The Case of the Vanishing Fishhook Read online

  HUH?

  You won’t believe this. Slim had vanished, and in his place there stood this . . . this . . . this HUGE ONE-EYED ROBOT. Honest. I’m not kidding. And it had the scariest face you ever saw—no ears, no nose, no wrinkles or expression, and one big eye in the shape of a box or a rectangle. It stretched across the upper part of his face, the eye did, and it was very dark, almost black.

  Scariest thing I’d ever seen.

  Well, you know me. When I’m confronted by robots and monsters, I don’t just sit there looking simple. I bark. Yes sir, and that’s just what I did. I leaped to my feet, bristled the hair on my back, and launched myself into a withering barrage of barking.

  Oh, and did I mention the ray gun in his right hand? Yes sir, he held some kind of deadly ray gun in his hand, and it was attached to a long black cord.

  I didn’t know who that guy was or what he was doing on our ranch, but I took no chances. I gave him the Full Load of barking, and also began edging towards the door. I had never gone up against a robot as big as this one. I’ll bet he stood six feet tall.

  Seven feet. The biggest, scariest robot I’d ever seen.

  Well, I barked at him for a whole minute, I mean, one bark right after another, and it should have scared him away. But it didn’t. You know what he did?

  Hang on. This gets real scary.

  He turned around very slowly and stared at me with that . . . that wicked black eye. The barking died in my throat. I froze and felt the hair rising on the back of my neck. Then . . .

  Are you sure you ought to hear the rest of this? Don’t even try it unless you’ve had some experience with robots and monsters.

  Okay, there we were. He was staring at me with his horrible robot eye and I was frozen in my tracks, waiting to see what would happen next. What happened next was that he raised his hands up to the level of his head, made claws with them, and started slouching towards me.

  Oh, and he growled too, a deep ferocious growl.

  Hey, that was all I needed to know about robots. THEY ATE DOGS!

  I went to Full Power on all engines, spun all four paws on the cement floor, and got the heck out of there. Once I had cleared the door, I dared to fire a bark over my shoulder, just in case he might be . . .

  Where was Little Alfred? I screeched to a stop. Holy smokes, the boy was trapped inside the machine shed with that bloodthirsty . . .

  Huh? Laughter? I cocked my ears and listened. Unless I was badly mistaken, someone inside the machine shed . . . several someones inside the machine shed were . . . laughing. That made no sense. I mean, this was a very serious deal, so why would . . .

  Did I dare creep back to the door and peek inside? It would be dangerous, but I had to do it. I had to check on the boy. For all I knew, that robot monster had tied him up and was now . . . well, tickling him or something. That would account for his laughter, see.

  Yes, I had to know the awful truth, so I forced myself to creep back to the door. My entire body was as tense as a coiled spring, the enormous muscles in my shoulders drawn as tight as bands of steel. Closer and closer I crept. I poked my head through the doors and saw . . .

  Okay, false alarm, relax. It was another of Slim’s stupid . . .

  He was welding, right? And you probably didn’t know that when people weld, they wear a black plastic hood, called a . . . well, a welding hood, of course. It has a slit of smoked glass that looks very much like a monster eye, see, and any dog who had seen . . .

  Oh, he got big yuks out of this. He flipped up the hood and pointed to his face and said, “It’s only me, you dufus dog.”

  Hey, I’d known it was him all along. He hadn’t fooled . . .

  He thinks he’s so funny, but he’s not, not funny at all. I don’t know why I put up with his . . .

  Skip it.

  Holding my head at a proud angle, I marched back into this so-called “workplace,” which had been transformed into the scene of Slim’s childish follyrot. I went straight over to my pal Alfred and gave him Looks of Embarrassment and Slow Wags on the tail section. It saddened me to see that he too was laughing.

  “Did you think he was a monstoo, Hankie?”

  No. Well, not for long. Could we move along to something else?

  At last Slim’s laughter faded away and he ran out of excuses to loaf and torment innocent dogs. At that point he lowered his welding hood and was forced to go to work. I know it must have broken his heart.

  He’s such a goof-off. And can you believe he’d called ME a “dufus dog”? Ha.

  All at once the air was filled with sparks and smoke and the crackle of burning metal. Alfred and I sat there for a long time, concentrating extra hard on being perfect children and dogs. It turned out to be pretty boring, actually, and after ten minutes of it, the boy got up and started prowling around.

  He played with some tools for a while, then he spied the ground clamp on the piece of metal Slim was welding. Welding on. The piece of metal on which he was . . . phooey.

  There’s this thing called a “ground lead.” It’s a thick black wire with a clamp on the end. When guys weld, they have to clamp the clamp on the piece of metal they’re welding. Why? I have no idea, but I know that if you unhook the clamp, the welder quits working.

  And that’s what Alfred did. He unhooked the clamp and hooked it up to a pipe wrench that was lying on the floor. And all at once, the air was no longer filled with smoke and sparks and the crackle of burning metal. The welder quit.

  In the silence we heard Slim scratching the welding rod over the piece of metal. The scratching grew louder and more vigorous. Then he leaped up and raised the hood.

  “This dadgum two-bit crackerbox piece of junk! I told Loper to buy us a decent welder. How can I fix all the stuff he tears up when he won’t . . .” The rest of what he said was lost in a fog of mumbles and mutters.

  He stomped over to the welder and flicked the switch off and on several times. He leaned down and listened to the hum. He twisted several dials. Then he kicked it.

  “Pig nose. Probably got a short. A mouse probably chewed a . . .” It was then that his eyes fell upon the ground lead, which was clamped to the Stilson wrench. His gaze moved slowly across the room and landed on Alfred, like a cat pouncing on a mouse. “Did you do that?”

  The boy was looking up at the ceiling. “Do what, Swim?”

  “Uh-huh. I think it’s time for y’all to move along.”

  “I was twying to help, Swim.”

  Slim took the boy by the ear and led him to the door. “Trying and helping ain’t the same, son, and an idle mind is the devil’s workshop.”

  “Aw, Swim, what’ll we do?”

  “Go play Tom Sawyer. Go get the mail. Go dig a hole. But the main thing is GO.”

  “What about my dog?”

  “Let not your heart be troubled, he’s next on the list to leave.” Slim came back into the shop. He drilled me with a hot glare and jerked his thumb over his shoulder. “All right, bozo, the fun part’s over. Scram.”

  Fine. I’d been about ready to leave anyway. Too much noise and smoke.

  I gathered myself up, made a wide path around Slim the Robot, and plunged outside into the fresh air and sunshine.

  Little did I know or suspect what lay ahead. It wasn’t good.

  Chapter Five: Little Alfred Schemes Up a Fishing Expedition

  Once outside, I joined up with Little Alfred. For a while we sat in front of the machine shed, watching the chickens peck for grasshoppers and tossing rocks. Alfred tossed most of the rocks and I watched the chickens, if you want to get technical about it.

  The morning air was starting to heat up and we began to wilt in the glare of the sun. The minutes dragged by. At last Little Alfred spoke.

  “I’m bored. How about you, Hankie?”

  Well, I hadn’t thought much about it, but yes, now
that he’d mentioned it, things did seem a little boring. I mean, when a guy finds himself watching chickens for sport, it’s a pretty slow day. Yes, I too was bored.

  He chuncked a rock at a hen, causing her to squawk and jump into the air. That brought a smile to his mouth, but it faded quickly. He heaved a sigh.

  “I wonder what Tom Sawyer did when he got bored.”

  Well, I didn’t know about that, seeing as how I’d never met Tom Sawyer and didn’t know who he was. Wait a minute. Was he the guy in the book? Okay, he was some character in a book, but I hadn’t read the book and didn’t have an opinion.

  “I think . . . he’d go fishing . . . in the Mississippi Wiver . . . with his best pal, Huckleberry Finn.”

  Hmm. Maybe so.

  A little gleam had come into his eyes. “Wet’s go fishing, Hankie, just you and me. I’ll get my pole and tackle box out of my woom, and I’ll get some beef liver for bait, and we’ll go down to the Mississippi Wiver and catch some big old fish.”

  Hmm. Well, that did sound kind of exciting.

  He was on his feet now, walking towards the house. “I’ll be Tom Sawyer and you can be Huck Finn. Won’t that be fun?”

  Well, I . . . maybe so. I mean, I had never played this game before and I didn’t know exactly what was required of a dog to be Huck Finn, but what the heck, I was open to new experiences and adventures. Sure.

  The farther we walked down the hill, the more excited we both became about the fishing expedition. It was sounding better all the time. But when we reached the bottom of the hill, a shadow passed over the boy’s face. He stopped, and his gaze went straight to . . .

  I followed his gaze and saw . . . uh oh . . . Sally May, his mom, was working in a flower bed near the yard gate. Have we discussed Sally May? Maybe not.

  Let me begin by saying that she was a fine lady and a wonderful mother, but there was something about her that . . . how can I put this? There was something about her that, uh, struck fear in the hearts of dogs and little boys.

  Well, maybe it wasn’t exactly fear. Call it guilt. See, it’s a well known fact that dogs and little boys often have things on their minds which might not, uh, meet the approval of the Lady of the House. And the scary thing about Sally May was that she always seemed to know.

  She could read faces. She could read minds. She never slept. She saw everything and knew everything. She had eyes in the back of her head and ears that could hear ants crawling in the next pasture, and her nose . . . you couldn’t sneak anything past that nose of hers. She had a nose like a bloodhound.

  And every time I came into her presence, I began to . . . wilt. And fidget. I found it hard to look her in the eyes and I began to experience powerful feelings of guilt—even when I hadn’t done anything wrong. And sometimes I even got the feeling that . . . well, that she just didn’t like me.

  That’s hard to believe, isn’t it? Maybe it was my imagination, but I sure got that feeling.

  Anyhow, there she was beside the yard gate, and her very presence stopped us in our tracks. Alfred dropped his voice to a whisper.

  “Mom might not wet me go fishing, so we’ll have to be sneaky.”

  I whapped my tail on the ground and stared at him. Be sneaky? Around Sally May? Was he serious? Ha! Trying to sneak something past his mother was like holding a skunk under a bloodhound’s nose and saying, “Do you smell anything?” It wouldn’t work.

  The boy ignored me. “I’ll sneak into the house and get my stuff. You visit with my mom and keep her busy, and I’ll sneak out the fwont door.” He gave me a wink and a smile. “She’ll nevoo suspect a thing.”

  Oh yeah, right. She’d never suspect a thing.

  Okay, I’d go along with this crazy plan, but I already knew where it was heading.

  The boy arranged his face into an innocent expression, shoved his hands into the pockets of his overalls, and started walking towards the house. Oh, and he was whistling.

  He walked through the gate and past Sally May. “Hi, Mom.” He kept going.

  Her head came up and she studied him with narrowed eyes. “Alfred, where are you going?”

  “Oh, nowhere.”

  “Alfred.”

  “Into the house, Mom.”

  “For what?”

  “Oh, I need a dwink.”

  She frowned and suddenly her gaze swung around to me. I felt as though someone had turned on a pair of searchlights, exposing me to all the world. Or stuck me with a fork. I found it hard to, uh, meet her gaze, and my eyes began wandering, so to speak, to the far horizon.

  “Alfred, wipe your feet. I don’t want you tracking barnyard into the house.”

  “Okay, Mom.”

  “And be very quiet. Molly’s asleep.”

  “Okay, Mom.”

  “And don’t snack. I’m fixing you a good nourishing lunch.”

  “Okay, Mom.”

  The boy disappeared inside the house. Her gaze lingered on the door and I could see Lines of Suspicion gathering on her brow. Well, it was time for me to swing into action with Diversionary Tactics—to use my charm, in other words, to take her mind off of Alfred’s presence in the house.

  To do this, I was forced to take bold action. I had to move through the gate and take several steps inside her yard—which happened to be Forbidden Territory to us dogs. Squeezing up my most charming and sincere smile, I edged through the gate and across the invisible line that separated the yard from the rest of the world. There, I waited to be recognized and greeted.

  Oh, and I forgot to mention that for this mission, I switched my tail over to Slow Sensitive Wags. See, I knew she’d never go for Broad Swings or Joyful Wags. Those settings were a little too active and rough for a lady such as herself. If a guy wasn’t paying attention to his business, he could sure get into trouble with those Broad Swings.

  See, the womenfolk don’t appreciate being whapped by a dog’s tail, and sometimes your Broad Swings can damage flowers and stuff. Clearly, this was an occasion for Slow Sensitive Wags.

  So there I stood beside her, a loyal dog waiting to be recognized, greeted, spoken to, and perhaps even petted and rubbed. A dog can always hope.

  But she didn’t notice me. Her eyes were still rivveted . . . rivitted . . . rivvitted . . . her eyes were still glued, shall we say, on the back door, through which Little Alfred had just passed. I waited patiently, but she continued to beam that suspicious eye towards the house.

  I needed to get her attention, so I pulled up a program which I hadn’t used in a long time. It was called “Here I Am,” and it involved the use of a low whimper. As you might guess, I’m not the kind of dog who makes a habit of whimpering. Drover does it a lot, but I’ve never cared for it. But on this occasion, it seemed to fit.

  So I ran “Here I Am” and gave her a whimper, with just a dash of quiver in the middle of it, and by George, it worked. It pulled her gaze away from the house, and all at once our faces were very close to each other and she was staring at me.

  “Yes?”

  That’s all she said, and I must admit that a quick scan of her facial expression and so forth indicated that she was less than . . . well, overjoyed by my appearance, but what the heck, she had spoken to me and that was a start.

  On a hunch, I cranked up the tail to Broader but Still Sensitive Wags. The message here was “Why, good morning, Sally May, and isn’t it a beautiful day?”

  “You’re in my yard.”

  Oops. I switched back to Slow and Sensitive, and increased the sincerity of my smile. The message here was, “Yes, but I saw you working all alone, and I just couldn’t resist coming over to, uh, share a few moments of . . . well, friendship and togetherness and so forth. No kidding.”

  I held my breath and waited for her response. Hey, it worked! I was really surprised. She reached out her soft white hand and began rubbing me behind the left ear.

/>   “Okay, Hank. I’ll give you a little sugar.”

  Wow, you talk about sugar. Those were some great rubs and scratches. My eyelids sagged to the half-open position, and I almost melted under the touch of her lovely hand.

  Do you realize what a triumph this was? See, Sally May and I had . . . that is, our relationship had suffered more than its share of ups and downs. We had gone through hardships and misunderstandings, yet here she was, scratching me behind the ears. And we were sharing a moment of real quality time—sharing the morning air, sharing our love of flowers and shrubberies and stuff, and sharing . . . well, Life and the world and everything.

  And even better, heh heh, she wasn’t watching the house anymore, which was sort of the idea from the start. Another minute or two and my little pal would make his escape.

  Oops. Just then she stopped scratching me and cocked her ear towards the house. I had to make a rapid response. I switched the tail section over to Circular Wags (those are pretty difficult) and toe-walked a little closer to her warm side. When she turned back to me, I was ready with Adoring Eyes and a smile of Extra Sincerity. This deal was really working and . . .

  Huh?

  She stood up, dusted off her hands and jeans, and pushed me out the gate. “That’s it. You can leave now.” She closed the gate behind me.

  Yeah but . . . gee, there for a minute I’d thought our relationship had . . . we’d shared so much and the emotions had . . .

  She placed her hands on her hips and gave me an odd smile. “Do you think I don’t know what you scamps are up to?”

  Well, I . . .

  She didn’t even wait for my answer. She went striding through the yard, around the south side of the house, and captured Little Alfred just as he was sneaking out the door with his fishing pole and tackle box.

  See? I told you. That woman knows everything. Nobody’s safe around her.

  Our mission had failed.

  Chapter Six: Pete Gets Drenched, Tee-hee

  Our mission had failed, but the most tragic part of it was that Sally May had almost broken my heart. I mean, there for a while I’d thought we had patched things up, formed a new relationship, reached a new platoon of emotional emotions, started all over again.