LITMIR.BIZ

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to a point (not quite as good as mine, but so what?), and nice ears that flap when she runs.

      Only trouble is that she’s crazy about a spotted bird dog, without a doubt the ugliest, dumbest, worthlessest cur I ever met. What could be uglier than a spotted short-haired dog with a long skinny tail? And what could be dumber or more worthless than a dog that goes around chasing birds?

      They call him Plato. I don’t know why, except maybe because his eyes look like plates half the time, empty plates. He don’t know a cow from a sow, but do you think that makes him humble? No sir. He thinks that bird-chasing is hot stuff. What really hurts, though, is that Beulah seems to agree.

      Don’t understand that woman, but I dream about her a lot.

      Anyway, where was I? Under the gas tanks, catching up on my sleep. All at once Drover was right there beside me, jumping up and down and giving off that high-pitched squeal of his that kind of bores into your eardrums. You can’t ignore him when he does that.

      Well, I throwed open one eye, kept the other one shut so that I could get some halfway sleep. “Will you please shut up?”

      “Hank, oh Hankie, it’s just terrible, you wouldn’t believe, hurry and wake up, I seen his tracks down on the creek, get up before he escapes!”

      I throwed open the other eye, pushed myself up, and went nose-to-nose with the noisemaker. “Quit hopping around. Quit making all that racket. Hold still and state your business.”

      “Okay Hank, all right, I’ll try.” He tried and was none too successful, but he did get the message across. “Oh Hank, there’s been a killing, right here on the ranch, and we slept through it!”

      “Huh?” I was coming awake by then, and the word killing sent a jolt clean out to the end of my tail. “Who’s been killed?”

      “They hit the chickenhouse, Hank. I don’t know how they got in but they did, busted in there and killed one of those big leghorn hens, killed her dead, Hank, and oh, the blood!”

      Well, that settled it. I had no choice but to go back on duty. A lot of dogs would have just turned over and gone back to sleep, but I take this stuff pretty serious.

      We trotted up to the chickenhouse, and Drover kept jumping up and down and talking. “I found some tracks down by the creek. I’m sure they belong to the killer, Hank, I’m just sure they do.”

      “What kind of tracks?”

      “Coyote.”

      “Hmm.” We reached the chickenhouse and, sure enough, there was the hen lying on the ground, and she was still dead. I walked around the body, sniffing it good and checking the signs.

      I noticed the position of the body and memorized every detail. The hen was lying on her left side, pointing toward the northeast, with one foot out and the other one curled up under her wing. Her mouth was open and it appeared to me that she had lost some tail feathers.

      “Uh-huh, I’m beginning to see the pattern.”

      “What, tell me, Hank, who done it?”

      “Not yet. Where’d you see them tracks?” There weren’t any tracks around the corpse, ground was too hard. Drover took off in a run and I followed him down into the brush along the creek.

      He stopped and pointed to some fresh tracks in the mud. “There they are, Hank, just where I found them. Are you proud of me?”

      I pushed him aside and studied the sign, looked it over real careful, sniffed it, gave it the full treatment. Then I raised up.

      “Okay, I’ve got it now. It’s all clear. Them’s coon tracks, son, not coyote. I can tell from the scent. Coons must have attacked while I was out on patrol. They’re sneaky, you’ve got to watch ’em every minute.”

      Drover squinted at the tracks. “Are you sure those are coon tracks? They sure look like coyote to me.”

      “You don’t go by the look, son, you go by the smell. This nose of mine don’t lie. If it says coon, you better believe there’s a coon at the end of them tracks. And I’m fixing to clean house on him. Stay behind me and don’t get hurt.”

      I threaded my way through the creek willows, over the sand, through the water. I never lost the scent. In the heat of a chase, all my senses come alive and point like a blazing arrow toward the enemy.

      In a way I felt sorry for the coon, even though he’d committed a crime and become my mortal enemy. With me on his trail, the little guy just didn’t have a chance. One of the disadvantages of being as big and deadly as I am is that you sometimes find yourself in sympathy with the other guy.

      But part of being Head of Ranch Security is learning to ignore that kind of emotion. I mean, to hold down this job, you have to be cold and hard.

      The scent was getting stronger all the time, and it didn’t smell exactly like any coon I’d come across before. All at once I saw him. I stopped dead still and Drover, the little dummy, ran right into me and almost had a heart attack. I guess he thought I was a giant coon or something. It’s hard to say what he thinks.

      The coon was hiding in some bushes about five feet in front of me. I could hear him chewing on something, and that smell was real strong now.

      “What’s that?” Drover whispered, sniffing the air.

      “Coon, what do you think?” I glanced back at him. He was shaking with fear. “You ready for some combat experience?”

      “Yes,” he squeaked.

      “All right, here’s the plan. I’ll jump him and try to get him behind the neck. You come in the second wave and take what you can. If you run away like you did last time, I’ll sweep the corral with you and give you a whupping you won’t forget. All right, let’s move out.”

      I crouched down and crept forward, every muscle in my highly conditioned body taut and ready for action. Five feet, four feet, three feet, two. I sprang through the air and hit right in the middle of the biggest porcupine I ever saw.

      Chapter Two: Quills - Just Part of the Job

      It was kind of a short fight. Coming down, I seen them quills aimed up at me and tried to change course. Too late. I don’t move so good in midair.

      I lit right in the middle of him and bam, he slapped me across the nose with his tail, sure did hurt too, brought tears to my eyes. I hollered for Drover to launch the second wave but he had disappeared.

      Porcupine took another shot at me but I dodged, tore up half an acre of brush, and got the heck out of there. As I limped back up to the house on pin-cushion feet, my thoughts went back to the murder scene and the evidence I had committed to memory.

      It was clear now. The porcupine had had nothing at all to do with the murder because porcupines don’t eat anything but trees.

      Drover had found the first set of tracks he had come to and had started hollering about coyotes. I had been duped into believing the runt.

      Yes, it was all clear. I had no leads, no clues, no idea who had killed the hen. What I did have was a face-full of porcupine quills, as well as several in my paws.

      I limped up to the yard gate. As you might expect, Drover was nowhere to be seen. I sat down beside the gate and waited for Loper to come out and remove the quills.

      A lot of dogs would have set up a howl and a moan. Not me. I figgered that when a dog got to be Head of Ranch Security, he ought to be able to stand some pain. It just went with the territory.

      So I waited and waited and Loper didn’t come out. Them quills was beginning to hurt.

      The

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