LITMIR.BIZ

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the Barncat came along just then, had his tail stuck straight up in the air and was rubbing along the fence, coming my way. He had his usual dumb-cat expression and I could hear him purring.

      He came closer. I glared at him. “Scram, cat.”

      He stopped, arched his back, and rubbed up against the fence. “What’s that on your face?”

      “Nothing you need to know about.”

      He rubbed and purred, then reached up and sharpened his claws on a post. “You sure look funny with all those things sticking out of your nose.”

      “You’re gonna look funny if you don’t run along and mind your own business. I’m not in the mood to take any of your trash right now.”

      He grinned and kept coming, started rubbing up against my leg. I decided to ignore him, look the other way and pretend he wasn’t there. Sometimes that’s the best way to handle a cat, let him know that you won’t allow him to get you stirred up. You have to be firm with cats. Give ’em the slightest encouragement and he’ll try to move in and take over.

      Pete rubbed and purred. I ignored him, told myself he wasn’t there. Then he brought that tail up and flicked it across the end of my nose. I curled my lip and growled. He looked up at me and did it again.

      It tickled my nose, made my eyes water. I had to sneeze. I tried to fight it back but couldn’t hold it. I gave a big sneeze and them quills sent fire shooting through my nose, kind of inflamed me, don’t you see, and all at once I lost my temper.

      I made a snap at him but he was gone, over the fence and into Sally May’s yard, which is sort of off limits to us dogs even though Pete can come and go as he pleases, which ain’t fair.

      With the fence between us, Pete knew he was safe. He throwed a hump into his back and hissed, and what was I supposed to do then? Sing him a lullaby? Talk about the weather? No sir, I barked. I barked hard and loud, just to let that cat know that he couldn’t get me stirred up.

      The door opened and Loper stepped out on the porch. He was wearing jeans and an undershirt, no hat and no boots, and he had a cup of coffee in his hand.

      “Hank! Leave the cat alone!”

      I stopped and stared at him. Leave the cat alone! Pete grinned and walked off, purring and switching the tip of his tail back and forth.

      I could have killed him.

      I whined and wagged my tail and went over to the gate where Loper could see my nose. He looked up at the sky, took a drink of coffee, swatted a mosquito on his arm, looked up at the clouds again. I whined louder and jumped on the gate so that he couldn’t miss seeing that old Hank, his loyal friend and protector of the ranch, had been wounded in the line of duty.

      “Don’t jump on the gate.” He yawned and went back into the house.

      Twenty minutes later he came out again, dressed for the day’s work. I had waited pa­tiently. My nose was really pounding by this time, but I didn’t complain. When he came out the gate, I jumped up to greet him.

      Know what he said? “Hank, you stink! Have you been in the sewer again?” And he walked on down to the corral, didn’t see the quills in my nose.

      At last he saw them. We were down at the corral. He shook his head and muttered, “Hank, when are you going to learn about porcupines? How many times do we have to go through this? Drover never gets quills in his nose.”

      Well, Drover was a little chicken and Loper just didn’t understand. Nobody understood.

      He got a pair of fencing pliers out of the saddle shed, threw a leg lock on me, and started pulling. It hurt. Oh it hurt! Felt like he was pulling off my whole nose. But I took it without a whimper—well, maybe I whimpered a little bit—and we got ’er done.

      Loper rubbed me behind the ears. “There, now try to stay away from porcupines.” He stood up and started to dust off his jeans when he noticed the wet spot.

      His eyes came up and they looked kind of wrathful. “Did you do that?”

      I was well on my way to tall timber when he threw the pliers at me.

      I couldn’t help it. I didn’t do it on purpose. The quills just got to hurting so bad that I had to let something go. Was it my fault that he had me in a leg lock and got in the way?

      Make one little mistake around this ranch and they nail you to the wall.

      I laid low for a while, hid in the post pile and nursed my nose. It was about ten o’clock when Sally May discovered the murdered hen.

      Chapter Three: An Enormous Monster

      I debated for a long time about what to do next.

      Should I hide out and play it safe, or go on down to the chickenhouse and get blamed for something that wasn’t my fault?

      Curiosity got the best of me and I trotted down to see what was going on.

      Drover was already there when I arrived, wagging his stub tail and trying to win a few points with his loyal dog routine. I walked up to him and said, out of the corner of my mouth, “Thanks for all the help this morning. I really appreciate it.”

      I think he missed the note of irony, because he said—and I mean with a straight face—he said, “That’s okay, Hankie, it wasn’t nothing.”

      Dang right it wasn’t nothing.

      Loper was kneeling over the hen, studying the signs. Sally May stood nearby, looking mighty unhappy about the dead chicken. Loper pushed his hat to the back of his head and stood up. His eyes went straight to me and Drover, only when I glanced around, I noticed that Drover had disappeared. It was just me, standing in the spotlight.

      “Hank, if you hadn’t been out barking all night, you might have prevented this. Why do you think we keep you around here?” I hung my head and tucked my tail. “Do you have any idea how much money it costs to keep you dogs around here? Seems that every time I turn around I’m having to buy another fifty-pound sack of dog food. That stuff’s expensive.”

      Maybe this ain’t the time or place to argue the point, but just for the record let me say that Co-op dog food is the cheapest you can buy. I don’t know what they make it out of, hulls, straw, sawdust, anything the pigs won’t eat, and then they throw in a little grease to give it a so-called flavor. Tastes like soap and about half the time it gives me an upset stomach.

      The point is, I wasn’t exactly eating the ranch into bankruptcy. Thought I ought to throw that in to give a more balanced view of things.

      Loper went on. “We can’t afford to keep you dogs around here if you’re going to let this sort of thing go on. Everybody has to earn his keep on the ranch. I don’t want this to happen again.”

      What did he suppose I wanted? Sometimes I just don’t understand . . . oh well.

      He picked up the dead chicken by the feet and carried it down to the trash barrel. I got to admit that I watched this with some interest, since it had occurred to me that there wasn’t much any of us could do for the dead chicken.

      The more I thought about chicken dinner, the more my mouth watered. Couldn’t get it off my mind. I like chicken about as well as any food you can name. Has a nice clean taste except for the feathers. Feathers are pretty tasteless, if you ask me, and they kind of scrape when they go down.

      Sure was hungry for chicken, but I decided against it. Wouldn’t look too good if I got caught eating the murder victim, after all the trouble I’d gotten into that day.

      I tried to concentrate on the scene of the crime. I studied

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