The haunted hound; (20 page)

"His father's Mister Blue."

Mr. Duncan's face got soft, the deep wrinkles in it seeming to fade out. "Old Blue/' he said in a low voice. "A great hound. I can hear that bugling of his right now. And I can remember many a night I sat with your father and your mother listening to that hound speaking to the line. And I remember once on a hunt they brought you along. You were just a little shaver. You went to sleep."

"Did I?" Jonathan asked.

"Yeah. Right in the middle of a hot race you went to sleep. I remember me and your dad deciding that you'd never make a fox hunter." Then Mr. Duncan laughed. "Guess we were wrong, eh?"

"I guess so, Mr. Duncan/'

Mr. Duncan opened his mouth as wide as it would go and started to put part of one of the sandwiches in it. But he stopped and looked down at Jonathan. ''When'd you eat last?'' he asked.

Jonathan was embarrassed. ''Oh, not long ago.''

''Well, stop looking so hungry at my sandwich. Boy, your eyes were eating it right out of my hand." Then he leaned close to Judy. 'AVhen'd you kids eat last, Judy?"

'This morning," she said, not taking her eyes off the silver stream of track ahead.

"I thought so. Here, I've got enough for us and the pooch, too."

Jonathan and Judy tried to be polite, but Mr. Duncan wouldn't let them.

Pot Likker didn't even try. He gulped once and his sandwich was gone.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

he lights on the caboose got ^^ i dimmer and dimmer and then

were gone. Soon they couldn't even hear Mr. Duncan's engine any more.

This was big, dark, open country. They could see a hill with tall pines on it rising against the night sky.

''That's Widow's Hill," Judy said, whispering. ''See those lights down there? That's where the men are letting their hounds out."

They climbed a fence and walked through a neglected pasture dotted with clumps of bushes.

Pot Likker had learned to heel and walked just behind and to Jonathan's right. Whenever he started away anywhere, Jonathan would tell him to heel.

A dirt road wound around the bottom of the hill and cars were coming along it, their headlights streaming out across the broom sage as they approached the corner.

Judy led the way in a wide half circle until, at last, they could see some parked cars and trucks and a lot of horses.

In the headlights hounds wheeled around. There was a

lot of noise with the dogs barking and starting make-believe fights, the men yelling and calling to them, and the horses neighing.

''W'e'll stay downwind from them so none of those old hounds will come over here bothering us/' Judy said, stopping behind a high clump of bushes. ''You better hold Pot Likker/'

Jonathan said indignantly, ''I don't have to hold my dog. I just tell him to sit down and he sits down until I tell him to get up. Pot Likker, sit down.''

In the dark, so Judy wouldn't see, he ga\'e Pot Likker a little push, and the dog sat down.

'They're about ready," Judy said, peering around the bushes. Then she squatted down beside Pot Likker. "Tell him to listen to me, Jonathan."

Jonathan squatted down, too, so that Pot Likker was between them. "You listen to Judy," he told Pot Likker.

Judy didn't touch the dog for she had already discovered that Pot Likker didn't like anyone but Jonathan to touch him. But she put her face close to his. "Now, listen. Pot Likker," she said. "You run this race right, hear? I don't know how you've been behaving while you were running foxes by yourself, but if you behave wrong now Jonathan will be ashamed of you.

"Run it right. Pot! Don't say a word until you really know you smell a fox. Don't go to hollering just because you feel good, or because you want all the other dogs to know you're there. Keep quiet, Pot, until you smell that fox. Then you

tell 'em, Pot Likker! Talk to 'em. Jonathan will be up on the hill listening for you to speak, so roll it out.

''Don't let the other dogs mess you up. Some of those July hounds can outrun you for a little while, but remember, you've got a long way to go and you'll catch up with them/'

Jonathan interrupted her. ''They're getting on their horses, Judy,'' he whispered.

''All right now, Pot. Here you go. Just run it right!"

Jonathan held the big, trembling dog for a little while longer as the other hounds started away. All the car lights were off now, and the dark file of horses wound up toward the top of Widow's Hill.

Jonathan turned him loose at last. "Go, Pot Likker!"

The black-and-white body bounded away. They heard a low, anxious, excited whine and then nothing more.

Judy straightened up. "He started off right anyway," she said. "A lot of dogs will start right off yapping."

"I'm shaking all over," Jonathan said.

"So am I. Oh, I hope, I hope, I hope," Judy said, hugging herself.

"Me, too. What can he do wrong, Judy?"

"Everything! He can start barking before he smells anything. He can start running a deer Oh, gosh, that would

be dreadful. He can get a fox trail and run it backward. He can get into a dogfight. He can get jealous of the dog that's hot on it and try to lead the pack off on a false scent. Or he can just quit."

Jonathan stiffened, looking at Judy in the dark. "Pot Lik-ker won't quit," he said.

''I don't think so, cither. But some dogs do. They just haven't got any bottom at all and can't run more than an hour or so. But I've seen some dogs who would run a fox all night long. I saw old Mister Blue one time come in at dawn with all four feet bleeding. Uncle Dan was carrying him back to the truck when he smelled another fox. He got out of Uncle Dan's arms and ran that fox until eleven o'clock in the morning. He's dead game all the way through."

Jonathan said quietly, ''And he's Pot Likker's father. Pot Likker may do all those other things wrong—and I won't care much if he does—but he won't ever quit."

Judy said slowly, "You never can tell, Jonathan. Some dogs just have that kind of courage and some don't."

"Pot Likker's got it."

Judy smiled slowly at him. "I think he has, too, Jonathan." Then she turned and looked up toward the top of the hill. "They're getting settled down," she said.

Jonathan saw the light of a fire flowing up the trunks of the pine trees and flickering against the dark green needles. "What do they want a fire for?" he asked, amazed, because he was sweating.

Judy chuckled. "They always build a fire. Habit, I guess. In the winter it keeps 'em warm. In the summer I guess they use it to see each other with."

Jonathan followed her then as she started up the hill.

'We won't go too close/' she whispered back. "But I want to hear what they say. Especially if Pot Likker gives tongue/'

''I do, too."

As the\- got nearer to the fire they slowed down, tiptoeing so as not to break twigs or anything. At last Judy halted behind a huge old pine, so old its bark was hard and smooth. She stopped Jonathan with her hand.

Cautiously they peeked around the tree. On logs, or just sitting on the ground, the fox hunters ringed the bright fire. Judy nudged Jonathan and whispered, ''That old man with the white beard is Senator Hammond. I know a lot of the others, too. The one in that fancy shirt is my Sunday-school teacher."

Jonathan looked at the men and, suddenly, one of them, his back to Jonathan, looked familiar. He nudged Judy. **Isn't that your uncle Dan? The one nodding his head?"

Judy grabbed Jonathan's arm with both hands. ''Ohh, ohh/' she said, pushing him back behind the tree. ''I got to sit down/' she whispered, collapsing.

Jonathan sat down beside her.

''What are we going to do?" Judy asked.

"About what?"

"Everything. Uncle Dan'll recognize him if Pot Likker opens his mouth."

"You think so?"

"I know so. Some other men make mistakes saying the wrong dog is speaking, but not Uncle Dan. He'll know it's Pot Likker."

"Maybe he'll think Pot Likker just ran away and got into this hunt accidentally."

''Not a chance. Uncle Dan knows Pot's your dog. And he'll know that wherever Pot Likker is you're somewhere close around."

''Can we get Pot Likker away now?"

"I don't see how. They're probably a mile from here and we won't even know where until one of them speaks."

Jonathan thought awhile. "Oh, well/' he said sadly, "if we can't do anything, there's no use worrying about it."

"Uncle Dan's a sort of understanding man," Judy whispered. "Sometimes."

Jonathan was about to say something when the voice of a dog cut through the night air. It was as though something had grabbed Jonathan's backbone and yanked it stiff.

"Just a puppy yapping," Judy said.

Jonathan let his breath out and sank back against the tree.

Around the fire the talk of the men was dying down, and Jonathan could almost feel them listening.

Then one of the men spoke. The voice was old and cracked and Jonathan guessed that it was the senator. "Should be about to the branch head now," the old voice said. "If they strike on that old four-toed fox in there, it'll be a race, boys!"

Jonathan leaned around the tree and saw all the men nod their heads.

Another man asked someone, "Bill, have you got that Sarko hound of yours in this race?"

The man named Bill answered, '*When you hear a real hound voice coming up here, then you'll know whether my dog Sarko's around here or not/'

''Oh, oh,'' Judy whispered. ''That's Mr. Tatum. Sarko is a wonderful dog. He really is. And he's got a voice like a man yelling in a barrel—you can hear him across a county."

A man at the fire asked, ''How about Ben Brown?"

"He's in there, too. And I've got a Trigg hound in here tonight that can outrun any fox-chasing dog in the state. Got him right out of the trials up in Kentucky. That dog's got a built-in streak of lightning."

"I seriously doubt," the old senator said, "if any dog here tonight can outrace my Dora. I seriously doubt it."

Judy giggled, but none of the men said anything. "Poor old Dora," Judy whispered. "She's all the senator's got, and he just loves her to death. She used to be a fine hound, too. But now all she is is smart. She knows every trick there is in the world."

Jonathan felt tight all over and his fingers were tearing apart all the pine needles he could find on the ground. "There're so many dogs down there," he said, his voice scared.

"Boy/" Judy said. "And good ones, too. They don't make foxhounds any better than Sarko and Ben Brown. Maybe that Trigg's good, too." She looked at Jonathan. "Pot Lik-ker's really in a race tonight," she declared.

"I—I'm glad," Jonathan whispered. "He'll do all right. He'll do fine. Won't he, Judy?"

"Sure he will, Jonathan. Of course he's awful young and he hasn't run with a pack before. But just think of all the good things hell learn. It'll be wonderful for him."

Something was happening. Over by the fire there wasn't an\' more talk at all. Everyone seemed to be waiting for a sound to come up out of the valley. Everything seemed to be making a hollow place of silence just so Jonathan could hear it when it came.

Jonathan began to listen with his whole body as he sat stiff against the tree, his face toward the dark wooded valley. He stopped hearing the crackling of the fire and the lonesome hooting of an owl. The layer of noise made by the summer wind through the pines, the stomping of the horses, the night bugs, and a mockingbird became like a wall around a silence in which he waited, listening.

He could see nothing down in the dark valley. No movement, no running animals. Nothing. Just deep darkness where the woods were and a lighter darkness on the open fields.

And it was so silent down there. It was hard for him to believe that a whole pack of foxhounds was running in that dark place.

Then, rolling up out of that valley, there came a voice. It was deep and booming, coming from a big, strong chest. It was a voice that wrapped around you and made you want to stand up and yell.

It nailed Jonathan against the tree, his breath trapped in his throat, his muscles frozen. To him there was nothing

else but that voice. Judy wasn't there, nor the fire, nor the men. Just that one great, bughng hound's voice.

He waited a long time, knowing in his heart that it was Pot Likker but waiting anyway to be sure. Then, at last, his whisper broken, he asked, ''Is it, Judy?"

''Yes," she said.

It was music, and he thought he was going to burst out crj'ing with happiness.

Then, as sudden and terrible as the screech of automobile tires, Jonathan heard the old senator say, "That's my Dora, boys. She always has made music like that."

All Jonathan's muscles started pushing him to his feet in outrage, but Judy caught him by the arm and pulled him down. Anybody could tell that that voice belonged to a young dog, a big, strong, swift-going dog. Not to an old, old dog.

Judy was whispering to him. "Nobody pays any attention to the senator," she said. "He's old and can't hear very well, and he likes to believe that it's always his dog Dora. Nobody minds, Jonathan. Dora's all he's got."

That one steady voice kept on, all by itself, for a long time—so long that Jonathan began to tremble again. "Is he doing something wrong, Judy?" he whispered. "Why don't the other hounds say anything, Judy?"