Читать книгу The Case of the Blazing Sky - John R. Erickson - Страница 6

Chapter One: We Discover a Hooded Monster

It’s me again, Hank the Cowdog. Maybe I haven’t mentioned this before, but I’m not only Head of Ranch Security but also Chief of our ranch’s fire department. That’s an important piece of information because this story has a lot to do with fires and firefighting.

It’s pretty impressive that a dog can go from being an ace crimefighter to being an ace firefighter, and move elephantly from one area of expertise to the other.

Wait. Did I say elephantly? I meant elegantly. To move elephantly would suggest that I’m clumsy and awkward, and nothing could be farther from the truth. There is nothing elephantly about the way I move from one job to another. Sorry for the confusion.

Fighting fires would be a HUGE deal for most of your ordinary mutts. Show ’em a raging prairie fire and they’ll hide under the nearest pickup, but that’s not the way we operate around here. Show us a fire and we whip the stuffing out of it.

Anyway, the point is that this story will have a lot of scary stuff about fires. It will have quite a bit about chickens, too, but that’s a touchy subject and I’d rather not discuss it just yet. For now, let’s not say a word about chickens.

Okay, maybe I’ll say just a few words. Nothing in this world has caused me more grief than Sally May’s flock of idiot birds. I have the job of protecting them, don’t you see, and sometimes it drives me to despair. They are so dumb! But the most challenging part of protecting our chickens from villains who love to eat them is that every once in a while, a guard dog finds himself . . . slurp.

Never mind. I said we wouldn’t discuss this sensitive subject and, by George, we won’t. Talking about chickens is not only a teetotal waste of time, but I’ve also noticed that whenever chickens enter the conversation, I’m usually . . . well, in trouble.

Hencely, I won’t say one word about chickens, even though I already did, and I’d be grateful if you’d forget about it. I said nothing about chickens, right? Thanks.

Where were we? Oh yes, it was the month of September and I don’t remember the year. It was the year we had September between August and October. August had been wet and cool, and our pastures had turned into a grass paradise. We had water flowing in the creek and standing in every hole and cow track. The cows and yearlings were fat and some local fools (Slim and Loper, for example) had ventured the opinion that we would have green grass all the way to frost. Ha.

Then came September with temperatures up near a hundred degrees and those hot southwest winds that steal moisture like a thief. Within two weeks, our country changed from green to brown, and the mood of everyone on the ranch went into a steep decline.

Me? I didn’t have time to feel gloomy about the dry weather, because someone on the ranch had to worry about the danger of fires. Yes sir. When you get that combination of tall dry grass and hot southwest winds, you have all the ingredients for a disastrous prairie fire.

Those fires get started in many ways: a careless camper, a cigarette tossed out the window of a passing vehicle, a lightning strike, a power line that has been blown down in the wind.

Oh, and let’s not forget sparks that come from electric welders and cutting torches. When the country is dry and windblown, only a moron would try to cut and weld steel, but you know what? It happens. And you know what else? It happened on my own ranch, before my very eyes, and, as you will see, it almost burned the pants off the guy who did it.

It was Drover who turned in the report of suspicious activity. It was a blistery hot afternoon and we were occupying a piece of shade on the north side of the saddle shed. I had been logging eighteen hours a day on Fire Patrol and was worn out from all the stress and strain, and I had seized the opportunity to . . . well, grab a few winks of sleep.

“Hank, you’d better look at this. Something’s going on.”

I lifted my head and glared at him through soggy eyes. “Drover, something is always going on. At any moment, in any part of the universe, something will be going on.”

“Yeah, but you won’t like this. Someone’s down at the corrals, and I think he’s running a welder.”

It was then that my ears picked up the drone of a portable welder’s gasoline engine. I shifted my gaze to the northwest and focused in on the scene. Sure enough, some guy was down there, welding the cow chute.

As you may know, a cow chute is a device that is used to restrain cattle, so that the cowboy crew can perform medical services that cows don’t necessarily want to receive. The chute is made of steel bars. When a cow walks into it, the cowboys trap her head in the “head gate” and compress the sides, holding her in one place whilst they give her a shot, check her temperature, or doctor an infected wound.

A cow chute is a handy piece of equipment, but thousand-pound animals take their toll, even on steel, and from time to time, our lads have to crank up the welder and do some repairs. But in the middle of a dry spell? That was a no-no.

“I don’t believe this, Drover. I was up all night, scouting for fires, and here’s some nut running a welder in the heat of the day! Why, he could start a fire that would burn this whole ranch to the ground.”

“Yeah, I wonder who it could be?”

I leaped to my feet and loosened up the enormous muscles in my shoulders. “Nobody on our ranch would do such a crazy thing. He must be a stranger. Let’s go to Code Three and put a stop to this nonsense.”

We went streaking through the corrals, ducking under gates and bottom boards of the corral fence, and arrived at the scene only minutes later. There before us, we saw a strange man, working under a welding hood and creating a shower of red and yellow sparks.

In the corral, there wasn’t much vegetation that could burn, just a small patch of weeds at his feet, so maybe the fire danger wasn’t all that great, but operating a welder during a drought was against regulations. And this guy needed a good scolding.

I studied his appearance and memorized even the tiniest of details. He was fairly tall and thin, wearing steel-toed lace-up work boots and a pair of blue coveralls that were spotted with grease. Little burned holes on the sleeves suggested that the guy often used these coveralls as his welding uniform.

Oh, and did I mention the ragged cuffs? The cuffs around both ankles were frayed into strings.

It was those ragged cuffs that helped me identify the culprit. I had seen them before. “Drover, I’ve got him identified. You know who that is? Slim Chance.”

Drover was as shocked as I was. “No fooling? But why . . .”

“We don’t have an answer to that, son, but he should know better than to run a welder in the middle of a drought. Oh, and don’t look at the fire.”

“Okay. What fire?”

“The flash of the welder. It will blister your eyes.”

“I’ll be derned. How can it blister your eyes?”

“Drover, we don’t know all the details, but I’ve heard the cowboys tell Little Alfred not to look into the flash of an arc welder. It can blister the eyes. That’s why men who are welding wear hoods, to protect their eyes.”

“I wondered about that. He looks kind of like a robot, doesn’t he?”

“No. He looks like a man welding.”

“Well, I remember the time you barked at him, ’cause you thought he was a robot monster. I saw it myself.”

I heaved a sigh. “Drover, that was long ago. Many bridges have gone underwater since then.”

“Well, he still looks like a robot to me.”

“He’s not a robot and please hush. Stand by, I’m fixing to give him a wake-up call.” I stepped forward and delivered a stern round of barking that said, “Hey, pal, did you happen to notice the dead weeds at your feet? You’re violating the Fire Code. Shut off the welder and find something else to do.”

Heh heh. That got his attention. He stopped welding and turned toward the sound of my barking. He looked at me with . . . hmmm, he seemed to be staring at me through that one slit-eye on the front of the welding hood.

Behind me, I heard Drover gasp. “Oh my gosh, look at that creepy eye!”

“Drover, please hush. All welding hoods have a slit of dark glass that—”

Huh? You won’t believe this. Even I couldn’t believe it. All at once the man in the welding suit raised a clawed hand in the air and we heard this . . . this deep mysterious GROWL coming from inside the hood.

Drover began backing away. “Oh my gosh, I knew it! Did you hear that? He’s growling at us! And look at those claws!”

“Drover, hold your position and quit—”

“GRRRRRRRRRRRR! ROWERRRRRR! GRRRRRR!”

Holy smokes, something horrible was taking place! I mean, we’d been sitting there, minding our own business and watching a guy do some repairs on a cow chute, right? Well, get this. Before our very eyes, the man we’d always known as Slim Chance was somehow transformed into a . . . into a huge robot monster, eight feet tall!

Hang on, it gets worse. This huge monster saw us sitting there and he started slouching toward us with deadly claws poised above his head. And all at once it became perfectly clear that . . . HE ATE DOGS!

Well, you know me. I’m no prisoner to past memories. Maybe that guy had once been my friend, but by George, something awful had happened to him and now . . .

My ears flew up on my head, my eyes popped wide open, and the hair stood up on the back of my neck. I took a step backward and summoned up the best bark I could muster on short notice. Okay, it was kind of a gurgle, but what’s a guy to do when he suddenly realizes that one of his very best friends has been monsterized?

What had happened to poor Slim? We didn’t know. Maybe he had stared into the flash of the welder and it had . . . I don’t know, boiled his chromatoids and changed him into a slouching monster robot.

Science doesn’t have an answer for every question. All we know for certain is that this is a very strange world we live in and . . . yipes! He took another step in my direction and, fellers, I didn’t wait around for science to figure this one out. I whirled around, pushed the throttle up to Turbo Six, and hauled the mail out of there, firing barks over my shoulder as I—

BAM!

Ran into the fence. But that was only a momentary distraction. I leaped to my feet and roared away like a greased lightning bug.

If that creature planned to eat me, he would have to start with the tail and work his way up.

ZOOM!