Mom leads me down the front walk and turns toward the hill.
“No, not that way,” I tell her. “We want to go this direction.” I pull her away from the hill.
But as usual, Mom doesn’t understand. And she’s strong, so we end up going her way instead of mine. We’ll still get to the place where Connor disappeared. We’ll still be able to set up a stakeout. It will just take us longer to get there.
We pass Mr. Parker’s house. Mr. Parker is out raking his lawn. Mr. Parker is always raking his lawn. There are never any leaves on it.
“Hello, there,” Mr. Parker says to Mom. My nose twitches. Something about Mr. Parker’s yard smells strange today. A new person has been here. It’s somebody I’ve smelled before, but I can’t quite remember where. It isn’t a very nice smell, though. Kind of sweaty and ... a little bit scary.
“Hi,” Mom says. “I’m Sarah Keene. We just moved in down the street.”
Mr. Parker sets his rake against a tree and limps over to us. Mr. Parker has a bad leg, but that never stops him from working in his yard.
“Welcome to the neighborhood,” he says to Mom.
“Thank you,” Mom says. She takes out a picture and shows it to Mr. Parker. “My son was out walking the dog a little while ago, and the dog came back by himself. I’m afraid my son may have gotten lost. Have you seen this boy?”
Mr. Parker pulls a pair of glasses out of his pocket and rests them on the end of his nose. He peers at the picture.
“Can’t say that I have. But my brother is visiting from Mankato. He went out for a walk this morning. Maybe he saw your boy.”
I didn’t know Mr. Parker had a brother.
Mr. Parker turns toward his house. “Jerry!” he calls. “Hey, Jerry! Come out here a minute.”
The door opens, and I can hardly believe my eyes. The stranger from this morning steps out of Mr. Parker’s house. He stiffens when he sees me.
“That’s him!” I tell Mom. “That’s the stranger Connor and I saw this morning.”
“Buddy!” Mom says sharply.
“But, that’s the guy!” I tell her, tugging at my leash. “Can’t you smell him? Doesn’t he smell dangerous?”
I think he smells like things that jump out at you when you don’t expect them. Now I know why Mr. Parker’s yard smells funny.
“Jerry, this lady is looking for her son.” Mr. Parker limps toward Jerry with the picture Mom handed him.
“He was out walking with the dog—”
Jerry glances at the picture. “Yeah, I saw them.”
“Where?” Mom asks. “How long ago?”
“Did you follow us around the corner?” I ask Jerry. “Did you ... kidnap Connor?” I can usually tell if a human is lying or if he’s telling the truth.
I think Jerry knows this about me because he doesn’t answer Mom or me. He starts to back away.
“You’ll have to excuse my brother,” Mr. Parker tells Mom. “He doesn’t like dogs very much.”
Of course he doesn’t. Because we sense things that humans don’t.
“I know you don’t like me, Jerry,” I say, pressing closer to him. “And I don’t much like you, either. I don’t like humans who—”
“I had a run-in with a dog a couple weeks ago,” Jerry tells Mom. He rolls up his sleeve. His arm is covered with bandages.
I stop and stare. I’m ... stunned.
“You mean ... a dog did that?” I ask.
I think Mom is a little surprised, too. “I’m so sorry,” she says. “Buddy is a nice dog, though.” She pats my head to prove it. “He won’t hurt you.”
I don’t know what to say. I sniff at Jerry again. He doesn’t smell so scary anymore. He smells ... scared, not scary. Sometimes it’s hard to tell the difference between a human who is scary and a human who is scared. I think that’s because sometimes the scariest humans are also scared of something.
Jerry is scared of me. That’s why he watched us so closely. When he said “nice dog,” he was probably telling me to BE a nice dog. Be a nice dog and don’t hurt him.
Cross off another part of my plan to find Connor. I found the stranger from this morning—Jerry didn’t have anything to do with Connor’s disappearance.
Mr. Parker adjusts his glasses and takes a good hard look at me. “Say, have you met the Dixons yet?” Mr. Parker asks Mom.
My tail stands straight up. The Dixons? Those are my people! Kayla, Mom, and Dad.
“No, not yet,” Mom says. “Where do they live?”
“On the next street over,” Mr. Parker says. “They have a dog that looks just like yours.”
“Really?” Mom says.
“’Course, I haven’t seen that dog around lately,” Mr. Parker says. “The lady is in the military, and I think the dad and little girl went out of town a while back. They probably took the dog with them.”
I wish.
“I’ll look forward to meeting them,” Mom says. “Goodbye.”
Then we start walking again.
Now I am on the lookout for Cat with No Name and for a place to set up our stakeout.
We continue down the street, around the corner ... and around another corner. We’re getting close to Kayla’s house. But we’re coming at it from a different direction. As we get close, I pick up Connor’s scent again. I follow it VERY carefully ... zigzagging across the sidewalk and the grass ... just in case I missed a clue before.
“What are you doing, Buddy?” Mom asks.
“Looking for Connor,” I tell her. She has a short memory. Isn’t that why we’re on this walk? So that we can set up a stakeout and find Connor?
I follow Connor’s scent across the grass and out toward the street. There is a sharp tug on my collar.
“No, Buddy,” Mom says. “We’re not going to cross the street.”
“But we have to,” I tell her. “That’s where Connor disappeared.”
I pull harder and Mom grabs the leash with both hands. She is stronger than she looks.
“I think we need to sign up for an obedience class,” she says, holding tight to my leash. “I’m not going to be able to take you to school unless I can control you better.”
I don’t know what obedience is, but I’m not going to worry about that now. We have to find Connor!
I look both ways, then pull hard on my leash one more time. Sniff ... sniff ... sniff ... I follow Connor’s scent to the place where it ends.
“Buddy,” Mom says. “Let’s get out of the street.”
“In a minute,” I tell her. “We can set up our stakeout over by that tree. But first I want to make sure I didn’t miss any clues.”
I sniff. I listen. I look.
Up ahead a bus wheezes to a stop next to the curb. I stand there and watch as three humans get off the bus and one human gets on.
Hmm. That gives me an idea.
Maybe we don’t need that stakeout after all.