Penny (15 page)

“Want to bet?” I asked Barbara.

“On what?”

“That Penny's at Marion's.”

“I wouldn't bet a penny on anything about her.”

“She knew we were coming. She thought we were coming to get her. That's why she took off.”

“How did she know?”

“She heard Sybil tell Bob.”

“Then why did she go to Marion's?”

“For a steak dinner.”

“She should have known that Marion would turn her in.”

“That's why she didn't stay. She's not at Marion's. Want to bet?”

Sybil came back, shaking her head. “Wouldn't you know it? Penny was there. She had lunch with Marion, then took a short nap on that sofa. She woke up just about half an hour ago and wanted out, and Marion hasn't seen her since.”

Barbara and I looked at each other, and she smiled. “Half an hour ago,” she said, “just about the time we arrived.”

“Maybe she's on her way home,” Sybil said. But there wasn't any conviction in her voice. “She should be here by now. When she starts anywhere, she doesn't dawdle.”

She went to the window and looked out, turned back shaking her head. “No sign of her yet. When she comes she'll bark and let me know she's here. Night or day, she barks when she comes home.” She sat down again. “Did I tell you she's got a charge account at the butcher's, down in the village? Last spring she took to going in there and begging for a bone. The butcher told me, so I said just let her have what she wants and send us a bill. He hasn't billed me yet for steak or calves' liver, but he has sent a bill for several bones.

“And,” she went on, “she learned to sing. She never sang for you, did she? Well, my dogs sing. They actually do. In the morning, usually, before I get up. Not howling, but—well, singing is the only word I can think of for it. A kind of warbling, and they each have a different part, tenor, alto, soprano. It really is quite musical, but thank goodness they never do it in the middle of the night. Well, anyway, Penny never joined them and I thought she wouldn't ever sing. Then one morning a few months ago when they started to sing I heard a new voice chime in. A good voice, very good. Baritone. I couldn't believe it, but it was Penny, sure enough. She doesn't always sing when the other dogs do, but when she does she makes it rather special.… She should be here by now. If she's coming.”

“Maybe she went the other way.”

“You never can tell about her. She has her own way of doing things. I should have put the leash on her this morning, but if I chain her up she's absolutely miserable. She just sits and looks at you. She makes you feel like a jailer. Then she whines and breaks your heart.”

Barbara got to her feet. “We really should be going along.”

“I know you can't spend the day. And I can't tell you how sorry I am that she isn't here. Maybe I should have phoned, but I kept thinking she would come home.… I know you have to go. But I keep hoping she'll come back and you can see her.… So many things I keep wanting to tell you. You said she used to snap at children. Up here she stays longest at places where they have kids. Little kids.… This will give you a laugh. We bought her a bed, one of those fancy wicker things with a hood and a mattress. Would she sleep in it? No, sir! Finally we put one of Bob's old Army blankets in a corner of the kitchen, and that's her bed now. She messes it around and won't let another dog near it.… Well, I guess she's not coming. But believe me, she's a magnificent dog. I appreciate her. But you don't dare let yourself get attached to a dog like that. When she goes off, you never know if she'll ever come back or what will happen to her. And as I said, she's a loner. She doesn't travel with other dogs. I guess she doesn't need other dogs—or people, for that matter. Not permanently, anyway. So I just admire her and let her go her own way.”

She went out to the car with us, watching the driveway for a dog that didn't arrive. We said good-bye. But when we reached the road Barbara said, “Let's go down the road a way, just to see if we meet her.”

So we went down the road instead of going directly home. Not a dog in sight. We kept going till we came to the ski lodge and the slopes, deserted and waiting for snow. We pulled into the parking yard and looked around on foot. No dog.

We went on to the crossroads in the village, and turned around and started back. No use going any farther. We went back past the ski lodge, up the hills to the plateau, past Sybil's entrance. No sign of a basset anywhere. We had seen a couple of brindled hounds in the village, and there was an Irish setter in the dooryard of one of the houses we passed. That was the sum of it.

We drove on in the lengthening light of late afternoon, and Barbara said, “Well, now we know.”

“What do we know?”

“That it wasn't our fault. Or Tom's and Carol's. She just isn't anybody's dog.”

“Or maybe she's everybody's dog.”

“She's at home anywhere, apparently.”

“And expects to be treated like visiting royalty.”

“Is treated that way.… I do wish we had seen her.”

“You saw the pictures, and you heard Sybil's stories. It was almost a memorial service. I kept listening for ‘Abide with Me' on the organ offstage.”

“You're just talking tough, and you know it. You were disappointed too at not seeing her.”

“I hid my tears pretty well, didn't I?”

She didn't answer. We drove in silence another five or six miles. Then in a field off to the right I saw a dog, or what I thought was a black and tan dog. It was so far away and the grass was so high I couldn't see any details, and the light made colors deceiving. It was an animal, and it was crossing the field diagonally toward the edge of the far hill. I lifted a hand and pointed, and I slowed the car. Barbara looked and exclaimed, “A fox! A red fox!” I looked again. Maybe she was right, though I couldn't see the bushy tail with its white tip. But it was a long way off, two hundred yards or more.

We drove on, and I asked, “Do you want to stop in Barrington and have supper?”

“Let's go on home and just—well, be glad we went. We had to know.”

“We still don't know. I don't.”

“We know that chapter, anyway. Enough. That rounds it out for me. But I do wonder how it will end.”

We went home, thinking the Penny story was closed, regardless of how it might end for Sybil.

Two weeks later Sybil called. Barbara took the call, then came back to the living room and said, “Sybil. Penny's gone.”

“Again?”

“Yet. She never did come back. Sybil hasn't seen her since that morning when she bolted out the door, the day we went up there. Nobody else has seen her, since she had lunch at Marion's. She simply dropped out of sight.”

“What does Sybil think?”

“She doesn't know what to think.”

“Was she upset?”

“No. Hurt, more than anything else.”

“Well, that
was
a nice memorial service.”

Barbara sat silent, looking at the fire. “What
do
you suppose happened, anyway? Did she hitch a ride with someone going to Florida? Or Arizona? Did she light out and just keep going? Did she get hit by a car or a truck and crawl off into the brush and die?”

“Not that,” I said. “If Penny got hurt she would demand an ambulance and a nurse and an intern—and get them! And a private room in the hospital.”

“All right. Have it your way. Suppose you tell me just what is your version of what happened. And when you get through, I'll tell you my version.”

So we spent the whole evening telling each other what happened to Penny.

Thirteen

Abby, I said, starting my version of the story, was suspiciously friendly that morning. Penny had not even had breakfast when Abby came over to her and said, “We're going to miss you, darling. We'll miss you terribly.”

Penny knew that tone. She sniffed. “I can't truthfully say I wish I could say as much.”

Abby smiled, that smirk which was little more than a deepening of her age lines. “Penny, dear, you needn't try to tell us. We know how you feel. But maybe those friends of yours with that great big estate and all those servants will let you come and visit us once in a while. Then you can tell us more of your tall tales about life among the grandees.”

Sybil was setting out Penny's breakfast. “Big-ear Abby,” Penny said under her breath. “You can hear a bit of gossip a mile off, can't you? How would you like to have one of those big ears chewed off?”

“Oh, darling! Touchy this morning, aren't you?” Abby showed her old, worn teeth in a false smile. Then she asked, “They are coming, aren't they?”

Penny turned to the dish of canned dog food. She didn't really like it, but she always ate the morning meal because she never knew what the rest of the day would bring.

“They're coming today, aren't they?” Abby persisted.

“Oh, go scratch your fleas!” Penny snapped. “What business is it of yours, anyway?”

Sybil heard them but didn't understand what they were saying. “Abby,” she ordered, “go away and let Penny alone. You've had your breakfast.”

Abby went back to the other dogs and whispered something at which they all laughed. But they left Penny alone, and when she had finished eating she went to her blanket, licked her face clean and pretended to doze while Sybil took up breakfast for Bob. She called him and he came, dressed for town, smelling of shaving lotion. They ate in the alcove and Penny could hear every word they said. Most of it was unimportant, but Penny caught things like, “They said they would be here around two-thirty.… No, I don't think they will want to take her. They just want to see her. But if they should want her back … well, she never has really settled down here.… She loves it here, Bob. It's just that—Yes, I know. She's a ‘free soul.' … Well, she is. Are you sure you can't be back by then? I'd like you to meet them.… I'll see.”

Then they had finished breakfast. Penny knew the routine on going-to-town days. He would go upstairs, be gone five minutes, come back with his coat on, say, “Well, I'll get going,” glance at the dogs, say “Good-bye, dogs.” They would yelp at him, in chorus, Abby leading. The expected response. He would go to the door, open it, turn to kiss Sybil and leave.

Penny stood up, stretched casually, eased over toward the door. Bob came downstairs, and Abby began to yelp almost before he gave the signal. He laughed and went to the door, unlatched it, turned to kiss Sybil. And Penny made her dash. The door was open a crack. She struck it with her shoulder, pushed, pushed it full open, almost upset Bob and was outside, free.

There was loud talk and a chorus of barking inside. Bob came out and shouted, “Penny! Come back here, Penny!”

Penny moved toward the garage, to have room to maneuver. Sybil came out, trying to hide the leash in her hand. “Come, Penny,” she urged, soothing. “Come on, like a good dog. Come, Penny.”

Penny debated a moment. Some days she let them think they could catch her and kept them cajoling and threatening for half an hour. She decided not to play that game today. If Big-mouth Abby had kept quiet, she might have, but she wasn't feeling playful now. She wanted to get away from them, all of them. She turned and trotted down the driveway toward the road.

She was almost at the gateway when she heard Bob's car coming. She turned aside into the bushes, just in case he decided to stop and try to collar her. But he didn't stop. Penny went back to the driveway, followed him a moment, then turned and went the opposite direction. There wasn't much action in that direction. She knew that. But she refused to follow Bob's car, just on general principles.

There was one place up the road a few miles where she usually was welcome. She didn't often go there because they had a cat she didn't like, one of those big, hairy Persian things that put on airs and tried to make Penny feel like a scrounger. The last time she was there Penny got so fed up with that cat's insolence that she chased her up a tree. The woman called Penny a very bad-mannered dog and said she wouldn't be welcome there if she didn't mend her ways. But maybe she had forgotten by now. No harm just stopping by, to see.

She trotted up the road, in no hurry at all. The day was young. She wondered how her Connecticut People, as she still called them, were by now. All right, so she had told some fancy stories about life with them on the farm. It had been fun most of the time. She wondered if the cows were still there—vicious, dog-killing bulls, in her stories. And the highway trucks, prehistoric monsters. And the sweeper, a fearful dog-eating dragon. None of the other dogs had ever seen a dog-eating dragon, let alone challenging it, stopping it in its tracks.

They were due about two-thirty, Sybil had said. They would be on time. They were punctual. He had always put Penny to bed at eight-thirty, got her up at five-thirty, on the dot. Gruff, but pleasant enough if you did things his way. Made quite a fuss if you didn't. As for Her, she was softhearted, thought Penny was a dear. Most of the time.… Well, she might go back and look them over. Or she might not, depending on what the day brought.

A big truck came roaring down the road, and she moved over onto the grassy shoulder to be well out of its way. A bird was there, a long-billed flicker working an anthill. When the big truck whooshed past, the rush of air blew the flicker right off the ground. It almost knocked Penny over. The bird fluttered in the air, caught itself and flew away. Penny trotted on, telling herself a brand new story about the prehistoric monster that could blow an eagle into the air with one puff of its breath.

She came in sight of the house with the big, hairy cat and left the road to take a shortcut. As she crawled through a fence her license tag was snagged in a loop of wire. Brought up short, she braced her legs, hauled back and jammed the tag still tighter. She tossed her head from side to side, braced all four legs and jerked. The brass tag was worn thin at the top, from all her jingling travel. It gave way, ripped loose from the link to her collar. She was free. And, in a legal sense, she was anonymous, an untagged dog.