I kept running. My feet pounded on the sidewalk so hard that jolts shot up my legs. Ra loped beside me. He kept looking at the car with his ears flat. Once he barked but mostly he growled low in his throat.
I could see my house ahead. I wondered if any of my neighbors were home. Should I yell for help?
The blue car rolled along the curb next to me. “You hear me, boy? You don't give me my watchdog back, you're going to wish you had!”
I stopped running and faced Mean Man Myers. “The Humane Society took custody of Ra,” I said, “because you didn't take care of him. They placed Ra with us and my mom is his foster parent. He is not legally your dog anymore and you have no claim on him.”
“Is that so?” His eyes had a wild, unfocused look. “Well, I don't care what the Humane Society or anybody else says. I bought that dog fair and square, and he's my property. I don't take kindly to people who steal someone else's dog.” He opened his door, stepped out into the street, and came toward me around the front of his car. He looked bigger up close than he had when he was sitting down. “If you keep that dog,” he said, “someone's going to get hurt, and it won't be me.”
I shot forward again. We were only a few houses from home now. Even if he chased us, I thought we could outrun him.
Mr. Myers didn't chase us. Instead he climbed back in his car, stomped on the accelerator, sped past us, then turned and drove up over the curb so that his car blocked the sidewalk. I had to run into the street to get around it. As I raced around the back of his car, he leaped out.
He was too close. I could tell I wasn't going to make it past him, so instead of continuing around the car I ran across the street and started up the front path to Mr. Conway's house. “Help!” I yelled.
Mr. Myers was too fast for me. He lunged forward and ripped Ra's leash out of my hand.
“Help!!”
Mean Man Myers gripped the leash in one hand and opened the passenger side door of his car with the other. He tried to make Ra get in.
Ra growled louder. The hair on the back of his neck stood on end, and his legs stiffened.
“Get in there,” Mr. Myers said as he shoved Ra.
Ra refused to jump into the car.
“You'll get arrested if you take him,” I said. “You'll be put in prison.”
“They can't lock me up for claiming what's mine.”
He leaned over, grabbed Ra around the neck, and tried to force him into the car. Ra bit him on the arm.
Mean Man Myers yelped, raised his arm to his mouth, and dropped the leash.
Ra took off down the street, with the red leash clunking along behind him. I hoped he would run home, but he galloped right past my house and kept going.
“Ra!” I yelled as I chased after him. “Come! Here, Ra! Come!”
But Ra seemed to have forgotten my efforts to teach him to come when called. He raced to the corner, turned, and vanished from my sight.
“Ra!” I shouted. “Come back!”
“You'll regret this, boy!” shouted Mr. Myers. “If you had given me my property when I asked, I wouldn't be on my way to the hospital; I'd be going home with my watchdog.”
I ignored him. He wasn't hurt too badly if he could stand around yelling at me.
I knew I couldn't catch Ra on foot. I ran up our driveway, hoping Mr. Myers didn't come after me, and dashed along the walkway to the front door, relieved to see lights in the kitchen. Mom was home. We could take the car to search for Ra.
I pounded on the door with one hand and fumbled in my pocket for my key with the other, expecting to feel a hand on my back at any moment. Mom opened the door before I could get it unlocked.
I rushed inside, pulled the door shut behind us, and locked it.
“Rusty! What's wrong?”
“Ra is gone.” I panted. “I was walking him, and Mr. Myers came and tried to take him. He grabbed the leash and tried to force Ra into his car. Ra bit him, and he dropped the leash, and Ra ran away. We have to go look for him!”
Mom rushed to the living room window and looked out. The blue car was idling in front of our house. Mean Man Meyers sat in it, staring toward our door.
“We can't leave the house while he's out there waiting for us,” Mom said.
She turned off the TV news and called 911.
Hurry
, I thought.
Ra is running farther away every minute. He could get hit by a car. He could get lost.
Mom made sure all the doors were locked and then we went upstairs to wait for the police. We stood on either side of my bedroom window and peered out.
Mr. Myers was gone. A new fear rose to the surface of my mind:
Mean Man Myers could drive around and find Ra. He could still take him. Or he might be so angry that he would purposely hit Ra with his car.
“We have to go look for Ra,” I said.
“We need to wait for the police,” Mom said.
“I'll go by myself. I can ride my bike.”
“No. You're not going alone.”
By the way she said it, I knew there was no point in arguing. The truth was, I didn't much want to ride around the neighborhood alone right then, anyway.
The same officer who had responded when the house was broken into came again this time. Mom explained what had happened and then the officer had me tell everything myself.
“You may have to get a restraining order against him,” the officer said. “Meanwhile, if you find your dog, I wouldn't take him out of your own yard until this case is settled.”
Mom gave me her
I told you not to go out alone
look and I knew I had it coming. Ra had needed to go out and then, once we were outside, I kept walking the same as I always did. What a bozo. I couldn't even think of a threesome bad enough to describe myself.
After the police officer left, I expected Mom to chew me out but she didn't.
Instead she said, “Let's go.”
We drove slowly up and down the streets, going farther and farther from home. I kept my window down and called, “Ra! Here, Ra!” We did not see him.
When it was too dark to see beyond the headlights, Mom said, “I'm going home, Rusty. We both need dinner. Maybe Ra will come home on his own. If not, we'll look for him again tomorrow.”
I looked hopefully at the front door as we pulled into the driveway, but there wasn't any dog waiting for us. He wasn't at the back door, either.
While Mom fixed our dinner, I called Andrew and told him Ra was lost.
“We should make some flyers, with Ra's picture on them,” Andrew said. “We can put them in store windows. I'll put a Lost Dog notice on Craigslist right away. If he hasn't come home by the time we get out of school tomorrow, I'll help you with flyers. We can use Dad's color copier.”
After dinner, Mom e-mailed Heidi Kellogg and told her the latest development. I started my homework and Mom began opening the day's mail. I heard her gasp.
“What is it?” I asked.
Mom's hand shook as she handed me an official-looking letter from a law firm.
“Mr. Myers hired an attorney,” Mom said. “He's suing us for stealing his dog.”
“He can't do this!” I cried.
“I'm afraid he can.”
“But he'll lose the case, right? You're Ra's foster parent now. It's legal for him to be here.”
“It's legal now,” Mom said, “but it wasn't legal when you took Ra. The dog was Mr. Myers's dog, and you stole him from private property. Every time you went there to feed Ra you were trespassing.” She sounded tired, as if she'd like nothing more than to climb into her recliner and take a nap.
“What happens now?” I asked.
“I can't afford to hire a lawyer,” Mom said.
“Maybe the Humane Society will help since they're responsible for Ra now.”
“They're a nonprofit organization whose donors give money to save animals. They can't spend their funds on a private party's lawsuit.”
“How can Mr. Myers afford an attorney?” I asked.
Mom shrugged. “Just because he lives in a rundown house and drives a beater car doesn't mean he has no money.”
I went to the front door and called Ra. Then I called him from the back door. Where was he? All the horrible possibilities rushed through my brain like a flooded stream flowing downhill.
When I went back inside, I heard a muffled sound and looked in the kitchen. Mom's head rested on her arms, which were folded on the table. I realized she was crying. She had cried a lot in the first months after Dad died but since then no matter how short of money we were or how bad our troubles got, I never saw my mom cry.
The worst part was, it was my fault. I had got us into a huge mess, and I had no idea how I could get us out of it. I felt like crying myself.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
I
woke up twice in the night. Both times I went downstairs, opened the door, and called Ra. He didn't come.
I wanted to stay home from school the next day to look for him but Mom said I had to go. She called Mrs. Gardiner, who promised to walk past our house several times during the day and call Mom at work if she saw Ra. Of course with her poor eyesight, she wasn't likely to spot him unless he stood right in front of her.
Heidi Kellogg called while I was eating my breakfast. “The Humane Society is posting a five-hundred-dollar reward for information leading to Ra's safe return,” she said. “They're using one of the photos that you sent me. Rewards have worked well in the past when they've sought information in animal abuse cases.”
Mom drove me to school. We cruised slowly past Mr. Myers's house.
I don't know what we would have done if Ra had been chained in his old yard but he wasn't there. The dull blue spotted car was not in the driveway, either.
Andrew was waiting for me when I got to school. “Did you find him?” he asked.
“No.” I told him about the reward and about driving past Mean Man Myers's house.
“If he isn't back by the time we get out of school,” Andrew said, “I'll help look. We can put up flyers. Wendy said to tell you she'll help, too.”
Whatever rift that had begun between Andrew and me was gone. Once again we were pals, working together, both on the same side.
“Let's tell Mrs. Webster and the rest of our class,” Andrew suggested. “I bet lots of kids would look for Ra.”
During the morning recess, Andrew and I stayed in the room. “Do you need something, boys?” Mrs. Webster asked.
“Can we talk to you?” I asked.
“Of course.” She sat at her desk and motioned for us to sit in the front row.
“Remember the dog I wrote about that wasn't being taken care of ?” I asked.
“The dog in your poem. Yes, I remember.”
“Well, Andrew and I rescued him.”
“How? What did you do?”
“We unchained him and took him home.”
“Oh, my,” said Mrs. Webster.
“We kept him hidden in our secret fort,” Andrew said. “We fed him and walked him and gave him flea treatment and took really good care of him. We named him Ra.”
“After the Egyptian sun god?” Mrs. Webster looked surprised.
“That, too, but mostly because
R
and
A
are our initials.”
“Go on,” Mrs. Webster said.
“Then my little sister blabbed to my mom about the dog,” Andrew said, “and our parents were going to make us take him back, only when we got there, a different dog was chained up with no food or water, and Ra acted scared, so we didn't leave him there, after all.”
“I should hope not,” Mrs. Webster said.
“My mom talked to the city's animal control officer,” I said. “The officer went there and saw the new dog. She took video of him for thirty-six hours, to prove he didn't get any food or water. She gave the Humane Society temporary custody of him and of Ra. My mom is Ra's foster parent, so Ra's staying with us. Then yesterday Mean Man Myersâ”
“Who?” Mrs. Webster interrupted.
“The man who had chained Ra to the tree, Mr. Myers. He followed me while I was walking Ra and tried to take him away, but Ra bit him and ran off and now Ra's missing.”
Mrs. Webster was quiet for a moment, as if it took a while to absorb all the facts we had given her. “Has Mr. Myers been charged with any crime?” she asked.
“Animal negligence. There's a hearing this afternoon.”
By then the other kids were returning from recess. Mrs. Webster didn't say anything about Ra to them.
At lunch, Andrew said, “We should skip school this afternoon and go to that hearing.”
“Are you nuts? Mom would never forgive me.”
“I've seen news clips of court hearings where people hold up signs. It shows the judge that the public wants the defendant to be held accountable.”
“How would we get there?”
“The bus. I looked up the schedule last night. If we leave now, we'd be there in plenty of time.” He reached into his backpack and brought out a rolled up tube of paper with a rubber band around it. He unfurled a three-foot-long banner that read KIDS AGAINST ANIMAL CRUELTY. “We can each hold one end,” he said. “We'll be powerful pertinent protestors.”
I shook my head. “We'd be painfully punished and penalized.”
“We could make a difference,” Andrew said. “Our presence might be important.”
“I can't,” I said. “I'm sorry, Andrew, but Mom's doing everything she can to help us rescue Ra. I need to do it her way.”
Andrew rolled up his banner and put it away.
When we got back to our room, Mrs. Webster told me she'd talked to my mom and to Heidi Kellogg.