Читать книгу The Dungeon of Doom - John R. Erickson - Страница 7

Chapter Two: I Get Fired

You see what I have to go through with Drover? I had received the alarm from Data Control and was trying to call him into action, using some new and interesting terminology from naval life, and he . . . I don’t know what he did or how he did it, but this happens all the time. He gets me so twisted around, I find myself . . . well, blabbing nonsense.

You heard the whole thing, so you know what I’m talking about. Sometimes I think the little moron is trying to make a mockery of my life.

Oh well.

The important thing is that I managed to sneeze control of the situation and get things moving in the right direction. We launched ourselves into the morning breeze and went streaking northeastward on a compass heading of 3400. Once airborne, I gave the order to start sending out some Stage One Barkings, just to let the enemy know that we were . . .

Yipes. The pickup came barreling down the hill, heading straight toward us on a collision course, so I sent out an urgent message to begin Evasive Action. In a flash, we throttled down and leaped out of the roadway, just in time to . . . cough . . . eat dirt kicked up by the tires of the smarty-pants pickup.

Hey, who and where did that guy think he was? For his information . . . holy smokes, no sooner had the first pickup rumbled past than another appeared right behind it, and then another. And another. What was going on around here? It was just barely daylight, so what were all these people doing on my . . .

Okay, relax. You thought it was some kind of invasion of the ranch? Ha ha. Not at all. No, it turned out to be . . . have I ever mentioned that it’s hard for a dog to do a proper job of running his ranch when nobody tells him what’s going on? Well, it’s not only hard, it’s impossible.

Here’s the deal. Slim and Loper, the cowboys on this outfit, had set up a branding day. They’d called all the ranchers and cowboys in the neighborhood to come and help with the work. So far, so good. I have no problem letting those guys play a small role in planning things around here. Give ’em a few little jobs to keep ’em busy and they’ll stay out of my hair. But this!

See, they’d planned the whole day’s work, they’d called everybody on the creek, BUT NOBODY HAD BOTHERED TO CLEAR IT WITH ME. So all at once we had all these unauthorized pickups pulling into ranch headquarters at daylight, and there I was . . . well, running around and barking like an idiot. How do you suppose that made me feel?

It made me feel pretty silly, is how it made me feel. Obviously we’d had a major breakdown in communications somewhere along the chain of command. Obviously someone on our ranch didn’t think it was important to let the Head of Ranch Security know what was going on.

As the pickups rolled into headquarters one after another, I marched over to where Drover was standing. “This is outrageous. They expect us to protect the ranch and keep records on everyone who comes and goes, but then they cut us out of the loop.”

He glanced around. “What loop?”

“The loop, Drover. Everyone knows what the loop is.”

“You mean the loop in a cowboy’s rope?”

“No, that’s not what I mean at all. I’m talking about the Loop of Communication.”

“You mean . . . ropes can talk?”

For a moment, I didn’t know what to say. “Let’s drope it, Dropper.”

“My name’s Drover.”

“I’m very much aware of your name. It comes up every time there’s a disaster on the ranch.”

“Yeah, but you called me ‘Dropper.’ It kind of hurts my feelings.” He hung his head and sniffled.

“All right, I’m sorry I called you Dropper.”

“Are you really?”

“No. And to be perfectly honest, I think Dropper would be a better name for you than Drover.”

“I think it sounds dumb.”

“That’s the point.”

“You mean . . .”

“Never mind. Do you realize what’s going on here?”

He glanced around. “Where?”

“Here. There. All around you, right in front of your nose.”

He crossed his eyes and . . . I couldn’t believe this . . . he looked at the end of his nose. “Well, a big fly just landed on my nose, and he’s green. But I still don’t see the loop.”

I swallowed my urge to go into a screaming fit. “The pickups, Drover, the pickups and stock trailers and horses. Do you understand why they’re here?”

“You called me Drover. Thanks. It really means a lot when you call me by my real name.”

“I’m fixing to call you . . . just answer the question.”

“Well, let me think.” He rolled his eyes around and scrunched up his lips. “They’re here because . . .they’re not somewhere else?”

“Okay, that’s a start. If the pickups and so forth weren’t here, they’d be somewhere else.”

“Yeah, and if they were somewhere else, they wouldn’t be here.”

“Exactly my point. But let’s look deeper. Why are they here instead of somewhere else?” I stood there for thirty seconds, waiting for the little ninny to come up with the answer. “I’m sorry, we’re out of time. You’ve flunked your test.”

“Wait, I’ve got it. They’re here because . . .”

“Yes, yes?”

“They’re here because . . . because . . .”

“Hurry up, Drover!”

“They’re here because . . . out of all the places in the whole world, this is where they all came. And there’s a whole bunch of places where they didn’t go.”

The air hissed out of my lungs and I found myself staring at the dirt. “I try to help you. I try to bring you into my conversations, and you give me meathead answers like that. You flunk, pal, and you can spend the rest of the day in your room—with your nose in the corner.”

He stared at me with tragic eyes. “No, anything but that. I hate standing in the corner.”

“Drover, I gave you five chances to come up with the right answer and you still couldn’t do it. When you flunk a test, you have to take the punishment.”

“One more chance. I’ll get it this time. Can you give me a little hint?”

I thought it over. “Okay, one more chance and that’s it. Here’s the hint: they came to help Slim and Loper with the spring branding.”

I know, it was more than a “little hint,” but I wanted to get this mess over with. And, to be honest, I’d begun to have second thoughts about sending him to his room. Maybe that was too harsh a punishment.

Drover went into a pose of deep concentration while I tapped my toe and gazed up at the clouds. Then his eyes popped open and a smile washed over his mouth. “I’ve got it this time.”

“Great. What’s the answer?”

He puffed himself up and said, “Loper’s pickup has a busted spring and they’re going to help him put on a brand-new one.”

A heavy silence rolled over us. I stared into the huge emptiness of his eyes. He was grinning, so happy with himself for coming up with the answer. I didn’t have the heart to tell him that he was three times dumber than a box of rocks. I pushed him aside and marched away as fast as I could go. I couldn’t stand any more.

Behind me, he called out, “Did I pass? Are you proud of me?”

“Yes. No. I don’t care. Don’t ever speak to me again.”

Whew! I got away just in time. I’ve said this before but I’ll say it again: that’s a weird little mutt.

By this time the cowboys had unloaded their horses and tightened their cinches, and they were standing in a circle around Loper and Slim. Loper was giving out the orders for the roundup, telling which riders to go to which parts of the pasture. I stood outside the circle for a few moments, then wiggled my way between a pair of legs and emerged inside the ring of cowboys.

There, I sat down and, well, gave them a grin that said, “Sorry I’m late. What’s the plan?”

When I appeared on the scene, Loper stopped in the middle of his sentence. His eyes came at me like . . . I don’t know, like a two-pronged fork, I guess you would say. They didn’t seem real friendly.

“Hank, we won’t be needing your help. Stay out of the way and don’t make a sound until we get the cattle penned.”

What? Stay out of the . . . hey, what was the deal? First they’d planned a roundup without consulting me, and now they didn’t want my help? I was astamished, shocked, and deeply wounded. I looked around the circle of faces (why were they all grinning?) and went to a tail-setting we call “I Can’t Believe You’re Serious.” In this setting, the top 90 percent of the tail assumes a lifeless position, while the last few inches tap out a slow, mournful rhythm on the ground.

Tap . . . tap . . . tap.

I studied their faces again, and suddenly realized that they weren’t going to use me in the roundup. They weren’t even looking at me. They had cut me out of their plans, thrown me aside like an old boot. This was crazy! I mean, what’s the reason for keeping a highly trained cowdog on the place if you’re not going to let him use his talents? Over the years, I had proved myself . . .

Okay, maybe I’d messed up a time or two. Stood in the wrong gate. Barked at the wrong time. Stirred up a cow or two. Caused a couple of, uh, stampedes. But, hey, I’d learned from my little lapses in judgment, and those experiences had made me an older dog, a wiser dog. I was sure I could control my savage instincts and be a productive member of the Team.

No more careless barking. No more picking fights with stupid . . . no more getting into childish scuffles with the cows, and yes, I had learned valuable lessons about standing in the middle of gates. I had graduated from the School of Hard Knots and was ready . . .

They left, I mean, just walked away and left me sitting there! I hadn’t even finished pleading my case. They swung up into their saddles and rode off across the dew-covered pasture, and not one of them even bothered to look back and see that they had left me there . . . a broken dog, a dog who was no longer wanted.