One Dog Happy

One Dog Happy

3 4 In the middle of a heat wave, in the middle of August, in the board-flat middle of the state of Illinois, in a college town bordered on one side by the tract housing of young families and on the other by the stinky fields and farm animals of the university ’s ag department, the minister was giving orders. He gave orders easily, because he was used to it. People did things for him; they seemed to want to. The minister was taking his wife and five children on vacation. There were plants to water, a litter box to empty, mail to take in, and so on. He was rattling off a list for their house sitter, a member of the church whom the children called Mr. Bob. Mr. Bob would be in charge of everything except the family’s One Dog Happy O n e D o g H a p p y 35 new dog, said the minister. The dog was “very strong” and liable to pull away when on the leash; in fact, in the three weeks since they’d gotten it from the pound, it had already run away from one of the children. “Yes,” Mr. Bob replied. “You called me to help that morning, and by the time I got dressed and got over here, someone had caught it already.” “Oh, that’s right,” said the minister, though he did not look sheepish or sorry. “So you remember, about the pulling off the leash.” The minister explained to Mr. Bob that he had decided to pay a young man to walk the dog daily, an army private who’d just returned from Iraq. The private’s father was also an elder in the church. “A dog walker,” said Mr. Bob testily. “What’s the going rate for that, anyway?” “I don’t remember,” said the minister. The minister’s son looked up from his Game Boy. “I thought you said a hundred bucks.” “A hundred bucks,” said Mr. Bob under his breath. Mr. Bob had always lived in the college town but since his retirement had been feeling especially sensitive to the youthful bias of the place. Half of any church congregation was in college or graduate school or had recently finished both, as the minister had. Next to them, Mr. Bob seemed old and feeble, though he was only seventy and sharper, he thought, than many people ten years younger than he. It was true that his eyes were light sensitive , and the black wraparound sunglasses he wore often gave people the impression that he couldn’t see at all. And maybe he appeared off-balance somehow, as his legs were very thin, yet he had gained quite a bit of weight in the midsection, which was why Baby George, the minister’s youngest child, had taken to calling him Humpy Dumpy. The other children had tried it too and had been reprimanded soundly. But Baby George was allowed to say it whenever he pleased. “My hands do shake,” Mr. Bob told the minister, “but it’s only my new diuretic.” “Oh no, Mr. Bob,” said the minister’s wife kindly. “My hands are always shaking too, especially if I have coffee. I never would have noticed it.” 3 6 O n e D o g H a p p y “Beagles are notorious for getting lost,” said the minister. “They follow the scent to the exclusion of everything else.” Mr. Bob had tried not to seem humiliated by any of this, but suddenly his irritation got the better of him, and he said in a low voice, “What kind of dog is that, then? Why would anyone want one?” “What’s that?” asked the minister. “He thaid why would anyone want one,” said the minister’s beautiful wife, smiling and nodding at Mr. Bob with her eyebrows raised, as if he were a child who’d said something very clever. She had a lisp and very long, shiny black hair that always smelled as if she’d just washed it. The minister was no match for her, but he was tall, and he carried himself as if being tall were enough. He stood erect; he plopped himself down and sat with his knees spread wide; he took up room. He didn’t worry about his bowed legs or his hair, which had receded sharply on the sides, leaving a...