In the living room she took Meriweather directly to her husband but before she could even introduce her or tell him what she was there for, Steve saw her. He stood up with an astonished look and demanded, "What are
you
doing here?"
Meriweather's mouth gaped open in utter consternation for a moment then slowly closed. She eyed the lawyer like she might have a burglar who was pointing a gun at her. "I could ask you the same question," she finally said.
"
I'm
here as the Douglas family's attorney and that includes Samantha. I really hope you're not here on CPS business because if you are, I'm afraid you're going to be severely disappointed."
"We'll see about that!" she responded forcefully but an expression much like fright passed over her, almost like a dark cloud casting its shadow on her face.
Dr. Summers was intrigued and puzzled by the woman's stated reason for being present. She passed the tamarin back to Samantha in order to get to her phone so that she could record the scene.
"What is this?" Elaine demanded of the Lufkin CPS director. "I hope you're not thinking of trying to take Samantha from us. Are you?" Her eyes bored into those of the other woman as if she were physically threatening her daughter. Her gaze spoke volumes about what she would be getting into if she tried.
Shufus growled softly.
"Easy, boy. She's not going to hurt us."
"I'm here to prevent you from getting hurt, young lady. And what on earth is that thing in your lap? Does it bite?"
"No but my dog will if anyone threatens me," Samantha said positively.
"Don't take that attitude with me or--"
"I think you'd better shut up and leave, Jesha," Steve said. "This young lady is in no more danger than my own daughter is."
"We'll see about that. I'm here on an official investigation and her parents are legally obligated to cooperate with me. If I find that she's been subjected to danger, such as contact with a possible disease-carrying animal like that creature in her lap or from hugging tigers, I believe the state will take a dim view of how her parents are caring for her."
"Yes, we will see," Steve declared, taking out his phone and dialing a number.
"Is Child Protective Services really investigating us?" Ronald asked unbelievingly.
"I think it would be more apt to say that Jesha Meriweather has taken it upon herself to investigate you in order to gain publicity for herself. Samantha's in no danger and I'll be glad to... excuse me." He spoke into his phone. "Your honor, I'm at the home of Samantha Douglas, the young lady who was recently in the news over that escaped tiger."
"Yes, that's the one. And Jesha Meriweather just appeared here to, in her words, investigate the situation. I believe she's already made up her mind to remove Samantha from her home because of the supposed danger her parents helped expose her to."
"Yes, your honor, that's right. I'm not only their attorney but Samantha is friends with my daughter and helped us enormously when we were having a problem with our dog. She got it and us all straightened out in just one week and we haven't had any trouble since."
He listened for a moment, then continued, "Right now Dr. Summers, the Zoo's veterinarian is here. She brought a sick lemur from an endangered species here because the family and I had a business meeting and couldn't go to the zoo."
"Oh yes, your honor. She diagnosed the problem right off. It was an inflamed nerve that was causing the poor thing an enormous amount of pain. Excuse me a moment, your honor."
Dr. Summers had been waving at him since the zoo was mentioned. "Yes, what is it?"
"I've brought a contract with me to hire Samantha as a consultant for the zoo. That comes with a retainer and the contract specifies that she will never be put in danger and that one of her parents must be present when we call on her."
"Your honor, there's another factor here." He described the veterinarian's statement and went on to say, "I believe Jesha is simply after some publicity for herself rather than actually believing Sammie is in any kind of danger from her home environment. Personally, I think she's one of the most well-adjusted young ladies of her age I've ever seen. She is an absolute wizard with animals and she also obviously loves both her parents."
Elaine flinched at the word "wizard" but she was much more concerned over the woman from CPS.
"I think a restraining order would be just fine, your honor. I'll hold myself personally responsible, too. You can find me in contempt of court if anyone discovers a thing that proves Samantha has been, or is presently in any kind of danger whatsoever. Even if she were, her almost constant companion is a young German Shepherd dog that would protect her with its life if necessary."
"Yes, thank you, your honor. I'll see you in the morning, but would you confirm for Ms. Meriweather that you are issuing a restraining order? Thank you."
He held out his phone in the CPS agent's direction. "Judge Simonson wants to speak with you."
If looks could kill, the attorney would have died on the spot but Ms. Meriweather took the phone and spoke once. After that she had very little to say other than "Yes, your honor" or "No, your honor". When she handed the phone back she picked up her briefcase and strode toward the door with Elaine right behind her. "You haven't heard the last of this," she declared as she left, but her haughtiness had all but disappeared.
"Thanks Steve," Ronald said. "I take it you've clashed with that woman in court before?"
"You bet I have. Most CPS agents are truly trying to do their best for the children in homes that they investigate but that woman--" he shook his head. "She really doesn't give a damn about the kids. What she's looking for is to get her name in the press and gain the attention of the home office in Austin. She'd love to move up in the Department. We've faced off in court before and she's lost every case where I was present."
"Was she really going to try to take me away from Mom and Dad?" Samantha asked, close to tears.
"She probably was, Sammie but don't worry. She won't succeed in whatever she tries with you."
"Thank you, Mr. Orleans."
"Sammie, why don't you and Betty go to your room and find something to do there for a fifteen minutes or so while we talk, please," her father said.
"Yes, sir. Come on Betty." She carefully handed over Tet and told him goodbye then she and her friend headed for her room. She looked back once and without her saying a word Shufus jumped off the couch and followed her.
The Vet hailed her. "Wait, Sammie! I have to go, but before I leave could you tell Tet that we'll be giving him a few more shots, and that the last one will eliminate his pain completely?"
"Yes, ma'am, I'll tell him." She hurried over and told Tet what would be happening. She had to repeat the message several times since most animals have little sense of time passing. She said goodbye again once she was certain the little creature understood. The white-headed lemur hugged her for a long moment before it finally let go.
Once Samantha was back in her room, Dr. Summers stood up, but before she could leave Steve stopped her.
"Dr. Summers, I take it you were serious about offering Sammie a contract?"
"I certainly was! We'll list her as an animal specialist and use her only on cases that we're unable to solve, like the little cotton-top here." She smoothed her hand over the silky white fur.
"Good. Let me give you my business card and you can send the contract to my office to look over, then I'll give it to Ron. How's that?"
"That's fine. Now I really do need to get Tet back to familiar surroundings."
"Thanks so much, Dr. Summers," Ronald said. They shook hands and she was gone. He turned to his attorney.
"What else do we need to discuss, Steve?"
"There's a possibility Sammie might have to appear in court. If it happens I'll let you know but I'll try to keep that from happening. I'll pick up the signed restraining order in the morning, as well as find out what else that woman might be up to. Whatever, any time she tries to contact you, call me immediately. There's no trusting her."
"I won't. I swear, I don't understand people like that, wanting to use kids to enhance their careers."
"There is no understanding them, Ron. Their way of thinking is alien to us. If I ever catch her in outright scheming I'll do my best to get her fired, but so far she's skated just at the edge of the law without quite going over it." He glanced at his watch. "I'll have to be going soon. It's getting near Betty's study time before she goes to bed."
"I think Sammie has some homework, too. How about we meet for lunch tomorrow at Dennison's Restaurant? Your office isn't that far from it."
"Fine. I should have a chance to go over the zoo contract by then. Thanks for having us over. This has been an amazing experience!"
"Just please don't talk about it, Steve. We don't want any publicity if we can possibly avoid it."
"I won't say a word that's not absolutely necessary, and anything I have to tell the Judge will certainly be kept confidential."
"Good. I'll get Betty for you."
***
Ronald pulled out a chair at the restaurant where they had agreed to meet. "Hello, Steve. I see you picked a table where we'll have a bit of privacy."
"My very intention. Since it's my treat I went ahead and ordered for you unless you want something to drink."
"Too early for me. I'll just have iced tea with the meal."
"Same here and that's what they're bringing." Steve looked reflectively at his guest for a moment then said, "Ron, is there anything else you think you ought to tell me about your daughter?"
"Like what?"
"Like how she communicates with animals. I didn't say anything last night but remember, I watched her completely reverse our dog's behavior in one week flat without ever raising her voice. And last night was pretty revealing, too, not to mention the episode with the tiger."
"Do you have to know how she does it, Steve?"
"I don't have to... hold on, our waiter is heading this way."
The two men remained silent until their food was placed on the table and their waiter had departed.
"As I was saying, I don't have to know but it might be very helpful sometime in the future for several reasons, the first being that she has the potential to earn a whale of an income with her talent." He raised his brows questioningly.
Ronald gazed at him for a long moment then decided he could trust his friend.
Heck
, he thought,
if you can't trust your attorney, who can you trust?
"Steve, at the moment we'd rather avoid any publicity that we possibly can. We've seen the bad effects from it. However, would you believe she really does talk to animals? No, you already know she talks to them. But the thing is, they know exactly what she's saying when she does. Not only that, the animals talk back to her. To us they're just animal sounds but to her they have meaning, and very explicit meaning at that. Somehow, she and animals are on the same wave length. Of course, the higher up on the intelligence scale an animal is, the more they have to say. She tells me a mouse thinks only of food, danger and sex and that those thoughts are more instinctive than real language, whereas Shufus conveys very intelligible meanings. For instance, she can tell a rabbit not to be afraid of Shufus and it won't be, or tell Shufus to leave it alone or make friends with it and he will. She tells me most animals are so surprised and amazed to find a human who can talk to them that they're eager to do what she asks or tells them to do. Now understand, Steve, that Elaine tries not to believe it, but I've seen too much evidence not to. Sammie can talk to animals, just like the old Dr. Doolittle stories if you've heard of them."
"Sort of vaguely. How long has this been going on with Sammie? Do you know?"
"Not exactly because she doesn't know. She tells me that she's been able to talk to animals as far back as she can remember. We thought it was simply her imagination when she was younger but it just kept on and on. I've seen her do truly remarkable things, like playing with grizzly bears or getting a mother wolf to allow her and her classmates to play with its pups. And I didn't see it, but she told me there was a grizzly bear mother that let her play with its cubs. If you don't know, grizzly females are extremely protective of their offspring. Then there's the tiger. You saw the video of her leading it into the zoo. What you didn't see was me driving there with it in the back of our SUV because Sammie asked it to ride with us. I hardly need to tell you that I was scared half out of my wits the whole time, but Sammie wasn't the least bit afraid."
"My God, Ron. How about me raising my concept of how much money she could earn by whole orders of magnitude? That's not even mentioning her value to human society. She could tell us exactly how the animals we raise for slaughter and consumption feel about their captivity--except that I doubt you'd ever submit her to such an environment at her tender age."
"You've got that right. She's so sympathetic
and
empathetic
with animals it might do her a lot of harm to be exposed to the thoughts of ... oh, say, pigs being raised for meat. They have to live their whole lives in those little tiny pens where they hardly have room to breathe, much less turn around." He shuddered at the thought.
Steve looked down at his steak and suddenly wasn't very hungry. Neither was Ronald.
Elaine's hope that there would be no publicity over the CPS designs on Samantha held for a few days, right up until a bored journalist by the name of Thomas Hoover, who sometimes did pieces for the
Houston Chronicle
began perusing court orders, thinking he might find something there to write about. When Hoover saw a restraining order against CPS he stopped scanning with the abruptness of a car screeching to a halt. He backed up until he found the piece that had caught his eye again. Restraining orders against Child Protective Services were rare enough to get his attention, and the subject of the order only reinforced his suddenly brightened outlook.
Samantha Douglas!
The girl who caught a runaway tiger and led it back to the zoo and subsequently helped the veterinarian treat it had been a great news story, but it had gradually died away and been replaced by the usual run of murders, drug arrests and all the other sordid activities from the police and court beat.