by David Kersey
CHAPTER FORTY TWO
Winter, when rainbows are placed on injured reserve and darkness earns much more playing time, did not obey my plea for skipping a turn at the plate. But, on the brighter side, winter is when my brain puts in extra practice for there is not much in the landscape of life to distract me.
Today, a late February day, is one of those blustery grey days that signals the continuation of winter’s bleak pall, so it’s time to busy my brain while my body suffers the blahs. I will lay here and think, in other words, perform an exercise in procrastination, for who wants to take the morning run in a below zero degree wind chill? I’ll stay in the basement and practice my spelling and run later, much later, like tomorrow. Maybe.
Did I tell you that John managed to have a much oversized computer keyboard made for me? Yup, he did, with each of the lettered keys two and a quarter inches square, and by rearranging some of the theater chairs, placed it dead center in front of the 103 inch TV screen, but not so close as to bulge my eyes into cue balls. I suppose you wouldn’t be overly surprised to know that an eighteen year old built it. In his garage. While listening to hip hop music for Pete’s sake. With a pony tail. No, his name isn’t Gates, but close, it’s Yates. Randy Yates, a college freshman over at Kent State. I imagine he’ll someday form a company named Yapple, who knows? I have already worn off the lettering of the backspace bar since the keys used to type are smaller than my paws, but hey, I’m getting the hang of the jumbled up mess of letters that a geek seriously under the influence of hallucinogenic mushrooms invented eons ago. I guess if you have fingers and a thumb you have the advantage over me and the keyboard arrangement works fine for you. But to a Golden Retriever like me with webbed paws the letter arrangement makes as much sense as easy listening music on a hayride, or a suicide bomber on his second assignment. I make a ton of mistakes.
B U C K. Easy to type. Learned that four months ago when John, well, really it was Marlene that taught me to find the shapes of letters that spelled my name. Seeing my name on the giant screen doesn’t pump up my ego all that much, probably less than hitting a walk off grand slam. On the other hand it could be more, it depends on if I have an audience and that happens now and then when Sheriff Chip visits. He comes around often now that John and Marlene are the lovebirds he had hoped.
Speaking of love, being the dashing cavalier that I am, I also know how to expand those four letters into……
B U C K L O V E S C A S S I E
That way when she wakes up and sees what I’ve left on the screen she’ll know that I’ve not only been a good boy by practicing my spelling but also telling her the truth about the size of my heart for her. By the way, I can tell she comes in here and sneaks using the keyboard when I’m not looking. You see, I know the difference between the Milk Bone crumbs and the Friskies crumbs that somehow find their way in the crevices too small to clean. I think keyboards should have a crumb tray like some toasters do, don’t you? Easy fix….just have an underlying slide tray….pull it out, and bingo, months of telltale overindulgences drop out of sight, along with the alien life forms that also manage to procreate in those tiny spaces. My belly could use a slide tray come to think of it.
“Good morning, Buck.”
“And good morning to you, Cassie.”
Every time I look at her I drool, for she is the most beautiful pure as fresh snow white cat from head to toe, except for a pink nose, matching pink toes, and large sapphire eyes that curl upward slightly in Oriental fashion. In sunlight she glistens as though prisms of light dance on the tips of her coat. If there is such a thing as FELINE magazine she would undoubtedly be the cover cat.
“It’s so cold outside I think our noses would run faster than our legs, but it’s up to you Cass, I’ll go if you go.” We run in the mornings without fail. Well, that’s not altogether true, not on a frigid morning like this one, when a flasher would have to settle for describing himself.
“No way, Jose, we don’t need to run when it’s this cold. I see you’ve been practicing already this morning.”
“Yes, but I get frustrated way too easily, I still can’t read or type a word that I haven’t already memorized. I’m starting to think I’ll never get to the place of actually reading something, or be able to type what I say to you. It’s all memorized stuff.”
“Buck, listen to yourself. Baby, what you’re able to do has to my knowledge never been done by any animal before. And you are acting like a human, dear. You want instant gratification. Just let this roll at its own speed. In time you will be able to read and type messages to humans. And listen, you have already memorized over a hundred words that you can type. It will connect for you someday. And really, Buck loves Cassie is front page headline material, ya big galoot.”
“I know, I know. It was like that six years ago when I first learned speaking words. One at a time and practice, practice, practice. I am impatient, aren’t I?”
“Hello you two.” Marlene surprised us not only because we didn’t hear her coming down the stairs but also because she was wearing a fur lined heavy winter coat. “Come on, I want to show you something, and don’t worry, the garage is heated and it’s nice and toasty in there.”
The distance between the main house and the four car garage is, I’d say, about fifty feet. Today it was less than ten strides, fully a third of normal gait since the biting cold would freeze my shadow. Marlene was right. The garage was warm but the concrete floor was dreadfully the kind of cold that would definitely be off limits for a belly landing.
She had arranged ten opened paint cans, brand spanking new without contents except each contained a small swatch about the size of a sugar packet, in two rows of five. “Ok, here’s the deal. All but one of the cans contain no drug odor, but one has the scent of marijuana in it even though it will look the same as the others. I want you both to walk past each can and when you come to the volatile, meaning the marijuana scent, I want you to stay in place, look at me, and bark. Got it?”
Actually I could smell the drug as soon as I entered the garage so this exercise should be a snap. Cassie and I walked slowly past each can and sniffed. It was the seventh can that smelled like the inside of a reggae band’s motor coach. Darn near knocked us off our chilly feet. We stood, looked at Marlene and I barked. Cassie meowed.
“Excellent, I knew you’d get it right the very first time. Just to make sure, turn your heads while I switch the can positions.” Which she did.
I knew which can held the scent and could have walked right to it but chose to play it her way. So we walked, sniffed, and barked at the correct place.
“Right. You guys are amazing. But wait, here’s a little twist. I’ve hidden a tiny piece of cloth with the scent on it somewhere in the garage. Can you find it?”
The garage was mostly cabinet lined but had some open shelving and a long work bench. Plus there was John’s Harley-Davidson and his 1936 Mercedes convertible, and Marlene had parked her Buick Century inside due to the February cold, so there were plenty of places to hunt. Cassie and I worked our way around the cars and then along the cabinets and walls. I rose to place my front paws on the workbench and I could smell it faintly. Though I couldn’t see it, I dropped on all fours and barked.
“You know what, Buck? I hid this little thing under a paint thinner can and I didn’t think you would find it. You are a natural at this, but like John says, with you nothing surprises me anymore. But there’s one more test. I snuck down into the basement and hid another tiny cloth while you two were using the keyboard. I want you to show John what you can do, so let’s go back to the house.”
I snuck a peak at what used to be the pasture on the way to the house. The canine training facility that was still far from complete was in the shape of an X if seen from the air. The central hub was an enclosed structure consisting of six rooms, one for an office and two for indoor training, a mock drug lab, a “garbage room” used to train on uneven surfaces, and wash room. The four enclosed and climate controlled wings
that flayed out from the hub were a series of six adjoining kennels inside each leg of the X shape, except one leg of the X contained a reception area and two prep kennels. Twenty kennels in total but so far there were no dogs in residence though Guido was for certain to arrive in the summer. An Army dog named Thelma Lou is supposed to arrive next month and hopefully the facility will be done by then. Work had begun on a two story guest house structure which was intended to be used by future employees or customers or visiting handlers. There were also two storage sheds. John had also arranged for a de-acceleration lane on Highway Nine and new entry to the facility but as of yet the commencement paperwork was not yet completed. This being Sunday meant no work would be done today. It was dangerously cold…too cold to work anyway.
“Good morning Buck and Cassie,” John said while sipping coffee at the basement bar. “Already hard at work I see.”
“Got a surprise for you today John. Buck and Cassie are in to something new. Ok, you two, let’s see what you can find. Go.”
We knew she wouldn’t have hid it in the TV room, so we started at the billiard table and that’s as far as we had to go. It was in the side pocket next to the wall. I stopped and barked. Marlene, giggling, went to retrieve the swatch and gave the matchbook sized cloth to John.
“Smell anything funny on that, John?”
“Can’t say that I do. What is it?”
“Marijuana.” Marlene held up a vial filled with brown liquid. “I only put a drop on the swatch. You can’t smell it, but I think both Buck and Cassie smell that distinct scent. I have six vials filled with different drugs so we may do a different one tomorrow, but I can’t rush them. We’ll see.
“Well, they’re not giggling or getting the munchies, so it must have been a small dose.”
“I also have a vial of urine from an ovarian cancer patient at Scott County Memorial Hospital. So I need to ask you to fill a vial with your urine and I will too. It’ll be interesting when we test them, which I may do tomorrow. It’s really the area I think they can be used most efficiently once they imprint the various cancers.”
“Tomorrow, after this front passes, will warm up to the 40’s and I have a little surprise for all of us, John mused.”
“What is it, John, tell us?”
“Nope, just wait. You’re going to like it. But today, it’s church, then watching the Daytona 500 and then a movie. Tomorrow will then be right around the corner.”