Now, lessee, I don’t smell Culebra yet but there’s dogs everywhere, they smell as sweet as the insides of Buddy’s shoes. So maybe if just lope out of town, I’ll catch Culebra’s scent again and this time be able to track her.
If I don’t, then I’ll come back here when it gets light. I wish the open fields were closer so I could cross-track to find my direction. It’s hard in these darned streets.
My toes are clickin’ on the pavement. And there’s a cat! I’m gonna get ‘im, he’s runnin’, I’m stretchin’ and runnin’ and goin’ across the grass and through the flowers. He’s fast, he’s like a shadow. He’s goin’ under that house! I’m gonna get him!
HEYHEYHEY! HEYHEYHEY!
Sssst!
My nose, you little devil, my nose!
Sssst!
Ow! Ow! Ow! Ow!
“There’s a dog after Deedah! Get outa there! Get outa there!”
My tail! Who’s got my tail? Oh, uh-oh, a lady back there. Oh, ow! Ow! Okay, I get it, I’m goin’! I’m history!
Boy, look how this place has changed. The houses were all dark and quiet a second ago, now everything’s all lit up. There’s people shoutin’ and runnin’. They all musta noticed that cat. Whoomp! “Git! Git!” Whoomp on my back again.
I run till it’s darker and there’s quiet again. Now I gotta see if I can pick up Culebra’s scent.
Suck air, suck it deep. No, nothing. Try again and—yes, there it is, oh, there it is!
I AM GOING HOME AT LAST AT LAST AT LAST!
Gotta go gotta go, catch my rhythm, go wit the flow, go, go, the houses are sailin’ past now, cats on this porch and that, forget ‘em, the smell of Culebra and home are tugging my heart now, can’t stop, can’t waste my time.
Oh, yeah, I’m gettin’ a strong scent now, strong and steady. There’s a woods. Thick, dark, the moonlight just sifting through the trees. I smell rats, coons, an opossum that just ate bird eggs. I smell a fox, her scent all damp with saliva ‘cause she’s hungry and hunting. I smell field mice near her, but they aren’t salty with fear, so the fox is gonna surprise ‘em. Boy, I wish I was her, gettin’ ready to eat, ‘cause old Bob is hungry again!
It’s real dark in here. Snakes and ‘coons make me bark hard, cause I don’t like ‘em. Armadillos are interesting, ‘cept you can’t eat ‘em, not conveniently, anyway. Possums’re easy to kill, they die as soon as you so much as sniff ‘em. ‘Cept if you turn your back for a second, then they’re gone. How does that work?
Oh, the scent—where is it? Suck air, go deep…deep.
It’s gone. So now what do I do? I hit the air even harder, but I just cannot find Culebra anywhere in it.
I have lost the way. It’s must be because of the forest. Maybe all the scents in here have covered hers. I have to find my way out of here. But how? By going where my own scent hasn’t yet been laid. Then afterward, I’ll have to start over again.
This place has a familiar overall odor to it. Every corner of everywhere is a little different. Every place has its own special set of smells, and I am wondering if this is where Buddy and me, we hunted coons? I loved to tree those suckers. Them things’ll tear your nose to pieces, worse than a cat. Buddy’d go boom with his long finger and down would come the coon.
Buddy and me, we sure liked each other, so why did he have to go away in a car without me? He was scared, I could smell it on him. So where is he? Where did he go? And why would he ever leave Bob, ‘cause I did a good job for Buddy, I did all the work that he asked and I played, too.
Now, let’s smell around here again. There’s something up ahead…dog smell…sort of.
What is that? It ain’t quite dogs, but it ain’t anything else, either. And there’s lots of ‘em. Whole bunch.
They’re smellin’ sharper, too. They know I’m here. They smell rough and strong, like that time we had the mountain lion come down just after the calves had dropped…now, there was a wild and powerful smell. I knew that mountain lion was likely gonna chew me up, but I had to go after him, I got our cattle to think about. I got to sleep with my head in Buddy’s lap, so it was worth gettin’ cut up the way I did.
Oh my, but do these things smell funny. Coyote in there, dog in there—but there’s no animal like that.
I can hear ‘em too. Listen to ‘em: pip pip hehehe! Kaieee. That’s pretty cockeyed dog-talk. What are them things?
They must be about two hills over, just beyond the moonlight.
Heeeee kek kek aarrr!
That’s lots closer than I thought!
HEY! HEY!
Akkakkakkoookeeeek!
What is going on here? They’re all around me, so as soon as I come out into the grass, I’m gonna have one on my left and another on my right. What does all that kekkin’ and gratchin’ and heein’ mean, though?
They got a lot more talk than us dogs, that’s for sure. I think it means they aim to warn me off, that’s what I think. So what if I don’t get warned off?
Try this, you: HEY! HEY! HEY!
Now, that shut ‘em up. That made ‘em get real quiet. They got themselves a serious dog here, and now they know it. I got a voice on me strong enough to make any dog think.
I’m gonna just trot right out. But no bird mutters in the night, no possum strolls. The coon lies upon the high branch, and the armadillo is still in the tossing grass. This is because they all smell the same thing as me. They smell a fight comin’.
Only the skunk snuffles along, ‘cause he don’t care.
I been skunked a million-teen times. It makes me howl. I remember that cat Satchel who got skunked. Satchel was real upset. Even though he was a cat, Buddy loved him, so I let him sleep against me and I protected him. Not when he got skunked, though. They put him in tomato juice. He was real cranky at first, but he started sleepin’ against me again after a while. When I let him, that is.
He used to sleep between my feet, with his head tucked up against my chest. That was okay by me. Cat or no cat, he was Buddy’s and so was I. I chased him every so often anyway, although I caught a scolding ‘bout every time.
Now, smell that. That ain’t a dog and it ain’t…I just never smelled nothin’ quite like it. It has the fluttery scent of danger, though. That I can certainly smell.
Ahead of me is a long rise. My head only clears the grass when it bends to the wind. I’m inside the funny smell of the pack, but I don’t hear nothin’. So I keep going, deeper into the clearing, taking scent all the time, trying to get their stupid odor outa my head, tryin’ to pick up Culebra again.
The danger here makes my hackles rise and I’m feeling all tense inside. Hungry, scared, kinda mad. I’m listening, too, and I think that I am hearing something that I don’t like. What I think I am hearing is more rustling than the wind should make. These things know how to stalk in tall grass.
And, all of a sudden, the sounds and smells become shapes.
OH! Who’rrrrrrrrre you? WHOA! Lookit yourrrrrrrrr eyes! Yourrrrrrrr scarrrry!
You got a bigger tail than me, you got those eyes that gleam in the moonlight. My blood starts singin’ in my ears, my nose smellin’ pure and clean, my eyes watchin’ your lean, dark form as you slide toward me, low and quick.
I’m NNNNNOT goin’ anywhere! I’M NOT!
Oh, so you wanna sniff? Okay, you can sniff the meanest dog in the world! You got nothin’ but wuz breath, you scrawny little creep! I never smelled anything so pitiful. In fact, you’re so pitiful, I’m gonna mark this spot right here. This spot right here is Bob’s place, and so is anywhere you can smell my mark.
Krrreeeeennnnaaaa kakakak smmmmrrrr…
You call that talkin’? You sound like you got a cheep-cheep in yourrrrrrr throat!
OH! OH! WOW! WOW! WOW! Somethin’s on my back! OH! WOW WOW WOW! And yourrrrrr comin’ at me, I see yourrrr teeth!
They got my throat, my throat, I gotta get my jaw down! Oh, there’s a whole bunch of them, they’re all over me!
OWOWOW! OHHHH! Gotcha, big boy! Now I got your throat, how does it feel? I shake my head, and I shake it again. You gonna roll? No?
I shake and shake and shake! Now? No. You make me, I’ll take this all the way.
Kai ii ii ii ii!
He rolls, I let go, he scrambles to his feet and they’re gone.
Whaaa—there was a whole bunch of ‘em and now they’re gone.
I’m goin’ through the grass and I’m stoppin’ ever few feet to mark the spot. I’m stoppin’ and markin’ so they know who is boss here. They are gonna know forever that Bob was here.
Ssst: Bob the dog! SSST again, Bob the big, the strong the powerful DOG!
And baby, you know I am comin’, a growlin’ and a yappin’ and a-shakin’ my head to get the blood outa my ears. I’m comin’ so you creatures better present to me. You better!
The wind is strong here on the hilltop, and it feels good where I’m cut. Feels real good. Boy, am I tired.
I scent for Culebra. Go deeper than ever. I want to go HOME! And—maybe. Yes! But then their scent covers it.
Herrrrree you come! Whole bunch of you just a-snarlin’ and a-starin’. Lookit your high tails. Lookit your ripplin’ flanks.
Okay, I got my own smells an’ moves and they are strong! They are stronger than anybody and everybody in your whole pack! ‘Cause I am Bob the hard-fightin, hard-livin’ D-O-G! SSSSSSSSSSSSTTTTT! Now there’s a puddle of scent you ain’t gonna forget!
Okay, fella, that’s right, you present. You present your pretty tail to Bob the Dog, and I am ready and I feel rrreal good. Bob, Bob the Dog! Heyhey!
I can hear you breathin’, fella. Thing you creatures gotta understand, I’m just plain bigger than you and I’m a country dog, I know how to fight.
If I’d’ve been some yard wuzzie, you’d’ve been fine. But I ain’t that, I’m big and I’m strong and I can fight harder than you ever knowed anybody could.
So I’m gonna scratch and I’m gonna put down my scent right in the middle of your lie. SSsssst! See? Right in the damn middle of your damn own special lie where you live.
And as for you, li’l fella, take a look into my eyes. That’s rrrrrrright! And now look at my teeth. They’rrrrrrreee big, ain’t they?
Oh! WOW! WOW! You came outa nowhere, you was behind me! I’ll fight!
That jaw—oh, it has me! I’m down! I’m eatin’ dirt! Gotta roll if I’m gonna live. Okay, here’s my throat, here’s my gut. You got your dog, beaten, I guess, and real hungry and I will follow you.