Authors: Nicholas Edwards

Dog Whisperer (2 page)

BOOK: Dog Whisperer

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This time, part of her knew that it really was only a dream,
but she still
felt
as though she was drowning. The waves seemed bigger than ever, and there were rocks around, too, because she kept crashing into themâwhich
hurt
. It seemed to take forever, but finally, she managed to wake herself up. She pulled her quilt closer, shivering and scared. Water seemed to be pouring all over the place, and at first, she was very confused. Then, she realized that it was raining outside.

Rain wasn't scary. She had probably just had the dream again because of the sound of it pounding against the roof.

It seemed to be very windyâher shade and curtains were flapping back and forth. A big storm must have whipped in off the bay, because it sounded really wild outside. Lots of times, her mother liked to go for walks during storms, but Emily and her father would usually just say, “Yeah, okay, whatever, have
fun,” and stay in and eat cookies and read by the fireplace.

Actually, no, they would
start
by readingâor Emily would sit in the big, blue easy chair and draw. Since her parents were both academics, they spent
a lot
of time reading and doing research. But Emily could almost always talk her father into playing a couple of Wii games, instead. They would jump around, and make a lot of commotionâand because her father was pretty uncoordinated, he would generally knock over a lamp or some candlesticks or something. Her mother didn't really approve of video games, but whenever they got her to give the Wii a try, she would get hooked and play for about two hours straight.

The rain was coming down even harder now, and she was glad she was indoors. The shade and curtains looked like they were doing a weird shadow dance together, which was kind of coolâbut, maybe a little creepy, too.

Emily wanted to stay under the covers, but the wind was pretty cold. Besides, some rain might blow in and get on her computer, and
that
would be bad. So, she dragged herself up and over to the window. There wasn't any lightning, but she could hear cracking sounds as tree branches broke. Every
so often, a foghorn blared out, too, and she hoped no boats were caught in the storm. They knew lots of people in Bailey's Cove who fished for a living or were lobstermenâincluding her friend Bobby's fatherâand it would be really dangerous if any of them were out there.

It took some effort, because the wind was so strong, but she finally managed to pull the window shut.

“Wow,” she said to Josephine. “That's a really bigâ” She stopped when she saw that her cat was suddenly standing absolutely upright on the bed, with her fur all ruffled up. “Hey, what is it?”

Josephine just stared past her, looking alert and alarmed, with her tail straight up in the air.

Maybe there was a seagull or something out there? Whatever it was had her cat's full attention!

Mostly, though, Josephine wasn't that interested in birds. Or squirrels or raccoons or deerâor even the seals that they sometimes found lying happily on the rocks by the water, getting some sun. Personally, Emily thought the seals were really cool. Once, a moose had even shown up in their backyardâand pretty much trampled all over the garden. But Josephine usually just liked to yawn a lot, take long naps, have some food, and then go
sleep some more. So there had to be something really unusual out there, if she was actually
interested
.

It probably wasn't a bear, or a bobcat, or anything like that, because they didn't really come down to the south coastâbut, wow, what if it
was
? That would be pretty neat. Her father always said that he didn't like nature at all, but he was really into photographyâalmost always
film
, not digitalâand they had lots of framed pictures of loons and deer and stuff around the house.

Josephine jumped over to the windowsill and began to pace back and forth, with her tail whipping from side to side.

Okay, there definitely
was
something out there. But her cat didn't seem nervous; she seemed uneasy. Anxious.
Worried
.

Emily squinted out at the storm, but it was too foggy to be able to see anything.

“Whatever it is,” she said to her cat, “it'll probably go away.”

As she turned to go to bed, Josephine meowed so loudly that Emily turned back.

“What?” she asked, a little bit impatiently. Even if there was some wild animal lurking around, it wasn't like she was going to go charging out there toâthen, she stopped.

Was somethingâcrying for help? She didn't think she could hear anything over the rain, but it
felt
as thoughâEmily frowned.

It didn't make sense, but all of a sudden, she was completely convinced that there was something out there that needed her!

Her parents probably had a rule that she wasn't supposed
to go running around outside at the crack of dawn in the middle of a summer squallâbut, it had actually never come up before. So, Emily decided not to worry about it. Besides, she was only going to be in the
backyard
. After already waking them up earlier, she really didn't want to do it again.

She had worn a pair of green shorts and a Yarmouth Clam Festival t-shirt to bed, so all she needed was some sneakers and a hoodie. She started out of her bedroom, then went back and swapped her sneakers for her L.L. Bean boots.

It was raining even harder than she expected, and she should have put on her slicker, first. But she was
already
soaked now, so it probably didn't matter. Even though it was light out, now, it was really, really foggy, and she couldn't really see the soft glow of the lighthouse up on the point. But, she could hear its foghorn, as well as the one way up at Halfway Rock.

Their town was a long peninsula, with a couple of islands, which were connected to the rest of the town by bridges. Her family's house was right on the water and had a tiny floating dock. Her mother went kayaking almost every morning, and she would paddle for a couple of miles up and down the sound. They also had an old wooden skiff, which they usually kept upside down on the lawn, because the shoreline was all rocks, with no sandy places.

They had neighbors on both sidesâand all along the peninsulaâbut their yard had lots of trees, so it always felt really private. The trees meant that they didn't get much sun, but her parents had had a wooden deck built, anyway. Sometimes, they had supper out there, at a picnic table. Lots of nights, they would hang out on the deck until after darkâunless the black flies got so annoying that they would have to go indoors to escape them.

It was so difficult to see through the rain and fog, that she stood on the deck and listened, instead. Wind, rain, waves crashing against the rocks.

Maybe Josephine had just been acting weird, and there wasn't anything out here at all.

Maybe.

The lawn sloped downhill to the rocks, and the grass was so wet that she was really glad she'd
changed into her boots. There were a few branches strewn around, but other than that, everything seemed to be normal. She turned around to check every direction but didn't see anything other than grass, a few bushes, and their gardenâwhere her mother and grandmother had planted tomatoes, zucchini, and some flowers. So far, though, mostly only the weeds were thriving.

There was a low rumble of thunder, and she immediately decided to go back indoors. Besides, she was really tired.

She was halfway back to the house, when she feltâwellâ
something
. She felt afraid, or anxious, orâurgent. Yeah, she definitely felt this strange sense of needing to take action.
Immediately
.

But, doing
what
?

Maybe her father was right, and she had just eaten way too much food at the baseball game, and now she had, like, indigestion. Which would make more sense if her stomach hurtâbut, it didn't.

There was a flash of lightning, and then more thunder, coming from the direction of the harbor, and she ducked instinctively. Okay, she would just check the yard one more time, really fast, and then go back to bed.

She walked down to the edge of the grass,
above the rocks, and towards one of their neighbors' houses.

She squinted through the fog, but all that she could see was crashing waves and rocks. Lots of rocks. The Peabodys' dinghy, tied to their dock, and bobbing up and down in the choppy water. A few lobster buoys. Other than that, she couldn't find anything unusual, orâwait!

There
was
something out there!

Emily looked more closely, and realized that there was a
large, white shape on the rocks. Was it an old sail, maybe? Or a piece of plastic, or some Styrofoam? But, the shape seemed to be too big for that. What it looked like was an animal of some kind. In fact, it
looked
like a polar bear.

Whoa. She was almost a thousand percent sure that there were no polar bears in Maineâbut what if one had gotten lost, and drifted down fromâwhat, the North Pole? No, that was just silly. It was probably only some junk that had washed up onto the rocks because of the storm.

She took a few cautious steps towards the bulky shape.

Was there such a thing as an albino seal? Whales sometimes beached themselves, and this might be a poor baby whale that had floundered into the cove and was too weak to swim anymore. Or even a shark, or a porpoise or something. When the surf
was high, all kinds of fish and marine mammals showed up unexpectedly. The coast of Maine was so rocky and uneven, with lots of islands and inlets and coves and all, that it was probably really easy for animals to get lost.

But, if it was a baby whale or something, it wouldn't be able to breathe much longer, if it couldn't get back into the water. Anyone who found a beached animal was supposed to call the authorities right away so that they could come out and help save it. Emily wasn't quite sure exactly
who
to call, but her mother would know, because she did, like, advisory work for the state senate president when the legislature was in session and worked on environmental issues and all.

More worried than afraid now, she walked closer. There were a few thick bushes in the way, and a wet branch smacked her in the face.

“Ow,” she said automatically.

She tried to squeeze her way through the branches, but the bushes were too dense. They
were
tall enough so that maybe she could crawl underneath them, instead. She crouched down, buried almost to her ankles in the mud. It was going to be messy to crawl through all of that! And she
liked
this shirt.

But, she stretched out onto her stomach and squirmed through to the other side, anyway. The mud felt really cold and gross, and she wiped as much of it off as she could with her free hand.

Now, she could see that it was definitely an animal out there. A coyote, maybe? She was always extra careful to make sure that Josephine stayed inside, because there were coyote sightings all the time.

It might be dangerous to go right up next to it and check, but whatever the animal was, it seemed to be hurt. She needed to find out, one way or the other.

Without thinking, she whistled a low, sharp whistleâand the animal immediately lifted its head and looked in her direction.

Hey, it wasn't a coyote; it was a
dog
! A big, white, soaking wet dog. A retriever, maybe.

“Here, boy!” she called. “Come here, boy!”

The dog tried to move, but then slumped back down.

She wasn't sure if he was just tired, or injured, but there was obviously something wrong with him.

“Come on, boy,” she said encouragingly. “You can do it.”

The dog struggled to get up, then whimpered
and fell heavily onto his side. He whimpered again, and then lay still.

Maybe he was caught on something, like rope, or an old fishing net, and because of that, he was trapped. She was going to have to go out there and help him.

The rocks were very slippery, and it was going to be that much harder to keep her balance in the pouring rain. Emily hesitated, but slowly began to make her way towards the dog. If she got her ankle caught in a crevice, or fell into the water or something, she wasn't going to be much help. And with no one around to rescue her, she wouldn't be able to rescue
him
âwhich meant that they would both be in big trouble.

Lightning flashed, followed by another crash of thunder a few seconds later. The dog cringedâand so did she.

“Good dog,” she said, trying to sound brave. “Everything's okay.”

She tried to avoid the rocks with too much algae, but kept slipping anyway. Her boots didn't seem to have any traction, and suddenly, her legs slid out from underneath her and she banged her right knee so hard that she gasped. In fact, it hurt so much that she almost started crying, but she just
stayed where she was, taking a few deep breaths to try and make the pain go away.

Okay, falling
that
heavily had maybe not been part of her plan.

“Um, sorry, I hurt my leg a little,” she said to the dog, as she pushed herself back up to her feet. “I'm okay, though. Just hang tight, I'm coming.” Not that she was expecting the dog to
answer
âbut it seemed polite.

The rocks were so treacherous and slick that she decided to be smart and take her time. She would lift one boot, set it down cautiously, make sure she was well anchored, and then brace herself with her hands before moving her other foot forward. It wasn't fast, but it was
safe
.

Well,
kind
of safe. In bright sunlight, when she could see what she was doing, and it wasn't raining like crazy, with lightning and thunder and fog everywhere.

Okay, it wasn't
at all
safe. And her knee hurtâa lot. But she still didn't stop, moving slowly and steadily towards him.

She was so close now that she could hear the dog panting, although it sounded more like wheezing. When the next flash of lightning came, she could see some dark splotches on his fur, so maybe he was
white with black spots. The only thing she could tell for sure was that he was
big
. Maybe ninety or a hundred pounds.

“Hey, boy,” she said, in a nice, calm voice. She had never had her own dog beforeâalthough she had always wanted oneâbut she had been taught to be very careful around animals she didn't know. Her parents had said that it was even more important when it was a stray animal who might be scared, and would maybe snap at her out of pure panic and fear.

“Good boy,” she said, even more calmly.

The dog was obviously very weak and in a lot of pain, but he raised his tail enough to wag it once.

Between the rain and ocean spray, it was getting even harder to keep her footing, but finally, she was close enough to touch him. She reached out to pat his head, and he licked her hand, his tongue feeling very dry.

“Good dog,” she said. “You're a good boy.”

Another huge wave came crashing up onto the rocks, and she lifted her arm to try and block both of them from the spray. It worked pretty well, but a second wave rushed in a few seconds later, and they both got even more drenched than they already were.

“I'm sorry,” she said. “I didn't see that one coming.”

The dog's tail thumped, faintly.

What she needed now was a plan. The first thing she had to do was to move the dog off the rocks, and away from the surging water.

“Can you get up?” she asked, and snapped her fingers reflexively. “Come on, you can do it.”

The dog just lay there, his breathing raspy and uneven.

“Come on, boy,” she said encouragingly.

He still didn't move.

Okay, he was way too big for her to pick up, but maybe she could try to pull him, a little bit, if she was very gentle. She reached out, feeling for a collar, but there didn't seem to be anything around his neck. So, she decided to see if she could help him stand up, instead.

But, when she touched his front leg, he yelped so loudly that she dodged away from himâand almost fell off the rocks into the churning water.

“I'm sorry,” she said quickly. “I didn't mean to do that. I'm really sorry.”

The dog moved his head towards her, and she was a little afraid that he might bite her, but he just licked her hand again. He was shivering badly, and she rested her hand lightly on his head, not sure what else to do.

It seemed to be raining harder than ever, and she wasn't quite sure what to do.

“It's going to be okay,” she said. “It really is.”

The dog just lay on his side, gasping for air.

She needed to go get some help.

Fast.

BOOK: Dog Whisperer

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