Chapter Five: Little Alfred Schemes Up a Fishing Expedition

Once outside, I joined up with Little Alfred. For a while we sat in front of the machine shed, watching the chickens peck for grasshoppers and tossing rocks. Alfred tossed most of the rocks and I watched the chickens, if you want to get technical about it.

The morning air was starting to heat up and we began to wilt in the glare of the sun. The minutes dragged by. At last Little Alfred spoke.

“I’m bored. How about you, Hankie?”

Well, I hadn’t thought much about it, but yes, now that he’d mentioned it, things did seem a little boring. I mean, when a guy finds himself watching chickens for sport, it’s a pretty slow day. Yes, I too was bored.

He chuncked a rock at a hen, causing her to squawk and jump into the air. That brought a smile to his mouth, but it faded quickly. He heaved a sigh.

“I wonder what Tom Sawyer did when he got bored.”

Well, I didn’t know about that, seeing as how I’d never met Tom Sawyer and didn’t know who he was. Wait a minute. Was he the guy in the book? Okay, he was some character in a book, but I hadn’t read the book and didn’t have an opinion.

“I think . . . he’d go fishing . . . in the Mississippi Wiver . . . with his best pal, Huckleberry Finn.”

Hmm. Maybe so.

A little gleam had come into his eyes. “Wet’s go fishing, Hankie, just you and me. I’ll get my pole and tackle box out of my woom, and I’ll get some beef liver for bait, and we’ll go down to the Mississippi Wiver and catch some big old fish.”

Hmm. Well, that did sound kind of exciting.

He was on his feet now, walking towards the house. “I’ll be Tom Sawyer and you can be Huck Finn. Won’t that be fun?”

Well, I . . . maybe so. I mean, I had never played this game before and I didn’t know exactly what was required of a dog to be Huck Finn, but what the heck, I was open to new experiences and adventures. Sure.

The farther we walked down the hill, the more excited we both became about the fishing expedition. It was sounding better all the time. But when we reached the bottom of the hill, a shadow passed over the boy’s face. He stopped, and his gaze went straight to . . .

I followed his gaze and saw . . . uh oh . . . Sally May, his mom, was working in a flower bed near the yard gate. Have we discussed Sally May? Maybe not.

Let me begin by saying that she was a fine lady and a wonderful mother, but there was something about her that . . . how can I put this? There was something about her that, uh, struck fear in the hearts of dogs and little boys.

Well, maybe it wasn’t exactly fear. Call it guilt. See, it’s a well known fact that dogs and little boys often have things on their minds which might not, uh, meet the approval of the Lady of the House. And the scary thing about Sally May was that she always seemed to know.

She could read faces. She could read minds. She never slept. She saw everything and knew everything. She had eyes in the back of her head and ears that could hear ants crawling in the next pasture, and her nose . . . you couldn’t sneak anything past that nose of hers. She had a nose like a bloodhound.

And every time I came into her presence, I began to . . . wilt. And fidget. I found it hard to look her in the eyes and I began to experience powerful feelings of guilt—even when I hadn’t done anything wrong. And sometimes I even got the feeling that . . . well, that she just didn’t like me.

That’s hard to believe, isn’t it? Maybe it was my imagination, but I sure got that feeling.

Anyhow, there she was beside the yard gate, and her very presence stopped us in our tracks. Alfred dropped his voice to a whisper.

“Mom might not wet me go fishing, so we’ll have to be sneaky.”

I whapped my tail on the ground and stared at him. Be sneaky? Around Sally May? Was he serious? Ha! Trying to sneak something past his mother was like holding a skunk under a bloodhound’s nose and saying, “Do you smell anything?” It wouldn’t work.

The boy ignored me. “I’ll sneak into the house and get my stuff. You visit with my mom and keep her busy, and I’ll sneak out the fwont door.” He gave me a wink and a smile. “She’ll nevoo suspect a thing.”

Oh yeah, right. She’d never suspect a thing.

Okay, I’d go along with this crazy plan, but I already knew where it was heading.

The boy arranged his face into an innocent expression, shoved his hands into the pockets of his overalls, and started walking towards the house. Oh, and he was whistling.

He walked through the gate and past Sally May. “Hi, Mom.” He kept going.

Her head came up and she studied him with narrowed eyes. “Alfred, where are you going?”

“Oh, nowhere.”

“Alfred.”

“Into the house, Mom.”

“For what?”

“Oh, I need a dwink.”

She frowned and suddenly her gaze swung around to me. I felt as though someone had turned on a pair of searchlights, exposing me to all the world. Or stuck me with a fork. I found it hard to, uh, meet her gaze, and my eyes began wandering, so to speak, to the far horizon.

“Alfred, wipe your feet. I don’t want you tracking barnyard into the house.”

“Okay, Mom.”

“And be very quiet. Molly’s asleep.”

“Okay, Mom.”

“And don’t snack. I’m fixing you a good nourishing lunch.”

“Okay, Mom.”

The boy disappeared inside the house. Her gaze lingered on the door and I could see Lines of Suspicion gathering on her brow. Well, it was time for me to swing into action with Diversionary Tactics—to use my charm, in other words, to take her mind off of Alfred’s presence in the house.

To do this, I was forced to take bold action. I had to move through the gate and take several steps inside her yard—which happened to be Forbidden Territory to us dogs. Squeezing up my most charming and sincere smile, I edged through the gate and across the invisible line that separated the yard from the rest of the world. There, I waited to be recognized and greeted.

Oh, and I forgot to mention that for this mission, I switched my tail over to Slow Sensitive Wags. See, I knew she’d never go for Broad Swings or Joyful Wags. Those settings were a little too active and rough for a lady such as herself. If a guy wasn’t paying attention to his business, he could sure get into trouble with those Broad Swings.

See, the womenfolk don’t appreciate being whapped by a dog’s tail, and sometimes your Broad Swings can damage flowers and stuff. Clearly, this was an occasion for Slow Sensitive Wags.

So there I stood beside her, a loyal dog waiting to be recognized, greeted, spoken to, and perhaps even petted and rubbed. A dog can always hope.

But she didn’t notice me. Her eyes were still rivveted . . . rivitted . . . rivvitted . . . her eyes were still glued, shall we say, on the back door, through which Little Alfred had just passed. I waited patiently, but she continued to beam that suspicious eye towards the house.

I needed to get her attention, so I pulled up a program which I hadn’t used in a long time. It was called “Here I Am,” and it involved the use of a low whimper. As you might guess, I’m not the kind of dog who makes a habit of whimpering. Drover does it a lot, but I’ve never cared for it. But on this occasion, it seemed to fit.

So I ran “Here I Am” and gave her a whimper, with just a dash of quiver in the middle of it, and by George, it worked. It pulled her gaze away from the house, and all at once our faces were very close to each other and she was staring at me.

“Yes?”

That’s all she said, and I must admit that a quick scan of her facial expression and so forth indicated that she was less than . . . well, overjoyed by my appearance, but what the heck, she had spoken to me and that was a start.

On a hunch, I cranked up the tail to Broader but Still Sensitive Wags. The message here was “Why, good morning, Sally May, and isn’t it a beautiful day?”

“You’re in my yard.”

Oops. I switched back to Slow and Sensitive, and increased the sincerity of my smile. The message here was, “Yes, but I saw you working all alone, and I just couldn’t resist coming over to, uh, share a few moments of . . . well, friendship and togetherness and so forth. No kidding.”

I held my breath and waited for her response. Hey, it worked! I was really surprised. She reached out her soft white hand and began rubbing me behind the left ear.

“Okay, Hank. I’ll give you a little sugar.”

Wow, you talk about sugar. Those were some great rubs and scratches. My eyelids sagged to the half-open position, and I almost melted under the touch of her lovely hand.

Do you realize what a triumph this was? See, Sally May and I had . . . that is, our relationship had suffered more than its share of ups and downs. We had gone through hardships and misunderstandings, yet here she was, scratching me behind the ears. And we were sharing a moment of real quality time—sharing the morning air, sharing our love of flowers and shrubberies and stuff, and sharing . . . well, Life and the world and everything.

And even better, heh heh, she wasn’t watching the house anymore, which was sort of the idea from the start. Another minute or two and my little pal would make his escape.

Oops. Just then she stopped scratching me and cocked her ear towards the house. I had to make a rapid response. I switched the tail section over to Circular Wags (those are pretty difficult) and toe-walked a little closer to her warm side. When she turned back to me, I was ready with Adoring Eyes and a smile of Extra Sincerity. This deal was really working and . . .

Huh?

She stood up, dusted off her hands and jeans, and pushed me out the gate. “That’s it. You can leave now.” She closed the gate behind me.

Yeah but . . . gee, there for a minute I’d thought our relationship had . . . we’d shared so much and the emotions had . . .

She placed her hands on her hips and gave me an odd smile. “Do you think I don’t know what you scamps are up to?”

Well, I . . .

She didn’t even wait for my answer. She went striding through the yard, around the south side of the house, and captured Little Alfred just as he was sneaking out the door with his fishing pole and tackle box.

See? I told you. That woman knows everything. Nobody’s safe around her.

Our mission had failed.