Читать книгу The Secret Pledge - John R. Erickson - Страница 7

Chapter Two: A Bad Start

I clawed my way over Slim and dived out the window, hit the ground and sprinted around to the back of Billy’s pickup. There, I drew myself up into a Pose of Dignity, took a wide stance, and gazed up into the face of my…

I gazed up into the face of Plato the Bird Dog, my second-worst enemy in the world (after the cat). He stood at the back of the pickup, looking down at me with that big, happy bird dog grin on his face—the one where his long sloppy tongue hangs out one side of his mouth.

“Hank! By golly, great to see you again. Hey, first day of bird season, what do you think, huh? Great, you bet. You know, Hank, I’ve been on a new training program this year and I think I’m coming out of the pre-season in the best shape of my life. Pecs and abs, Hank, that’s where it starts, and I’ve been building up the bottoms of my feet, too.”

“I’d like to speak to Beulah.”

“Those feet are so important, Hank, so important. The thing is, you forget how much cactus we have in these pastures, and if you don’t get your feet toughed up, by golly, two hours in the field and you’re done. How about your feet, Hank, how are they holding up?”

“They take me where I want to go.”

He laughed. “Good line, I like that. ‘They take me where I want to go.’ Ha ha. But, seriously, Hank, we all get so busy, we overlook the…”

“I’d like to speak with Beulah.”

“Beulah? Oh. Great. She’s here.” He turned toward the front. “Honey Bunch? Guess who’s here. Old Hank, by golly.” He turned back to me and gave me a wink. “She’ll be right with you. She’s fixing her ears.”

“What’s wrong with her ears?”

“Well, she’s…you know how she is, Hank, every hair in place, always looking like a million dollars. Isn’t she something? Whoa, hang on, Bud, here she comes!”

The nitwit stepped aside and…gasp…there she was in all her glory and splinter. The pittypatapations in my heart struck again, and we’re talking about a heart that was banging like a bass drum. I tried to speak but the words seemed frozen in my mouse.

In my mouth, that is. I had already taken care of the mouses. The meese. The mooses. Skip it.

She had fixed her ears, all right, and her nose and her eyes and every single hair, and the total effect left me speechless, so I stared. I gawked. She gave me a smile. “Hello, Hank. You’re looking well.”

It took me a moment to unthaw my speech mechanisms. “Thank you, ma’am, but looks don’t always tell the story.”

“Oh? Have you been ill?”

You know, I had walked into this situation, thinking that I would pursue a Go Slow Program—recite a poem, sing a song, talk about flowers or something—but now that she was right in front of me, I tossed caution out the window and went plunging toward the bottom line.

“Of course I’ve been ill! Since I saw you last, I haven’t been able to eat or sleep. I walk around at night like a ghost. I’ve lost twenty pounds. My hair is falling out. I’m losing teeth. Even the fleas are moving out.”

Her mouth fell open. “Oh Hank, that’s terrible! What seems to be the problem? Do you have a disease?”

“No, Beulah, you have a disease.” I stabbed a paw in the air toward the bird dog. “HIM. He’s worse than mange. He’s worse than cholera. How can I lead a normal, healthy life when you’re wasting your time with him?”

Plato had been listening, of course, and thought it was time to open his big yap. “Hank, if I may intrude here, you’ve raised several points that we should…”

“Dry up.” Back to Beulah. “There’s a simple solution, right before your eyes.”

“Hank, please…”

“I’m the solution. Me, the cowdog of your dreams.”

“It’s not that simple.”

“Of course it is. Ditch him, get rid of him, send him down the road!”

“Are you finished?”

“No ma’am, I’m just getting warmed up.”

“Well, you’ll have to excuse me, I have things to do. Maybe we can talk about it another time.”

I couldn’t believe it. She stuck her snooty nose in the air, and left me and the Quail King alone in a poisonous silence. Plato shrugged and grinned. “Well! Perfect weather for a hunt, Hank, and they say the quail numbers are up this year.”

I roasted him with a glare. He didn’t notice and went right on blabbering.

“You know, Hank, and when bird season’s over, by golly, we ought to sit down and, you know, have a real heart-to-heart talk, just me and you. Guy-talk.” At that moment, Billy started his pickup and pulled away. Plato waved a paw. “Well, here we go, Hank, opening day! Great to see you again! I hope you get to feeling better.”

Oh yeah? Well, we didn’t need to talk about what I hoped for him.

As the pickup sped off to the west, I studied the lonely figure sitting near the cab. Was she weeping? Looking back at me through tear-drenched eyes?

No. Bummer.

I made my way back to the pickup, knowing that I would have to listen to Slim gripe and complain. Sure enough, that’s what he did. He rolled up his shirt sleeve and pointed to several red scratch marks on his arm, then pointed to the place on his shirt where, once upon a time, a little button had lived.

“Bozo. You liked to have tore my clothes off. How am I going to get that button sewed back on my shirt? I don’t even own a needle and thread.”

This might have gone on for hours, but, lucky for me, an oil field tanker truck had pulled up behind us and blew his air horn. Slim almost jumped out of his skin, but what did he expect? We’d been parked in the middle of the county road for twenty minutes, but guess who got blamed. Me.

“Bozo.”

Fine. I made my way across the seat and shoved Drover out of the Shotgun Position. After a moment of silence, he said, “How’d it go with Beulah?”

“Not so great.”

“I’ll be derned. What did you tell her?”

“Is that any of your business?”

“Just curious.”

“Well, if you must know, I told her to ditch Plato.”

“Just like that?”

“Yes, just like that. I went straight to the point.”

“Maybe that was the wrong approach.”

I barbecued him with a glare. “What do you know about approaches to women?”

“Well, I know that yours flopped.”

That hurt. I heaved a heavy sigh and turned my gaze out the window. “In small but tiny ways, you have a point. Maybe I was too blunt.”

“You were too blunt. She’s not a bulldozer.”

“Drover, she’s a lady, not a bulldozer. Here’s a thought. Next time, I’ll try to be more subtle.” I turned back to the runt. “Why are your eyes crossed?”

“Oh, I was about to sneeze.”

“So sneeze.”

“Well, it passed.”

“Good, but please don’t cross you eyes when I’m trying to give you lessons on romance. It makes me think you’re not paying attention.”

“Sorry.”

“One of these days, when you grow up, if you ever grow up, you might need some tips on charming the ladies.

“Yeah, I think she likes me.”

“But I can’t help you if you’re crossing your eyes all the time.”

“She loves my poetry.”

“The point to remember is that we don’t approach the ladies as though they were heavy equipment. Technique is very important.”

“Got it, thanks.”

Whew. Some dogs require more tutoring than others, and Drover requires a lot. I mean, he wears me out. I try to be patient with the little mutt. I want to pass along helpful tips from my Archive of Wisdom, but let’s be honest: It’s very hard to help a dog who spends half his life sneezing and crossing his eyes.

Oh well. Life moves on and so does a ranch pickup on a feeding day. We had work to do and we did it, even though my heart had been badly damaged. I could only hope that fate would allow me one more chance to woo back the Lady of My Dreams.

The next morning brought us bright sunlight that glistened on frost-covered trees and grass. By the time I had finished Morning Patrol, the frost had melted away and the day had turned out warm and beautiful, with the temperature nudging up into the fifties. We’re talking about gorgeous, perfect autumn weather.

To be honest, the day was so pleasant, I found it hard to concentrate on my daily workload of work. I mean, in the wintertime, sometimes it’s too cold for me to get excited about work, and sometimes in the summer, it’s too hot. In the fall of the year…well, by George, once in a while on a delicious fall afternoon, it’s just too nice for work, and sometimes a guy yields to the temptation to…

Maybe we shouldn’t be talking about this. You know how I am about the children. I wouldn’t want them to get the wrong idea, that I’m a lazy bum who takes naps in the afternoon.

That’s the kind of behavior we expect from Drover, but me? Hey, I’m Head of Ranch Security, not a lazy bum, so it’s very unlikely that you’ll ever find me napping on a warm autumn day. No sir. I might be lying in a warm patch of sun, but I’ll be hard at work, running spreadsheets or reading reports or updating my logbook of Drover’s Chicken Marks.

You talk about hard work! Keeping a record of Drover’s Chicken Marks is a full-time job. It would wear out five ordinary mutts, but I have to do it all myself, in my so-called spare time.

Have you ever seen that book? You talk about HUGE. Two thousand pages, thirty-four pounds of Chicken Marks. Sometimes, when Drover has a good day, we delete a few, but most of the time, we’re adding them.

We keep that logbook in our vault in the Security Division’s Vast Office Complex. It’s open for public inspection every Thursday between two and one o’clock in the aftermath. If you’re ever in the neighborhood, you should drop by and read it. It will give you a shocking glimpse at exactly what the King of Slackers has been doing all these years.

But the whole point of this discussion is that after spending hours and hours, bringing the logbook up to date, I was exhausted, just flat worn out and, well, on warm autumn days, occasionally a guy’s eyelids begin to droop.

Sometimes my eyelids seem to have a mind of their own, don’t you see. On this occasion, school was out, so to speak, and the eyelids were running the show. They staged a mutiny and began drifting in a downward direction, and before I knew it…well, perhaps I dozed, but it had nothing to do with my being a lazy bum.

Yes, I dozed, and even better, I fell into the embrace of a delicious dream about…can you guess who? Stand by, we’re fixing to watch a dream.

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