Dancing Dogs (19 page)

He could hear her talking to another person, an older one with a deeper voice. The girl sounded sad to him, and lonely. He stood up in his crate and started making a racket. He longed for this girl whom he could sense and smell but not quite picture.

He missed her.

T
HE DOOR TO
J
ULIUS
’
S CRATE
opened. “Poor thing,” said an unfamiliar human voice. “He can’t run or walk much. I’ll put him in the bigger open pen where he can move around a little bit. He’ll be confined in the van for a long time.”

Two hands came in and gently lifted him out. He was given a pungent treat, carried down the hall, and then placed on the floor in a large pen with sawdust on the bottom and the smells of many other animals, mostly dogs. He could only move slowly and it hurt, but he began to sniff, soaking up the stories in the smells of the place. There were a lot of sad and painful stories in that pen, and Julius trembled. He took small and careful steps before coming to the door at the end of the pen. He howled for the girl.

…

H
ELEN THOUGHT SHE HEARD
her puppy. She found the Medical Procedures room and opened the door. It was dark inside. She dropped to her hands and knees and crawled to his crate. But there was no dog inside it. He was gone.

An envelope taped to the front of his crate read “Pennsylvania Regional Veterinary School, Research Lab.” She tore open the envelope and read the note inside: “Julius … male beagle … nine weeks … multiple leg fractures … picked up for surgery, rehabilitation, tensile-tendon experimentation, and, if possible, eventual re-homing.”

Helen didn’t understand the word “re-homing,” but what really bothered her was “experimentation.” Her mind raced. Was the vet school going to experiment on him? She had heard about labs where they practiced complicated surgeries on dogs and cats without homes. Animal-rights groups were always protesting these experiments, but the vets argued that there was no other way for them to hone their surgical skills and learn about the insides of animals. How else would they get to practice? She didn’t know, but practicing on a live animal didn’t seem right to her.

She opened another crate and picked up a happy, squirming black puppy, a small girl. She cuddled it then put it back. It was adorable, but she didn’t feel the same thing she felt with the injured beagle. She didn’t know why. Her father always said that one dog was like another, but she didn’t agree. And this puppy didn’t howl.

People were starting to come into work, and she had to get out of there—she couldn’t just wander around the place looking for Julius. She opened the door a crack, peered into
the hallway, and ran back the way she came. The security desk was still vacant. She rushed out the back door and into the parking lot.

P
OWERED BY SOMETHING INSIDE
of him, something beyond his consciousness, Julius stuck his nose in the door latch, which had been left open from the outside. He did not howl. He simply pushed at it, and pushed again, then squeezed his thin frame through the narrow opening, dragging his sore and awkward leg behind him. Although his leg hurt, the puppy had no real concept of pain. He couldn’t really remember ever not feeling it, and so it seemed almost natural to him.

There were no people in the room, and the door to the hallway was open. He passed other dogs in cages, some friendly, some not, and some cats who hissed at him. His movement touched off a din in the room, and he limped to the hallway as quickly as he could. There he picked up the smell of the girl and began to follow it, his tail wagging excitedly. He was a nose dog. It was time to get to work. He picked up another smell—cheese again—and moved even more quickly.

Julius just kept moving toward her smell, dragging his cast behind him. He never stopped or slowed down, not even to investigate all of the rich scents that swirled around him and told him so many other stories.

H
ELEN WAS PANICKED
. Her mother knew she was not at home, and her teachers would soon know she was not in school. She had no permission to be out on her own, and she knew her
parents would be anxious about her. They might even call the police if they thought she was missing or had run off. Which, in a way, she had.

And she had an awful feeling that she was too late for Julius—that he had already been shipped off to a vet hospital where he would face a life of experimental surgery and never know the love of a home. Or of her.

Tears streaming down her cheeks, she ran through the parking lot and toward the Dumpster to get her backpack. When she rounded the corner, she froze. There, his cast sticking awkwardly out to the side, sat Julius, right on top of her backpack. When he saw her, his tail started going a mile a minute and his piercing yowl cranked up in joy.

Helen broke into a run and grabbed the dog. “Shh! I can’t believe you’re here! But you have to be quiet or they’ll hear us.” Julius’s howl quieted to a whine, but his tail continued to move like a helicopter blade. She hugged him, supporting his cast carefully, while Julius licked the tears from her cheeks. She smelled cheese and saw some crumbs dropping from his mouth—he had found her stash of crackers in the backpack. She could hardly believe how soft he felt, how sweet his puppy smell was.

“My boy, my boy,” Helen whispered softly. She picked up a stick and punched a hole through the bottom of her backpack. She carefully placed the squirming puppy inside. Julius fit perfectly, his leg cast sticking through the hole at the bottom and his head poking out of the top. She put the pack on backward so that Julius hung off her chest, where he could see her and look over her shoulder at the world. It seemed like he had been born to this, being carried by Helen.

But she was terrified. Helen had never skipped school without permission, lied about anything major, or stolen
anything in her short life, and in just a couple of hours, she had done all three.

She peered out from behind the Dumpster. Then she looked down at Julius. He was where he belonged, finally. He was a happy puppy, one of those dogs who would go anywhere with the person he loved, trusting and content.

Helen wished she felt the same.

She heard some shouts coming from inside the shelter. They must be looking for Julius, and perhaps for her. The guard may have told them about her, or her mother might have called. Even the school.

But she was not giving up. This was her puppy. It was meant to be. Helen leaned forward and kissed him on the nose. “Let’s go, boy,” she whispered, and started running along the far side of the parking lot, shielded by trees and cars. At the edge of the lot, she knelt behind a hedge and made sure that the shelter workers hadn’t seen her. When she felt safe, she rose to a crouch and ran down an alley behind some houses.

She would go a half block, and then she would hide. She hid in an open garage, behind an appliance store, in the shadow of a fountain in the park. Twice, Helen stopped and took Julius gingerly out of the backpack to let him pee, and then they cuddled for a bit before she put him back in. He seemed tired, and she wondered if he needed some medicine. Maybe she had been foolish to take him away from his doctors. Maybe she had put him in danger.

She was getting tired herself. When she was only a few blocks from home, she let her guard down. She walked out in the open, still carrying her puppy on her chest. Julius was asleep now, his head drooping down over the backpack.

Just as she turned onto her street, she heard tires scream and saw flashing red and blue lights.

“Young lady, stop right there!”

Helen froze when she heard the police officer’s voice. She was a criminal, and she didn’t want to get shot. She didn’t want Julius to get shot either.

But the police officer was surprisingly calm and nice. He didn’t do any of the things police officers did on TV. He got out of the car, introduced himself as Officer Jenkins, and asked if she was the little girl named Helen who had taken a dog out of the county shelter. She nodded, tears running down her cheeks, and she nodded again when he asked softly if this might be the dog.

He asked if she would like a ride home, and she bobbed her head. “No handcuffs, I guess,” he said.

It was the strangest and most embarrassing ride of her life. Her face was beet red, and she lowered her head to avoid the stares of neighbors and kids riding their bicycles on the street. The dog curled up in her lap and trembled—he was clearly not used to riding in cars. She reached in her pocket and took out a cheese cracker, ate half and gave the other half to the puppy.

When the police car pulled into the driveway, Helen’s mother rushed out of the house and hugged her until she thought her neck might break. She introduced her mother to Julius, and although her face softened when she saw the puppy, she still looked Helen in the eye and said, “You know this dog doesn’t belong to you. You do know that, don’t you?”

Helen nodded, too choked up to talk, but she wouldn’t let anyone else hold Julius.

Her father was there too, having rushed home from
work when he found out she was missing. He took her onto the porch while she clutched the puppy. “Helen, I want to say something to you,” he said. “What you did this morning was wrong, and I’m thinking of ways to punish you. But I understand why you did it, and even though I’m angry, I’m also proud of you for being so brave. I love you, and I’ve realized that I don’t really know my little girl as well as I should. I’m going to fix that.” And then he gave her—and Julius—a big hug.

Her parents drove her to the shelter, and Officer Jenkins followed them there. Helen wouldn’t let Julius out of her grip, but once there, she allowed Dr. Jaffe from the Pennsylvania Regional Veterinary School to examine him, check his cast, and give him some medicine for the pain. The puppy seemed to be greatly enjoying all of the attention, but he never took his eyes off Helen. If anyone tried to take him away from her, he yowled so loudly that everybody in the room would wince.

The shelter director explained that Julius was not up for adoption because he wasn’t strong enough. “He needs surgery and a lot of care, and we don’t want any family to take home an unhealthy animal. It’s our responsibility to take care of him until he’s healed. If he survives the necessary surgery, he’ll be put up for adoption then.”

Dr. Jaffe told her that the vet school provided expensive surgeries to shelter animals for free. And then they returned them. The school did not experiment on dogs or cats. Students at the vet school would operate on Julius’s leg—under the strict supervision of their teachers—and then return him to the shelter. If Helen wished to adopt him then, she could. Dr. Jaffe looked at Julius and Helen and smiled. “Seems like a good fit.”

The shelter director said it was wrong for Helen to have stolen Julius from the shelter. Imagine if a person had been bitten. What if Julius had hurt his leg further, and needed attention? Sick animals needed care, and they could be dangerous.

Helen nodded her head as she considered the director’s words. She hadn’t thought about Julius hurting anyone, but she had worried that she’d put the puppy in danger.

“I’m sorry for stealing Julius,” she said seriously, “but I didn’t actually take him out of the shelter, honest. I was planning to, but he wasn’t in his crate so I left. He got out by himself, and I found him sitting on my backpack behind the Dumpster.”

The director raised her eyebrows. “I have a hard time imagining this injured puppy escaping from an enclosure, getting out of the shelter, and walking across the parking lot unaided and unobserved,” she said. “I’m not saying I don’t believe you, Helen, but it’s a stretch.”

Helen could see that the director clearly did
not
believe her. She didn’t know what to say. It
was
a stretch. “It’s the truth,” she said, her eyes welling up a bit.

“Okay,” the director said, “if that’s what you say.” She paused for a moment, studying Helen, then continued. “If the operation goes well, and I hope it will, you’ll be welcome to apply to adopt Julius. But I can’t promise anything. We’ll have to consider what’s best for the dog. And your entire family must be on board.”

Officer Jenkins stood up and leaned over to kiss Julius on the nose. “For what it’s worth,” he said, “I’m around a lot of people who lie well, and Helen here, I don’t think she knows how.” Helen blushed and smiled shyly.

Then he shook her hand, said he had other more serious
criminals to attend to, and wished her luck. “Don’t be running away from home or stealing anymore dogs, young lady,” he said, and winked. “Next time, I’ll use the handcuffs.”

“Thanks for the ride, Officer,” she said, looking him in the eye. He smiled.

Helen was surprised at how nice the vet and the shelter director were, all things considered. She was sorry that she had stolen Julius. But not very. Not really. She loved him now more than ever, and she was worried about the surgery and whether her parents would let her adopt Julius if he made it through. And she was very tired.

T
HREE WEEKS LATER
, Julius came home. Helen’s parents had gone to the shelter, filled out the adoption papers, and paid the fee—$75—which would come out of her allowance as punishment for cutting school, leaving home without permission, and stealing the dog from the shelter. Helen also agreed to volunteer at the shelter twice a week, cleaning up the messes in the dog and cat crates. She was happy to do it.

The vet techs from the hospital lifted Julius’s crate out of the van and put it on the sidewalk, and Helen, who heard the yowling from inside the house, came running out to open the crate and pick up her puppy. They had fought long and hard to be together, and now, they finally were. Maybe it was true, Helen thought. Maybe if you wanted something badly enough, it might actually happen.

Julius had steel pins in his knee and would always walk with a bit of a limp, the doctors at the vet school told her, but he would be fine. He could go for walks, chase balls, sniff things, and easily climb the stairs to get to Helen’s bedroom, where he would sleep for the rest of his days. She would have
to watch out for arthritis when he got older. And she’d have to monitor his medications and learn how to massage his leg and give him physical therapy.