workie, no eat. Come on, Junior, my belly button’s rubbin’ a hole in my backbone.”

  He pushed himself off the limb and went flapping off into the darkness. Junior grinned and waved a wing good-bye and said, “W-w-well, s-s-see you n-next t-t-time, d-d-doggie.” And then he flew away, leaving Drover and me alone with our thoughts—and with a pretty serious problem.

  See, you might have thought our story had reached a happy ending, but that’s not the case. Yes, we had just ridden a wild bucking tornado completely into the ground, and yes, we had even managed to spend a couple of hours in Sally May’s house without getting ourselves strangled or shot.

  Not bad for one night’s work, but now we faced another stern challenge: We were hung up in the topmost branches of a very large cottonwood. And in case you didn’t know, we dogs are not tree­climbers. We don’t climb up trees, and we don’t climb down trees either.

  And to make matters even worse, we had no idea where we and that tree were located. We might have been in Oklahoma or Kansas or Nebraska, for all I knew, which means that this story might end with us . . .

  Gee whiz, just think about the terrible possibilities. We might starve to death in the top of the tree, or fall to our deaths below, or become orphans and vagabonds in a strange location.