The Disappearance of Drover Read online

  Dogpound Ralph was following me, and he noticed. “What did you have in mind?”

  “I have steak in mind, Ralph. I plan to beg or borrow a steak. That’s what we did when you and I went on The Fling, remember?”

  “Yeah, but you messed it up and got caught.”

  “A plate fell off the grill and broke. It was an accident. It could have happened to anyone.”

  He trotted up beside me. “You’ve got no charm or technique, just blunder in and start grabbing. Better let me handle this.”

  I laughed. “You? That’s funny, pal, and the answer is no.” I stopped and looked him straight in the eyes. “You wait right here and watch. I’ll show you charm and technique. In five minutes, I’ll be back with a steak.”

  He shrugged. “Bet you won’t.”

  I didn’t bother to argue with him. What did he know, this jailbird-dog who hung out with the local dogcatcher? I left him there and crept toward the clouds of smoke that were causing various parts of my body to do peculiar things: nose, ears, eyes, heart, lungs, and liver, every part of a dog’s body that responds to delicious smells.

  The trouble with these steak deals is that they’re always supervised, and this one was no exception. The cook was sitting in a metal folding chair, his left boot resting on his knee, and right away I picked up a couple of clues that told me that he was wearing a Cowboy Cook Costume.

  First, he wore his pant legs tucked inside the tops of his boots. Second, his jeans were hitched up with a pair of bright red suspenders. Third, he wore a huge bushy mustache that was waxed on the ends, and fourth, he wore a big cowboy hat with a wide brim and a tall crown.

  See, your ordinary everyday cowboy or rancher (Slim and Loper, for example) wouldn’t dress in such a gaudy fashion, but a guy who’d been hired as a cowboy cook would. A lot of dogs wouldn’t have noticed such tiny details, but I picked ’em up right away. Oh, and I almost forgot the fifth clue: that big hat had no sweat stains around the base of the crown.

  Heh heh. These guys can’t get up early enough in the morning to fool Hank the Cowdog. He wasn’t a working cowboy. They’d hired him as a cook.

  He’d dug a fire pit in the ground, burned a batch of mesquite wood down to coals, and had laid an iron grill across the pit. Steaks and burgers hissed on the grill, and nearby he had a big cast-iron pot hanging over the fire.

  As I approached his camp, I slowed my pace. I mean, I didn’t want him to get the wrong idea, that I was just some mutt who’d come to poach a steak or something like that. Cowboy chefs are pretty suspicious of dogs who come up to watch them cook, don’t you know, so I made it appear that I had . . . well, stumbled upon his camp by accident. No fevered eyes, no dripping chops, no frenzied tail-wags.

  He looked up and saw me, and for a moment I wasn’t sure which way this would go, whether he would leap out of his chair and yell at me, or invite me to, uh, share his campfire. He had a pair of friendly eyes, and after a bit, he smiled beneath his mustache and said, “Hello, pup. Pull up a chair. You want a cup of coffee?”

  I think that was a joke. Dogs don’t drink coffee or sit in chairs, but his manner was cordial, so I went to him and sat down beside his chair. He scratched me behind the ears and gave me a pat on the ribs. This was a nice man, and obviously he liked . . . sniff, sniff . . . dogs. This deal appeared to be moving in the right direction.

  He cocked his head back and looked me over. “Well, you’ve got some tallow on your ribs, so I guess you’re not a stray.”

  Oh no, not a stray. I had a steady job on a steak . . . on a ranch, that is. I thumped my tail on the ground to add some sincerity to my, uh, presentation.

  “Don’t be stirring up the dust.”

  Oh, the tail, sorry.

  “Mrs. Berry don’t approve of sand on the meat.”

  Right, no problem. I flipped two switches and shut down the tail.

  He leaned back in his chair and took a deep breath. “Steaks sure smell good, don’t they?”

  Steaks? What steaks? Oh, by George, he had some steaks on the grill! Ha ha. I hadn’t even noticed.

  “Those are rib-eyes, pup, USDA Grade Awesome.” He pushed himself up out of his chair. “Say, I need to step inside for just a second. Would you keep your eye on them steaks for me?”

  Slurp. Oh sure, anything for a friend.

  “I won’t be long.”

  Heh heh. Neither would I.

  The instant I heard the screen door close behind him, I whipped my head around to the grill and stared at the steaks, twenty of them, and I can hardly describe the emotions that were bouncing off the walls of my mind.

  Never in my wildest dreams would I have thought that this job would turn out to be so easy. I mean, cowboys know dogs, and as a general rule, you can expect that they have a pretty good understanding of . . . well, the temptations that we face every day. Yet this guy—I didn’t even know his name—this cowboy cook had walked off and left ME in charge of twenty sizzling rib-eye steaks!

  Holy smokes, this was Christmas for Dogs! A river was running through my mouth. I was shaking with excitement, my heart was racing, my eyes were fluttering, and I took a creeping step toward . . .

  “That’s what I figured.”

  Huh? A voice had come out of nowhere and froze me in my tracks. An instant later, the screen door opened and out came my, uh, new friend, the cowboy cook. His mouth held an odd, lopsided smile. He sat down in his chair and said, “Come here.” I rushed over to him and laid my head in his lap and went to Slow Thumps on the tail section.

  “Don’t stir up the dust.”

  Oh yes, sorry.

  He took my face in his hands and looked into my eyes. “Let me tell you a little story.” He reached down and flipped up the lid of a . . . what was that? Oh, it was a guitar case, and he pulled out a guitar. And he started singing this song.

  Ed and the Cheese

  At fifty a bachelor cowboy named Ed

  Took a job on a ranch on a fork of the Red.

  He wintered that year by himself in a shack

  With a leaky old roof and a privy out back.

  He had him a cook stove, a chest, and a bed.

  The place wasn’t fancy but neither was Ed.

  But then he took notice of something not right.

  He had him a roommate that came out at night.

  Ed never did see him but knew he was there,

  From the mess on the cabinet anda hole in the chair.

  So Ed, he decided to give it a test,

  Left two hunks of cheese in plain sight on the chest.

  Next morning he checked it and sure ’nuff he found

  His roommate had snuck out and gobbled it down.

  Ed nodded and gave his two fingers a snap

  And left his new buddy some cheese in a trap.

  This tale has a moral for those who will hear.

  There’s danger in being a rat with no fear.

  Old Ed lured him out and caught him with ease,

  ’Cause a thief can’t resist taking unguarded cheese.

  The cowboy placed his quitar back in its case and turned his eyes on me. “So there it is, pup. Did you get the point?”

  The point? Well, it wasn’t a bad song (I’d heard worse from Slim Chance), but I hadn’t noticed anything especially pointy about it. No.

  He leaned back in his chair and parked one leg over the opposite knee. “See, when I stepped into the café, I was giving you a test.”

  A test?

  “And you flunked. You ain’t exactly a thief, but only because I didn’t give you the chance.”

  I hardly knew what to say. What a cheap trick!

  “The point is, you told me what was on your mind.”

  Well, what did he expect? Hey, I wasn’t Mister Perfect Doggie. What kind of dog would sit there and ignore twenty hissing s
teaks on the grill?

  He gave me a grin. “It was nice knowing you, but now you have to move along.” He brought his face right down to my nose and narrowed his eyes. “’Cause we ain’t feeding steaks to the dogs today.”

  Fine! I didn’t want his old steaks anyway. The very idea, him pulling sneaky tricks on a dog who’d come over to pay a friendly visit! I’d never been so insulted. I lifted my head to a proud angle and marched away. This was outrageous!

  Furthermore, I had important work to do. A friend of mine, who happened to be an incredible ninny, was running loose in town, and I had to find him before he . . .

  “Hey, pooch, I might let you taste my beans. You like cowboy beans?”

  No, I did not like cowboy beans, especially if they were made by a sneak who laid traps for innocent dogs. We dogs have our pride, and just because we get hungry once in a while doesn’t mean . . . on the other hand, a guy should never let pride rule his roost.

  I, uh, did an about-face and went back to the fire and gave him an expression that said, “Okay, as a personal favor, I’ll try your beans.”

  He lifted the lid on the big cast-iron pot and dipped out some beans into a tin plate. “It’s a new recipe. I call it ‘Gasping Delight.’”

  Interesting name. Hurry up.

  “Now, it’s got a few peppers in it . . .” He set the plate on the ground in front of me. “. . . so you might want to eat it kind of slow.”

  Never tell a dog how to eat. We invented eating.

  I put my nose into the plate and started wolfing like there was no tomorrow. Good. Real good. Hey, these were some very tasty beans. Too bad I lived with cowboys who weren’t smart enough to make a pot of . . .

  All at once, my eyes began to water and something strange was going on inside my mouth. HARK! GASP! What was that stuff?

  “Reckon I made ’em a little too hot?”

  I stared at him through swimming eyes. “A little too hot? Buddy, somebody dumped a sack of gunpowder into your stupid beans and you don’t need to worry about me hanging around. Good-bye!”

  And with that, I whirled around and stormed away. Hark.

  Chapter Nine: Back on the Case

  It worked out fine. I didn’t have time to waste on cowboy cooks or nitro-beans, because I was on an important mission. Had you forgotten about Drover? Well, maybe I had too, but a three-alarm fire in my mouth brought me crashing back to reality.

  Ralph was sitting in the same spot where I’d left him, only now he wore a wicked little grin. “Told you.”

  “Ralph, you can shut your trap any time you wish.”

  “You’ve got no charm or technique. Your face is a flashing neon sign.”

  “Ralph, he used trickery. He cheated, but never mind. I’m on a mission to save my friend. You said he went north?”

  “South.”

  “I’m almost sure you said north.”

  He rolled his eyes. “I said south. It rhymes with Ralph, and maybe I’d better go with you.”

  “You’re too slow.”

  He pushed himself up from the ground. “I’m slow, but I know the difference between north and south.” He gave me a wink. “Three.”

  “I don’t understand that.”

  “Well, it was a joke, and it went past you like a fast ball. Let’s go.” He waddled off to the south.

  “Don’t give me orders, Ralph. And don’t forget who’s in charge.” I hurried and caught up with him. “Explain your joke.”

  “If you subtract north from south, the answer is three.”

  “It makes no sense.”

  “It’s a joke.”

  “Ralph, it’s not funny. You’re in over your head.”

  “His name was Corky.”

  “What?”

  “I just remembered your buddy’s name. It was Corky and he’s a Yorkie.”

  I laughed. “That’s not bad. You’re getting better.”

  “It wasn’t a joke.”

  “With you, it’s hard to tell, isn’t it? When we wrap up this case, I’ll give you a few tips on humor.”

  “Meathead.”

  “Yes, those were some beautiful steaks. Too bad I didn’t get one.”

  “There’s a lot you don’t get.”

  “Exactly. But you know, Ralph, life goes on in spite of our little setbacks.”

  “His name was Corky.”

  “Yeah? Well, don’t try his beans. They’d take the paint off a barn.”

  “You’re looking for the wrong dog.”

  “I agree. He’s not worth it, but he’s my friend and I’m . . . I wish you wouldn’t roll your eyes when I’m talking. It’s very rude.”

  “Just skip it.”

  That ended the conversation, which was fine with me. To be honest, I found it hard to communicate with Ralph, and his jokes were really bad. That came as no surprise because . . . well, the guy was a basset hound and what can you expect? If my face was a neon sign advertising Steak Lust, his was a billboard that blared the message “I have no sense of humor.”

  He had zero sense of humor, but maybe he could help me find Drover.

  We headed south on a course that took us back to Main Street and the center of town. You’ve seen pictures of downtown Dallas and New York City, right? Well, downtown Twitchell was about the same: a drugstore, Leonard’s Saddle Shop, the pool hall, a couple of clothing stores, a grocery store, and Twitchell Hardware. Huge place. A dog could get lost without even trying, especially if his name was Drover.

  When we reached downtown, I did a thorough Recon of the whole area. I sure didn’t want to walk into some kind of disaster. Don’t forget that Twitchell had a dogcatcher and two stray dogs named Buster and Muggs, to whom I had recently, uh, mouthed off. I had no wish to run into any of them.

  The street that had been lined with cheering crowds only hours before was now fairly empty and quiet, with just the normal flow of cars and pickups, and an occasional cattle truck riding its jake-brake through town. (Big diesel trucks have this thing called a jake-brake that makes the engine roar, and truck drivers love using it when they pass through a town.)

  There wasn’t much action in downtown Twitchell, so Ralph and I picked up the pace and headed south. Or let’s put it this way: I tried to pick up the pace, but Ralph had trouble keeping up. Not only did he have short legs, but he couldn’t seem to walk fifty feet without stepping on his ears.

  By the time we had come to a residential neighborhood south of the downtown area, Ralph was out of breath. “Hey, can we stop and rest?”

  I came to a stop. “Okay, two minutes. We haven’t a moment to lose.”

  “If you’re in such a hurry, how come you took time to steal a steak?”

  I beamed him a glare. “I had no intention of stealing a steak. My plan from the beginning was to coax one out of the cook.”

  “Well, he sure got the wrong impression, since he sang you that song about the rat and the cheese.”

  “A dog in my position deals with larger concepts, Ralph. I’m not responsible for wrong impressions. Are you ready to move out?”

  “Just another minute. How are you going to find Corky’s mother?”

  “I have a plan, and that’s all you need to know. And, for the last time, his name is Drover.”

  “He told me it was Corky Yorkie.”

  “Ralph, you need to get your ears fixed. You’ve stepped on them so many times, it’s damaged your hearing. Are you rested up?”

  “Not quite.”

  “Good, let’s move out.”

  You know, Ralph was a nice guy and we’d had a few laughs together, but he could be really tiresome. I guess that’s what happens to a dog that spends most of his time riding around town in the back of the dogcatcher’s pickup.

  But the important thing was that Ralph wasn’t leading this mission. I was, and
I had devised a clever plan for finding the yard where Drover’s mother stayed . . . the poor woman.

  You want to hear my plan? Okay, here we go. We walked up and down the alleys and I called out, “May I have your attention please? Will Drover’s mother please report to the front?”

  Pretty awesome plan, huh? You bet. Simple but effective, and I had a feeling that it would work like a cork . . . like a charm, let us say.

  As you can see, Ralph’s blabbering had taken its toll. How else can you explain that a word like “cork” would pop up in my thoughts? It just goes to prove . . . all at once I can’t remember what it proves, but it proves something very important and we should never forget it.

  Where were we? Oh yes, executing my plan. Ralph and I walked down alleys, calling for Drover’s mother to step forward and identify herself. After an hour, we’d had no success and I began to wonder if the poor woman had gone into hiding. Maybe she didn’t want to admit her part in producing a little mutt like Drover. I couldn’t blame her, but it did nothing to ease my mind. With every passing minute, my concern about his safety grew deeper and darker.

  And don’t forget that I was operating under a deadline. When the sale ended at the auction barn, Slim would load his horse and head back to the ranch. I sure as thunder didn’t want to miss the bus.

  I was about ready to abandon the mission, when it happened. As I recall, we were in the third alley west of Main Street and that’s when we heard a voice. It said, and this is a direct quote, it said, “Yeah, that’s me. Who wants to know?”

  I called back, “Hank the Cowdog. I’m with Search and Rescue. We’re looking for your son.” I turned to Ralph with a triumphant smile. “At last, we’ve found her!”

  Ralph shook his head. “Voice is too deep.”

  “Ralph, some mothers have deeper voices than others. They can’t help it.”

  “I’m telling you, that ain’t a mother’s voice.”

  “What do you know about it? Have you ever been a mother?”