Dog-Gone Mystery (2 page)

Jessie thought Roxanne didn’t sound too sure about her promise.

Roxanne continued. “Our last dog owner is Mrs. Servus,” she said. “She owns a beautiful malamute named Grayson.”

“Grayson
Majesty
,” corrected Mrs. Servus, who was standing next to the Aldens. Her dog sat beside her. It was a big dog, mostly gray and white. It looked a bit like a wolf.

“What a beautiful dog,” said Violet.

Mrs. Servus overheard her. “Yes,” she said, “Grayson Majesty is beautiful.”

“He has such blue eyes,” said Violet.

“He does
not
!” said Mrs. Servus. She jerked on the dog’s leash and the two of them walked away, to the other end of the room.

Violet was embarrassed. “Did I say something wrong?” she asked Jessie.

Jessie shook her head. “No,” she answered. “I don’t know why Mrs. Servus got upset.”

Roxanne clapped her hands. “Okay, owners! Okay, dogs! Time for class to begin!”

Everyone lined up in rows with their dogs, except for Candy Wilson, who didn’t have a dog. She waved to the class. “Goodbye, everybody!” she shouted. “I have grooming appointments all day today and tomorrow, but I can always make room for your dogs. Be sure to visit Clip and Yip!”

Ms. Wilson reached into the pocket of her apron and pulled out two shiny tools. She waved them over her head in a circle, then left. Henry thought one of the tools must be a clipper, and the other a pair of special scissors.

For the next half hour Roxanne taught some basic commands, such as
sit
and
come.
Then she worked with each dog and each owner, one at a time.

As class came to an end, Roxanne taught the
stay
command. Each owner told his dog to stay. Henry said “stay” to Watch, and Watch sat still. Henry looked over at Mr. Brooks and Boxcar. The Dalmatian seemed to be staying put.

Nearly all the dogs seemed to obey, except for Double and Trouble, who kept yipping and running in circles. Roxanne went up to each Pekinese and pushed its rear end down to the floor. “Stay!” she commanded. The two Pekinese sat down and stopped yapping.

“Roxanne is very good,” Jessie said softly.

Henry nodded. He thought Roxanne was doing a great job with so many different dogs and owners.

“Now,” said Roxanne to the dog owners. “I want each of you to tie your dog’s leash to a post. After you do that, we will all quietly leave this room. We’ll walk into the next room and close the door. We’ll stay there for five minutes. And when we come out, our dogs should still be sitting and waiting for us.”

“What?” said Mr. Smith. “I don’t think Wrinkles is ready to be left alone yet.”

“Five minutes is a long time,” said Mr. Brooks as he looked at Boxcar. “Can we make it two minutes instead?”

Roxanne shook her head. “Don’t worry,” she said. “Your dogs are better than you think they are.” She frowned at the Pekinese as she said this.

Everybody did as they were told. The dogs stayed put as the owners walked away.

In the next room Roxanne closed the door. She talked to everyone about why it was important to have a well-trained dog. “A well-trained dog is a happy dog,” she said. “It will feel comfortable around you and around people you meet.”

“Can we go out now?” asked Mr. Smith.

“Just a minute,” said Roxanne. “I need to check on something.”

She walked out of the room.

A few moments later, Roxanne was back. She looked at her watch and said, “Five minutes are up.”

When the owners stepped out into the training room, the door to the outside was open. There was an empty space where Boxcar had been sitting.

Everybody stopped and stared at the empty space.

“Where’s Boxcar?” asked Benny.

Mr. Brooks ran outside and began shouting for his dog. “Boxcar! Boxcar! Where are you?”

Roxanne looked very worried. “Oh, no,” she kept saying. “Oh, no.”

Jessie patted Watch on the head. “Good dog,” she said.

“Poor Mr. Brooks,” said Violet. “It looks like Boxcar really won’t stay.”

“Did Boxcar run away?” Benny asked.

“It looks that way,” said Jessie.

Henry looked at the place where Boxcar had been tied. Henry didn’t understand how Boxcar could have gotten himself and his leash off the post. But maybe he could—dogs were smart.

The other owners were petting their dogs and praising them for staying. Even Double and Trouble had done well.

“We should help Mr. Brooks look for Boxcar,” said Violet.

The other Aldens agreed. The children and Watch went outdoors. Mr. Brooks was walking up and down the parking lot, calling out his dog’s name. The children helped him look. They checked in the nearby park and on three side streets, but there was no sign of the Dalmatian dog anywhere.

When the children returned to the parking lot, Roxanne led everybody back into the Dog Gone Good building. She explained to the class that Boxcar had run away. “I have to teach another dog training class,” she said. “But if you have time to help Mr. Brooks, please do.”

“We have time,” said the Aldens.

Mr. Smith and Mrs. Servus also helped search, but there was no sign of Boxcar. After a while Mr. Brooks said he would go back to his bakery to see if Boxcar went there.

The children looked for another hour, but Boxcar seemed to have vanished.

As they walked to the Bread Loaf Bakery Benny asked, “Do you think Boxcar went back to the bakery?”

“I hope so,” said Violet. “I hate to think of a dog lost and all alone.”

“If I were a dog, I’d go home to the bakery every day,” said Benny.

But when the children entered the bakery, they could tell by the look on Mr. Brooks’s face that his dog had not returned.

“Thank you for helping,” said Mr. Brooks. He gave them a loaf of bread. “Oh, no,” said Jessie, “you don’t have to do that. We’re always glad to help.”

“Please take it,” said Mr. Brooks. “I want to show my thanks.”

Jessie took the bread and thanked him for it.

“We can keep on helping you,” said Henry. “If you have a picture of Boxcar, I can scan it into our computer. Then I can make flyers with Boxcar’s picture.”

“Really?” asked Mr. Brooks. “You’d do that?”

“Yes,” said Jessie. “We love to help. Tomorrow morning we can come back, and if Boxcar isn’t home yet, we can take flyers into all the stores around here.”

Mr. Brooks gave Henry a picture of Boxcar. Jessie pulled out her notebook and asked him to describe Boxcar. She wrote down a description. Then she wrote Mr. Brooks’s phone numbers.

“You are making me feel better,” Mr. Brooks said as they were leaving. “You are making me feel as if we’ll find Boxcar.”

“We are good at finding things,” said Henry. “We’ll find Boxcar for you.”

During dinner that night the children told Grandfather and Mrs. McGregor all about the dog training class. They also told about how Boxcar was missing at the end of the class, and how they were going to help Mr. Brooks by making flyers.

“That is a kind thing to do,” said Grandfather. “Do you still want to go to Northport with me tomorrow?” he asked, “Or will you spend the whole morning helping Mr. Brooks?”

“If we went to Northport, would we have time to visit the computer store?” asked Henry. The children’s favorite computer store was in Northport.

“Yes,” said Grandfather.

The children talked it over and decided they could help Mr. Brooks and still be back in time to go to Northport with Grandfather.

“Let’s make that flyer for Mr. Brooks right now,” said Jessie.

The children helped clear the table, then went to Henry and Benny’s room.

Henry scanned the photo of Boxcar into the computer.

Violet wrote a headline:
Lost Dalmatian Dog.
“We could print the headline in purple,” she said.

Jessie typed a description of Boxcar. She also wrote information on when and where Boxcar was last seen, and who to call if he was found.

Henry printed fifty leaflets and Benny put them in a large envelope for the next morning.

“These are excellent flyers,” said Mr. Brooks the next morning.

“Thanks,” said Henry. “Our plan is to go into stores for four blocks in every direction and ask if we could put them up.”

Jessie and Benny went in one direction, and Henry and Violet went in another.

Jessie was very happy that almost every store owner agreed to put a flyer in the store window.

Benny carried the flyers. “Look,” he said, pointing to a large sign that hung from a store roof. “That sign is shaped like a French poodle.”

“Yes,” said Jessie. “So that must be Clip and Yip.” But when Jessie tried the door, it was locked. “Oh,” she said, “that’s too bad. Ms. Wilson might have been able to give us ideas about where a lost dog would go.”

Jessie looked around for a list of the store hours, but there wasn’t one in the window or on the door.
That’s strange
, she thought. She knew that most stores posted their business hours.

Benny and Jessie continued going to stores and asking them to post flyers about Boxcar. By ten o’clock they were done. So were Henry and Violet.

The Aldens rode their bikes home, and then Grandfather drove them all to Northport.

He parked the van in front of the dentist’s office. “I’ll be done by noon,” said Grandfather. “We can meet at the diner.”

Grandfather went into the dentist’s office. The children set off for the computer store.

“Look,” said Benny as they waited at a street corner. “There goes Ms. Wilson in her van.”

The others looked up in time to see the Clip and Yip van turn left.

“Her store wasn’t open this morning,” said Jessie. “We couldn’t post a flyer there.”

“I wonder what she’s doing in Northport,” said Violet.

“Maybe she makes house calls,” said Jessie. “You know, somebody who has a dog that needs to be groomed calls Clip and Yip, and Ms. Wilson comes to the house.”

“Maybe,” said Henry, “but most people take their dogs to the groomer’s.”

“Let’s go see if we can find her van,” said Benny. “We could give her a flyer to post in her store.”

The children crossed the street, then they turned left on the same street the van had gone down. They didn’t see it the street. But when they looked around, they saw the Clip and Yip van at last. It was parked in an alley.

The Aldens stood there, wondering where Candy Wilson could be. Jessie looked at the stores around them.

“Dogs,”
said Benny. “What’s that other word?” He was pointing at the corner store. Benny was just learning to read.

The other children looked at the store. “You can sound out the first three letters,” said Henry. “You’ve seen them before.”

“Yip,”
said Benny, reading. “The store is called
Dogs
—
Yip
something. I’ll get it,” he said. Benny tried again and read:
“Dogs
—
Yippee!”

“That’s very good!” said Jessie.

“A lot of people must like the word
yip,
” said Benny. “There’s Clip and Yip and there’s Dogs—Yippee!”

Henry chuckled. “Maybe,” he said. “Or maybe just one person likes the word. Let’s go in and find out.”

The children looked into the store window, which was full of dog things. There were dog beds, dog biscuits, leashes, collars, dog toys of all kinds. They walked into the store. Candy Wilson was standing behind the counter writing something. She looked up. When she saw the Aldens, she frowned.

“What are you four doing here?” she asked. “I thought you lived in Greenfield.”

Jessie thought Ms. Wilson was not friendly. Jessie explained about Grandfather and the dentist. “This is a very nice store,” said Jessie, looking around.

“Do you work here?”

“Did you come to buy something for Watch?” asked Ms. Wilson.

Jessie noticed that Ms. Wilson had not answered her question.

The Aldens explained why they were there, and they gave Ms. Wilson a flyer with Boxcar’s picture on it. “Will you put this up in your Greenfield store?” asked Henry.

Ms. Wilson took the flyer and read it. “Yes,” she said, “I’ll put this up in my Greenfield store. It’s very sad when a dog is lost.”

Violet thought it was very nice of Ms. Wilson to help. Maybe she wasn’t so unfriendly after all.

Barking sounds came from the back of the store. “I hear dogs,” said Benny.

“I sell puppies and dogs,” said Ms. Wilson. “But I’m busy now.”

Jessie felt like Ms. Wilson wanted them to leave. “We’ll go now,” she said. “Thank you for taking the flyer about Boxcar.”

“Lost dogs are hard to find,” said Ms. Wilson. I’ll do all I can to help.”

As the children were walking out the door, she called after them. “Don’t forget to bring your dog to Clip and Yip for a grooming.”

After visiting the computer store, the Aldens met Grandfather for lunch. They told him about Candy Wilson. “She must own two businesses, one in Greenfield and one in Northport,” said Grandfather. “That’s not uncommon.”

“They’re both dog businesses,” said Benny as he finished his chicken pieces.

“That’s good business sense,” said Grandfather. “That way, some customers might buy at both places.”