Chapter Ten: Happy Is Exposed

Pete was snorting and gasping with laughter. For a moment of heartbeats, I gave serious thought to beating the snot out of him, but with Sally May standing nearby and already in a volcanic state of mind, I had to settle for a stinging retort. “Pete, you’re despicable.”

I tried to step on his tail, but he snatched it away. I hurried out the gate, and there I met…guess who. The World’s Happiest Dog. He’d finally dragged himself out of bed and there he was, swinging his tail back and forth and wearing that big Labrador grin that caused women and children to swoon.

I marched straight toward him and gave him both barrels. “I had you tucked in bed. I had you settled for the night, and what did you do? You sneaked out of the barracks and deposited seventeen potatoes on Sally May’s porch!”

He seemed surprised by my anger. “Hey, those were good spuds. I thought she might need ‘em. Those kids eat a lot of groceries. I was just trying to help, honest.”

“The potatoes were sprouting, they were half-rotten, they smelled bad. Sally May didn’t want them stinking up her porch.”

“Gee, I never thought about that.”

“I wouldn’t care about any of this, except for the fact that I got blamed for it.”

“Are you serious?”

“Look at her face and tell me if I’m serious.” I pointed toward the porch and…huh? I couldn’t believe this.

She was smiling like the rising sun, and do you know why? Because she had just seen The World’s Happiest Dog, and somehow that made her the The World’s Happiest Ranch Wife. And here she came down the sidewalk, she and her son, both of them glowing with joy. They brushed right past me and went straight to the Lab, who greeted them with a huge dripping smile.

“Hi, Happy! How are you this morning, huh? Good dog.”

Sally May stroked him on the head and Little Alfred climbed on his back and rode him around, laughing and waving his arm as though he were twirling a rope. I even heard him say, “Mom, I wish we could keep him.”

Oh brother. I had to stand there and watch. I soon realized that Kitty Kitty had slithered up beside me. He heaved a sigh. “Isn’t this sweet?”

My eyes almost bugged out of my head. “Sweet! It’s an outrage. It makes me sick. Do you know who dumped the potatoes on the porch?”

“Of course I do. I saw the whole thing.” He fluttered his eyelids. “You must find this very discouraging, Hankie.”

“You bet I do. If I even have a naughty thought, she sees it. That big oaf can do anything and get by with it.”

“I know. It doesn’t seem fair, does it?”

“No, it certainly…” I noticed his smirk. “Are you trying to make a mockery of my misfortune?”

His eyes brightened. “You know, Hankie, that does sound like something I might do.”

I heard a growl rumbling in the depths of my throat. “How would you like to climb a tree, huh?”

A woman’s voice interrupted my thoughts. “Hank, leave the cat alone!”

You see what I mean? She has radar…FOR ME!

Pete’s smirk grew even wider. “Poor doggie! You’re not having a good day, are you?”

“Pete, you’re disgusting.”

I whirled away and left the cat sitting in the rubble of his own shubble. But I had to admit that the little creep had gotten one thing right: I was having a bad day. As a matter of fact, I was beginning to wonder if I might lose my job.

Don’t get me wrong. I’d had bad days before, a lot of them, and I had learned to cope with disappointment and injustice, but this was a different kind of problem. How do you compete with a perfect dog? When your people think the mutt can do no wrong, what’s left for rest of us who…well, have a naughty thought every now and then, and occasionally mess up?

You can’t win. You’re wrong from the start, guilty before you’re even charged, because it’s impossible to compete with someone’s dream-notion of The Perfect Dog.

Yes, it was very discouraging. With the sounds of their laughter and happiness echoing through the gloomy, torch-lit dungeon of my mind, I left the scene and trudged back to my miserable, lonely little office beneath the gas tanks. There, I planned to sit on my stinking, flea-infested gunny sack, and spend the rest of my day—or maybe the rest of my life—eating my heart out with a plastic spoon.

Does that sound like a festival of self-pity? Maybe so, and I didn’t care. By George, I had earned the right to feel sorry for myself, and that’s exactly what I intended to do.

I had been brooding for about ten minutes, when I heard voices and footsteps. I rose and gazed off to the east, and saw Alfred, Sally May, and Happy Lab. They were walking down the hill, and Alfred was carrying the red plastic bucket. It appeared that they were heading for the garden, perhaps to return the potatoes to the compost heap.

They were enjoying themselves, laughing and tossing a stick for the Lab to fetch, a scene of happy people enjoying the company of the Dog of Their Dreams—a dog that wasn’t me.

I watched. Alfred reached the open gate. He walked inside the garden, while his mother tossed the stick for Happy to chase and bring back. (Labs are great fetchers). Alfred dumped the potatoes back into the compost and was about to leave…when he froze and looked around the garden.

I heard his voice. “Mom, something got into the garden and ate all the tomatoes. And the squash is gone. And look at the okra plants.”

Sally May rushed through the gate. Her eyes grew wide and, even at a distance, I could hear her gasp. “My garden! What…who…” She whirled around and looked in all directions. Then her voice shattered the morning calm. “HANK! If I ever get my hands on that dog…Hank!”

The sound of my name sent a shiver down my spine, and on instinct, I pulled my tail up between my legs. Good grief, I was in trouble again, and I hadn’t done anything! I had just about decided to make a dash for the machine shed, when I heard Alfred’s voice again.

“Mom, it wasn’t Hank. Look at the footprints. They’re huge.”

There was a long moment of silence. Then Sally May said, “Oh no, surely not. I can’t…there must be some…he would never do that, I’m sure he wouldn’t.”

“Mom, it was Happy.”

“But why would he… Do you think he eats tomatoes and squash? That’s ridiculous.”

“Those aren’t coon tracks, Mom. And you know what? I bet he’s the one that carried the potatoes up to the house, too.”

“Oh my stars! I can’t believe this.” With a stricken look on her face, she turned around to her precious Labrador…and guess what he was doing. He had found a rake leaning against the fence and was in the process of chewing the wooden handle. That got her attention. “Happy, no! Bad dog! Don’t chew my rake.”

She made a dive for the rake and…what do you know, Mister Perfect took off, dragging the rake along with him. “Happy! Give me that rake!”

I could hardly conceal my…that is, I was filled with feelings of shock and dismay. I mean, the guy had obviously spent half the night wrecking her garden, and now he was trying to chew her rake into splinters. How tee hee disappointing!

Well! What an interesting turn of events. Someone besides ME had nudged the Lady of the House into a thermonuclear moment. And make no mistake, she was mad. She came boiling out the garden gate and headed down to the corrals to find her husband.

“Loper! Where are you? You need to do something with this dog before he destroys the ranch!”

Alfred stayed behind with Happy and looked into his eyes. “Why’d you have to go and do that?” Happy turned on his happy smile and swung his tail back and forth, but this time, the magic didn’t work. Alfred left, shaking his head.

Happy stood there for a while, looking confused. Then he heaved a sigh and came back to the gas tanks in a slow walk. His head and tail were hanging low. He flopped down and lay there with his eyes open.

I found myself looking at him. “I know this will sound like a silly question, but why didn’t you just stay in bed? It would have been so simple.”

“I couldn’t sleep, so I got up and took her spuds back to the house. I thought she’d be glad.”

“Yes, well, you’re great with kids, but you don’t understand women at all.”

“I guess not.”

“And the garden?”

He stared at the ground. “I wanted a snack. I didn’t figure she’d miss a few tomatoes.”

“You didn’t eat a few tomatoes. You stripped the vines. You ate ‘em all, and then you cleaned house on the okra and squash! What’s wrong with you? Dogs don’t eat that stuff!”

“Yeah, and it made me sick. When will I ever learn?”

“Oh brother! What about the rake?”

He shrugged. “I’d never chewed a rake before, and all at once, it seemed like a good idea. I think I really messed up this time.”

I stared into his innocent, empty bird-brain eyes. “No, it’s worse than that. Normal dogs mess up. I mess up. You have performed a miracle in reverse.”

“I told you, I do ridiculous things.”

“Yes, well, I had no idea.”

“I wrote a song about it. You want to hear it?”

“A song? No thanks, I’m a very busy dog.”

“It tells my story. It’s about doing ridiculous things.”

I heaved a weary sigh and sat down. “Okay, let’s hear it.”

In case you’re interested, here’s the song.