Roll Over and Play Dead (5 page)

Caron and Inez were subdued as we got out of the car. The others arrived, and they seemed equally disinclined to comment on the gate and its sign. Deputy Amos, thin and inclined to twitch, studied the group, then said, “Churls has a nasty temper, and he’s liable to be hostile about allowing us on his property. I know you folks are worried about your animals, but stay with me and don’t challenge Churls. Let me ask the questions, okay?”

Everybody nodded. Amos went to the gate and shouted, “Churls! We’re here from the sheriff’s department!”

Beyond the gate was a narrow dirt road, little more than a path through the weeds, and at the end of it, a stark house. A white Lincoln was parked alongside a pickup truck in the yard, and on one side of the house was a satellite dish to suck in shows from the sky. A wisp of smoke drifted out of the chimney.

The only response to Deputy Amos’s call was a dispirited bark from an unseen dog. He waited for a minute, repeated his message, and shrugged at us. “Sheriff Dorfer said he’d called Churls to let him know we were coming.”

“Did he remind Churls of his legal obligation to allow us to search for the missing animals?” I asked. The group nodded and muttered similar sentiments, although no one looked as if he were prepared to climb the gate and march up to the house.

“I’m sure he did,” Deputy Amos said. He went to his truck and honked the horn several times. “Maybe he’s inside and can’t hear me. The one thing we can’t do is set foot on the property until he admits us. I don’t want to run into any pit bulls roaming around.”

“Probably bluffing,” Culworthy said.

“He’s not bluffing,” the deputy said with a wince. “We’ve had reports that he breeds and trains them here, and takes them to Oklahoma for the actual fights.”

“That’s illegal!” gasped Caron.

“It sure is, little lady. Only the fights take place in another state, so it’s out of our jurisdiction. There’s nothing illegal about owning pit bulls.”

The little lady was about to respond when the door of the house banged open and a man came out on the porch. He looked at us for a long time, then went back into the house. When he returned, he was carrying a shotgun and wearing a cap. He came across the yard and approached the gate.

“Newton Churls, at your service,” he said with a sneer. He was elderly, and dressed in dirt-encrusted overalls and a stained shirt. A potbelly jiggled as he shifted his weight from foot to foot, and tufts of oily gray hair stuck out from under the cap and protruded from his ears. With his lip curled back to expose brown teeth, he reminded me of a shriveled monkey.

“Sheriff Dorfer called?” said Deputy Amos, advancing from his truck.

“Reckon he did.” The sneer slipped for a brief moment, and Churls looked startled. “Reckon he did,” he repeated lamely, “but he didn’t tell me who all was coming. I didn’t expect to see…a crowd. Upsets the animals.” He took a pinch of tobacco from a can and deposited it in his cheek, but he seemed puzzled by our presence.

I wasn’t sure if I’d witnessed something or not. When Deputy Amos remained silent, I said, “And the sheriff explained that according to the USDA regulation, you must allow citizens to search for their missing animals?”

“Reckon he did. But there ain’t no reason, because I don’t take stolen animals.” He spat on the ground. “It’s against the law to traffic in stolen animals.”

“Then exactly where do you get animals?” I said in my most withering tone.

“I pick up strays on occasion, and I buy animals from the shelter in the next county. Every animal on the place has a USDA registration number, missy, and I got a right to sell it to anybody willing to meet my price.”

“Let us in, Churls,” Deputy Amos said. He was attempting to sound authoritarian, but his voice was on the high side and I realized he was closer to twenty years old than thirty. A grizzly, overweight veteran would have been more comforting.

“If the animals were obtained legally, then it shouldn’t disturb you too much,” I added.

Churls spat again. “You’re doing plenty of disturbing already,” he muttered, “but let’s get this damn thing over and done so I can get back to work.” He used a key on the padlock, opened the gate, and gestured for us to enter.

“What about the pit bulls?” Colonel Culworthy said from behind Vidalia.

“I’ve heard they can be vicious,” she said as she scuttled behind him. If they kept it up, they were likely to end up at the highway, I told myself as I glanced nervously around the yard and woods surrounding it, having heard horror stories about pit bulls myself.

“Suit yourselves,” Churls said. He tossed the padlock up and caught it. “I ain’t got all day.”

Helen Maranoni gave her husband a push. “Let’s go look for Juniper, George. She’s apt to be terrified.”

“She’s apt not to be here,” Churls said, cackling nastily.

Daryl Defoe’s cackle wasn’t much politer. “What’s the matter, Colonel Culworthy? I guess they don’t call ’em chicken colonels for nothing…”

Enough, I told myself. I smiled grimly at Caron and Inez, stuck out my chin, and walked through the gate. When a pack of crazed dogs failed to beset me, I continued up the rutted driveway to the yard. Everyone drifted along behind me; from their murmurings, I knew they were keeping a lookout for the pit bulls.

In the side yard was a low metal structure with a corrugated tin roof and heavy chain-link fencing. Concrete walkways went between rows of cages, each with a crude doghouse or metal drum to provide shelter. Most of the fifty or so cages held three or four dogs, some silent and others making a peculiar wuffly noise as they jumped against the fence.

“Why don’t they bark?” Caron said.

Churls replenished the chewing tobacco in his mouth and said, “The vet comes out every week and we cut their vocal cords. The racket’d drive me crazy.”

“You do what?” I said, horrified.

He spat once again. “You heard me. Now look for your dogs and get the hell off my property.”

Helen looked at her husband. “If he’s done that to Juniper, I shall never forgive you.”

“Neither will I,” he said quietly.

Vidalia took the colonel’s arm and they went down one of the concrete walks, looking sadly into the cages. The girls and I went down another. The fence rattled as the dogs flung themselves at us, and the pathetic noise grew louder as we passed the cages. The smell was unspeakable. A few dogs lay in mud and filth, their coats matted and spotted with mange. Flies buzzed about and settled on eyes, snouts, and dishes containing the dried remains of food. A small beagle wagged his tail at me for a second. At the end of one row, Vidalia despondently studied the cats.

“This is disgusting,” I said angrily to Deputy Amos, who was on my heels. “This place passes inspections and is licensed?”

“The state doesn’t have an inspector at the moment,” he said. “To tell the truth, I’ve seen worse. But I’ll fill out a report and give it to Sheriff Dorfer, and maybe he’ll send it to one of the regional offices.”

The group came out of the labyrinth and stood in a huddle, mute and horrified. Churls waited nearby, spitting on the grass and cradling the shotgun in his arms like a puppy. I started toward the back of the house.

“Where the hell do you think you’re going?” Churls snarled as he hurried after me and grabbed my arm. His black fingernails bit into my skin.

I stopped. “Take your hand off me this instant or I will shove your teeth down your throat,” I said without inflection. “I am aware you have a gun. If you so much as glance at it, I will take it away from you and put it in a place that will prove most uncomfortable.” As the words came out, I realized I was courting death, but I was so incensed by the man and his captives that I didn’t even blink.

The hand was removed. I continued around to the backyard, where I saw a large pen constructed of the same heavy chain-link fencing. Three pit bulls paced the concrete floor, each watching me with suspicious yellow eyes. Considering there were only three, there seemed to be a large quantity of teeth contained in lethal jaws. From the roof of the pen dangled a rope, and as I drew nearer, I saw that its end was frayed and stained with blood.

Deputy Amos joined me. I pointed to the rope and said, “What’s that for?”

“Training.” He glanced over his shoulder, then continued in a low voice. “It can get real bloody.”

I was getting real nauseous myself. “How dangerous are those dogs?” I asked, watching them pace in the pen.

“Plenty dangerous,” he said, keeping a watch over his shoulder. The others had come out of their zombielike trances; I could hear Culworthy harrumphing and Caron opining loudly about the conditions. No one else had followed us, though. “Churls raised them, so he can handle them unless they’re agitated. Don’t take much to do it, and he’s real leery about going in there. Personally, I wouldn’t set foot in there with my weapon drawn and a bullwhip. Those jaws lock onto your neck, you’re a goner.”

Shuddering, I moved away from the pen and looked around to see if there might be more dogs in view. All I saw was a rusted car on concrete blocks, a shed with broken windows, piles of weathered lumber, beer cans and plastic wrappers, and a lone chicken pecking at hard earth.

I started to turn back when I saw Daryl move to the shed. He stopped and crouched down for a minute, as if anticipating an assault, then opened the door and vanished inside it. Seconds later he came out, a cardboard box in his arms, and went around the far side of the house.

“Guess we’re done, huh?” Deputy Amos said. “No one recognized a pet, so Churls must be telling the truth when he says he doesn’t deal with stolen animals anymore.”

“If he buys dogs from bunchers, he wouldn’t know, would he?” I heard a bark in the distance; it seemed to originate from the wooded hillside beyond the fence. I started for the back of the yard, but a loud argument erupted in the area where I’d left the others, and I veered toward them.

Helen Maranoni was advancing on Newton Churls, her face contorted with rage. She was holding the box, and from within it came excited yaps. “You perverted, evil monster! How could anyone think of hurting these innocent babies?” Flecks of spittle spewed out of her mouth like a mist of acid rain.

Churls was backing up handily. “You got no business looking in my shed. I bought those pups.”

“To bait your pit bulls! How could anyone do such an evil thing!” Helen demanded so loudly I suspected the entire county could hear her.

“They ain’t stolen,” said Churls as he backed into the side of the house. “Besides, none of them is hurt.”

I hurried to Caron’s side. “What’s going on?”

She looked at me, her eyes spilling over with tears. “He had Juniper’s puppies in the shed. Daryl says sometimes the trainers use poor little puppies to give the pit bulls a taste for blood.”

As I gaped, Culworthy and Vidalia moved to Helen’s side, and a second later Daryl and George swelled the ranks. All of them began to berate Churls, who was trapped by the house and looking increasingly frightened. His eyes were narrowed to slits, and his snarls were now bleated avowals of innocence.

I would have been quite pleased if the group tore him to pieces, but Deputy Amos appeared to have reservations and shoved his way to Churls’s side. “Stop this,” he snapped.

“This man is a murderer,” Helen said. “He planned to kill Juniper’s puppies. I demand to know how the litter came to be here.”

Churls had found some courage from the deputy’s presence. He spat, barely missing Helen’s shoe, and said, “Some guy or other brought ’em last evening. He told me they was given to him, and I had no call to disbelieve him. I thought they were cute little things, and I was going to keep ’em. If you’re claiming they were stolen, your beef’s with him, not me.”

“Arrest this man,” Helen said to the deputy.

“That’s right,” Vidalia added, although without a trace of trill. “It must be illegal to treat animals this way.”

“I was going to keep ’em for company,” Churls insisted.

I believed that the same way I believed the solution to all my problems was aluminum siding. However, I wasn’t surprised when Deputy Amos said, “There’s no proof that he was going to do something bad to the puppies.”

Helen bristled and said, “We demand that he return the puppies to us right now. Furthermore, I want the name of the man who brought them here. I intend to file charges with the police.”

Churls had found enough courage to juggle the shotgun into prominence. “I didn’t know him from dog piss. First time I ever saw him, and most likely the last. Now, I’ve had enough of you folks. I let you look around, and you didn’t find your animals. Take the runty things and get off my property—it’s time for me to let the pit bulls have their daily exercise.”

We trudged back to the gate. Helen was crying, with her husband holding one arm, and Vidalia clutching the other. Daryl carried the box. Culworthy marched behind him, his expression thoughtful. Even Caron and Inez seemed too distressed by the scene to offer editorials.

Deputy Amos and I were at the tail end of the processional, which was as lively as any funeral. In a low voice, I said, “Isn’t there anything you can do to stop him?”

“No,” he said, sighing. “We’ve had complaints before, but there isn’t any way to catch him in the act and we’ve got to have proof before we can move in. Like I said, I’ll write up a report. Maybe the boys in the regional office will do something. Most likely they won’t.”

“I heard a dog barking in the woods. Isn’t it possible he took our animals away from the main area?”

“Possible ain’t probable cause.”

“But if we came out here unannounced,” I said, becoming excited, “he wouldn’t have an opportunity to relocate the animals. If we found them in pens, we’d have proof he’s dealing in stolen pets.”

“If you come out here unannounced, you’re going to find three pit bulls running loose,” he said flatly.

“There is that,” I said under my breath. I realized Culworthy was staring back at me. He looked away quickly, but not before I noted his pursed mouth and the unnaturally bright eyes of a warrior.

I wasn’t sure if he’d overheard my conversation with Deputy Amos. If he had, I was quite sure it meant trouble for a mild-mannered and unassertive bookseller.