Smart Dog (4 page)

Sister Mary Grace paused for a good five seconds before saying, "Thank you, Kaitlyn. You don't know what a weight that takes off my mind." If she had been talking to anyone besides Kaitlyn, Amy would have suspected that maybe Sister Mary Grace was being sarcastic. But teachers all loved Kaitlyn. The other students all loved Kaitlyn, and so did everybody's parents. Amy was sure she was the only person in the world who didn't think everything Kaitlyn said or did was wonderful.

Still, even though it wasn't intentional, Kaitlyn had done Amy a good turn: Sister Mary Grace had been distracted and was letting the note-passing incident drop.

Trust me,
Amy thought, turning around for a quick glare at Sean. All that had gotten her so far was trouble.

After all the buses had pulled out of the school's parking lot, the children who lived close enough to walk home were dismissed. Most of Amy's friends were bus riders or lived in the other direction, so she usually walked home alone. She had expected that this would be especially true today, getting out late, but Sister Mary Grace canceled the detention Amy should have served for being tardy. "Just get your dog home," Sister Mary Grace said, tearing up the detention slip, "and we'll call it even."

Outside, a small crowd gathered around her—not only fifth graders, but some of the younger children, too, and even one sixth-grade boy, though he only walked one block with the group before turning down a side street. Even Minneh—Kaitlyn's shadow—was there, though Kaitlyn, of course, was not. Amy suspected that Kaitlyn had sent her to spy.

Sherlock jumped and begged and fetched and shook hands with anyone who asked, and in between he pranced by Amy's side, looking as proud of himself as though he were leading a parade. He must have checked the clocks in every room of the school, Amy thought, for just about everybody seemed to have personally seen his jumping routine.

Still, at least he remembered not to talk, even when one of the girls commanded, "Speak, Sherlock. Speak!"

Sherlock glanced at Amy for instructions.

Feeling like a fool, Amy barked, to show him what was expected.

Agreeably, Sherlock barked, too.

One of the fourth graders howled, like a wolf baying at the moon.

So did Sherlock.

Then all of the fourth graders howled.

Sherlock howled louder.

So much for sneaking home quietly,
Amy thought. The neighbors had to be able to hear them from a block away.

But finally the noisy crowd arrived at her front yard, and finally—after many, many
Good-byes
and
Good doggies
and
See you tomorrows
—they moved on from her front yard. And then Amy realized she had an even bigger problem: She could no longer put off worrying about what she was going to do with Sherlock. She sat down on the front step and rested her chin on her hands, her elbows on her knees.

Sherlock sat down next to her and wedged his head between her arms so that she pretty much
had
to pet him. "What's wrong?" he asked. "Is that boy going to call Animal Control? Or Dr. Boden at the college?"

Boy?
Amy had to think. "You mean Sean?" She shook her head. "No, I think we can trust him." She thought about it and realized she wasn't just saying it to reassure Sherlock. "I think he's OK. I'm just trying to figure out what I should tell my parents."

"I can tell them," Sherlock offered. "Just like I told you."

Amy must have been making a face, because Sherlock asked, "What? What's wrong?"

"Oh, I don't know if anything is," Amy said. "It's just that sometimes parents.... Well, they're grown-ups."

Sherlock waited for more to this explanation. "Do you want to scratch my belly while you're thinking?" he asked. He rolled over, as though for her convenience, exposing the soft paler fur underneath.

Distracted, Amy scratched. "I mean, I don't
think
they'd call Dr. Boden. I don't
think
they'd want somebody to cut open your brain. But they might say it's none of their business. They might say you belong to the college and we don't have any right to keep you. I just can't be sure."

"Oh." Sherlock rolled back over and laid his head on his paws with a sad sigh. "You don't think they'd like me."

"Of course they'd like you," Amy said. "What's not to like?"

Sherlock gave a feeble wag of his tail.

Amy continued, "They'd
want
to be on your side. But I can just imagine them getting a letter-writing campaign going—like they did when they thought there needed to be a light at the corner, instead of just a stop sign. They went around and talked to the neighbors and got them to sign a petition and had town meetings, and they got the light, but it took about two years."

"Dr. Boden isn't going to wait two years," Sherlock said.

Amy nodded. "I know. So we can't tell them the truth. I'll tell them..."—she considered—"...that you followed me home. That you're a lost dog."

"Is
lost
different from
strayed
?" Sherlock asked. "Or will they be afraid I'll bite and call Animal Control?"

Amy ignored the fact that he was right. "I'll tell them how nice and friendly you are," she said. "And smart. I'll say"—Amy let a little bit of whine creep into her voice—"'Can't we keep him until his owners show up? We'll put up signs saying we've found him, and I promise to walk him and feed him and take care of him myself.' I'll say, 'Ever since Mom went back to work, I'm always alone and you never say
yes
to me anymore about anything.'"

Sherlock looked skeptical. "Is that likely to work?"

"It might," Amy said.

But she couldn't even convince herself.

"Are you hungry?" Amy asked. Mom didn't approve of snacks—but surely the rules were different for dogs than for people.

Sherlock nodded. "I haven't eaten since last night."

That definitely meant the rules should be different.

Amy took Sherlock into the kitchen, and she opened the refrigerator door. "What do they normally feed you?"

"Doktor Woof Dog Food." Then—he must have been reciting from memory—"'Crunchy, veterinarian-approved, bite-sized biscuits that supply all of your dog's daily nutritional needs and prevent tartar build-up on teeth, to keep your pet's breath smelling fresh.'" He added, "They come in a bag with a picture of a pretty cocker spaniel."

"Uh-huh," Amy said. She poked at a foil-wrapped package that might have been meat loaf, in which case her mother had prepared it the night before for tonight's dinner; or it might have been fruitcake left over from Christmas, four months ago, which hardly seemed a fair thing to inflict on Sherlock for his first meal with them. She peeked into various plastic containers and found grapes, leftover beans, corn chowder, and chopped onion. She closed the refrigerator and opened the cupboard. Not much to choose from there, either. "How about tuna fish?" she asked. "Or is that just for cats?"

Sherlock shuddered.

"You don't like tuna?" Amy asked, wondering whether he'd eat cereal, some of which at least looked like dry dog food.

"I don't like cats," Sherlock said. "Which is strange because I've never actually met one. But they
sound
terrible. Tuna is fine. Sometimes some of the students shared their lunches with me when Dr. Boden wasn't looking, and I like tuna. If it's the kind without too much mayonnaise."

"It doesn't actually come with
any
mayonnaise," Amy said. "That's added."

"Wow," Sherlock said.

Amy opened a can and dumped the tuna into a small bowl, then she set out another bowl with water. Her mother, she guessed, would consider those bowls unfit for human use if she ever suspected, so Amy would have to be sure to wash them and have them back up in the cupboard before her mother got home to see.

"This is good," Sherlock said, just as the doorbell rang.

Now who,
Amy thought, trying to hide the worry from her face,
could that he?

She must not have done a good job, for Sherlock asked—as he seemed to be doing a lot recently—"What's wrong?"

"It's too early for my mom," Amy explained. "And, anyway, she'd use her key. I'm not expecting anyone. Come on." She gestured for him to follow. "If we go to the top of the stairs, there's a window that looks out over the front stoop and we can see who it is."

She started for the stairs, but Sherlock went directly to the front door. He sniffed underneath the door. "It smells like that boy from school," he said, "Sean."

"Sean takes the bus in the other direction entirely," Amy said. But when she got to the window, she saw Sherlock was right: Sean was on the stoop, and there was a bicycle lying on the lawn, which explained how he'd gotten there.

She opened the door just as Sean was pressing the doorbell a second time.

"What are you doing here?" she demanded.

"Gee, are you that friendly to all your visitors?" Sean asked. He turned his attention from her without waiting for an answer. "Hi, Sherlock. How are you doing?"

"Fine," Sherlock said. "Did you know that tuna comes without mayonnaise?"

"Yeah," Sean said. "My dad's got high cholesterol, so everything that comes in the house lately is fat free. Dry tuna is actually better than tuna with fat-free mayonnaise."

Sherlock nodded. "Tiffany was always on a diet," he said. "So she used fat-free mayonnaise, which was the worst kind."

"Excuse me," Amy said, resentful of being ignored. "Did you bicycle all the way over here just to discuss tuna with Sherlock?"

"No," Sean said reasonably. "He was the one who brought up the subject." He went back to his bicycle and started rummaging through the pouch attached to the handlebars.

Amy followed and tried sniffing at him, discreetly. She didn't notice that Sean smelled at all, but she knew dogs had better noses than people. Sherlock probably could smell
her,
also.

Sean looked up suddenly, and Amy wondered if he'd heard her sniffing. He didn't say anything about that. He said, "I came to give you this." He held up a brown leather collar, from which a tag dangled. The tag said:
BIG RED.

"It's my dog's collar," Sean explained when Amy didn't say anything. He showed her the flip side, on which were engraved Sean's name, address, and phone number. "For Sherlock."

"But," Amy pointed out, "Sherlock isn't big and he isn't red."

"I'm sorry," Sean said, sounding more annoyed than sorry, "but my dog
is.
" He knelt to show Sherlock the collar. "You don't mind, do you?"

Sherlock sniffed the collar. "Girl dog?" he asked.

Sean nodded.

"She smells nice," Sherlock said, which was such an unexpected thing for him to say, it made Amy giggle. Sherlock let Sean fasten the collar around his neck. It was a little too loose, but not so much so as to be obvious.

"There we go," Sean said. "Just in time."

Amy looked up to see what he meant and saw her mother pulling into the driveway.

"I have a plan," Sean whispered. "Trust me."

Amy had already seen how far
that
had gotten her.

"Hi, honey," Amy's mom said. She glanced at Sean, but didn't even seem to notice Sherlock. "Sorry I'm late, but I stopped for milk."

If she was late, it was only by about thirty seconds, but she was a natural worrier, so she always figured other people were, too.

"Uh, hi, Mom," Amy said. "This is, uh, Sean—" Before she could get out his last name, much less that she knew him from school, Sean burst into tears. Very noisy tears.

Which was as big a surprise to Amy as to her mother.

"Oh, dear," Mom said, shifting her grocery bag to her other arm. She laid her hand on Sean's arm. "What's the matter, Sean?"

Sean buried his face in Sherlock's fur. "Sorry," he said, sniffling. "It's my dog."

For the first time, Mom glanced at Sherlock.

Sherlock, who'd been nudging Sean's shoulder as though to see what was the matter, must have realized at the same time Amy did that this had to be part of Sean's "trust me" plan. Sherlock put on an expression that was simultaneously brave and intelligent and concerned and pitiful.

"Your dog?" Mom repeated.

Sean nodded, showing his tear-streaked face. "Your daughter"—he waved vaguely in Amy's direction as though he'd just recently been told her name and had forgotten.

"Amy," Amy supplied.

"...called," Sean continued, "when she found Big Red and realized he must be lost because he was so far from home."

Amy, who could get lost five blocks from home, hoped her mother wouldn't question this newfound geographical skill.

"Well, he's here now," Mom said, "and safe and sound. Would you like me to give you a lift home?"

Sean gave a howl that sounded to Amy as fake as the fourth graders imitating wolves. But Mom looked frantic. "What?" she asked. "
What?
"

"We're moving," Sean said. "And the new apartment doesn't allow pets. And my father said if we didn't find a home for Big Red by today, we'd just have to drop him off at the Humane Society. And my sister, Kaitlyn, she says when the Humane Society can't find homes for dogs, they kill them."

Amy knew that Sean was an only child. But she could take a good guess which Kaitlyn Sean was thinking might say such a thing. Sean finished, gasping and gulping dramatically for breaths, "And my sister says that only the puppies ever get adopted from the Humane Society. She says Big Red will be fried within the week."

"Oh," Mom said, looking distressed, "they don't 'fry' them. And besides, there are a lot of people who don't have the time or patience for little puppies, and they're especially looking for a dog that's already full grown and trained—"

"Big Red is very well trained," Sean said.

"I'm sure he is," Mom agreed.

"He always lets you know when he has to go out, and he never chews on the furniture or on anybody's stuff, and he doesn't dig in the yard, and he doesn't bark when he's left home alone, and he's friendly to people who like dogs, and he doesn't bother people who don't like dogs. He's very well behaved."