LITMIR.BIZ

      It’s me again, Hank the Cowdog. When you’ve been on the side of law and order as long as I have, it’s hard to get used to being a fugitive and an outcast.

      But that’s by George what happened in June of whatever year that was when it happened—last year, I suppose you might say. But it definitely happened.

      I’ll take first things first and one thing at a time because I’ve found, over my years in security work, that it just doesn’t pay to do it any other way. This job pays little enough under the best of circumstances, and how did I get on the subject of pay?

      It’s an important subject but it seems to me that I had something else on my mind. I’ll get it here in a minute. Weather’s been nice, hasn’t it? Had a little shower the other morning.

      What the heck was I going to talk about? It really burns me up when I . . . oh yes. The fugitive and outcast business.

      Okay, here we go. This may turn out to be one of my more exciting stories, so hang on. It started out as a normal day in June. I had been out on routine patrol most of the night, checking things out, making sure my ranch was secure from coyotes, coons, skunks, badgers, and the many species of monsters we have around here.

      At daylight, everything checked out, so I went down to the sewer and freshened up and made my way to the gas tanks, where I had every intention of keeping a date with my gunnysack bed.

      Drover was there, as you might have guessed, wheezing and twitching in his bed. He heard me pawing at my gunnysack and opened one eye. His eyeball went around in circles.

      “You should have someone look at that eye, Drover. There’s something wrong with it.”

      “Tblckw dkvlskc with murgle skiffer.”

      “Maybe so, but that doesn’t alter the fact that it goes around in circles. And speaking of circles, did you make your patrol? I’ll need a full report on conditions in the eastern quadrant of headquarters. Might as well get it over with now, before I go off duty.”

      “Lorken tonsils skiffer murgle skungling pork chops.”

      “How can you be sure of that? Did you check it out yourself or is it just hearsay?”

      “Humlum morkin reskiffering sardines.”

      “And you’re positive about that?”

      His other eye slid open and he stared at me for a moment. “Where am I?”

      “That depends on your location, Drover. Once you get that settled, the rest of it will fall into place. Where were you the last time you remembered?”

      “I don’t remember.”

      I flopped down on my gunnysack and released my grip on the world. “That’s one of your problems, son. You need to work on developing your memory. Memory is very crucial to success in the security business. Try it again, and this time, concentrate.”

      “Okay. What am I concentrating on?”

      “You’re concentrating on trying to remember.”

      “Oh. Remembering what?”

      “Remembering where you were the last time you were somewhere.”

      “Boy, that’s a tough one.”

      “Yes, but I don’t need to remind you that you could use a little toughening up. Go ahead and scuffle with it. When you come up with an answer, wake me up.”

      “You going to sleep?”

      “Not entirely. Although it may appear that I’m falllllling azzzzzzleep, tblckw dkvlskc with murgle skiffer.”

      “Oh good. It sure gets boring around here when I have to think and remember. Now let’s see, where was I the last time I was somewhere?”

      “Lorken tonsils skiffer murgle skungling pork chops.”

      “No, I don’t think so, because that would have made it Saturday and that was the day all the clouds went over, wasn’t

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