Jack's Trophy
By C. Dahlen

The short aluminum awning offered little protection from the heavy mist as Tom waited for Merle to shuffle across his kitchen, switch on the light, peer through the partially drawn curtain, and finally open the door just a crack to block the yelping dog bouncing off the back of his legs. The dog circled to either side as Merle pushed back with his feet and punctuated the barking with his shout and shout again of “Dammit dog, Get back!” before he grabbed the collar of the dog and opened the door wider.

“What brings you out tonight?

“I got him, Merle, I got him! You know the old buck living in the woods behind my place. I got him.”

“Don’t say. Hmm. Don’t say!” He held the struggling dog and looked up at Tom. “You come out just to tell me that?”

“No. I need your help, or rather Jack’s.” Tom said looking down at the long low profile of the red longhaired dachshund grumbling behind Merle’s legs. “l need Jack’s help. I got him, but I lost him. It wasn’t a clean shot, and I lost him when the mist got heavy.”

Tom waited patiently as Merle hummed. Hmm. Merle always hummed when he got excited. Hmm. Merle stuck his head out the door, looked around, and sniffed at the weather.

“Hmm, hmm, you better come in. Almost dark soon. Wet, too. Hmm. Don’t know. Really don’t know. It depends on the dog.”

As Tom entered the kitchen, Jack grumbled again and lay down at Merle’s feet with his head between his paws and his eyes up to keep a close watch on the intruder. Tom knew Jack’s grumbling was mostly show. He smiled at the broad head and narrow muzzle with just a trace of white graying the upper lip. His dark ears spread onto the floor as Jack lay his head across Merle’s foot. Tom noticed the left ear had a quarter inch triangular notch out of the tip. Jack wore his battle scars proudly. Merle crossed the small bright kitchen and sat at the wobbly captain’s table. Tom settled into the opposite chair to wait.

“I was just going to salve up my feet.” Merle took a green square can from the table and dabbed the yellow paste on the soles of his feet. “They get pretty dry and sore this time of year. From mucking around in the wet fields. Hmm. Don’t know about the dog. Maybe he will? Maybe he won’t. Never could tell him what to do. I can put in suggestions, sort of, maybe trick him with food and sometimes he even just does what I want. Of course I have to let him think it’s his idea. But he can track, hmm, hmm. Good at it, too, when he wants to be, but I can’t always be sure what he’s gonna come up with.”

He wiped his hands on a towel and patted his leg. “Right, Jack.” He laughed with the dog. Jack jumped up, put his front paws on Merle’s leg, and pushed his head up under the old man’s hand.

“Sometimes you just gotta get your own way.” Jack wagged his tail and licked Merle’s face as the man scratched the dog behind the ears. He then pushed the dog to the floor and sat with his hands loose between his legs so the dog could lick the balm off his fingers. “I know he can track, and I know he’s good at it, but he don’t always finish up the way he starts. More than once, he’s been after rabbit and come up with squirrel.”

“There was one time, oh, I guess about two years ago. We were out hunting rabbit, and Jack took off. I didn’t know what for. The way he tore through the woods I figured it wasn’t rabbit because a rabbit will run a short distance then stop, look, and hide. He could have had his own plans, he generally does, but I can’t imagine he smelled what he caught from where we were. And I certainly know he smelled it and didn't run it down. Hmm. I trailed off after him by listening for his yell but that came to a sudden high yelp like he was hurt and then stopped. Man, I was worried. Hmm, hmm. There’s coyote around here and they’ll take a dog sometimes. But then a coyote might be surprised with Jack. When I finally got up to him I found he’d gotten a porcupine complete with quills. Jack had them here across the top of his head, he was lucky he didn’t get them in his eyes, and also around here under his neck. But that didn’t stop him from rolling out that porky and making quick work outta him. I had a hard time pulling him off and getting him to the vets. His face was raw and swollen for a week. But even at eight years he didn’t slow down a wink. The next night he took out a thirty pound coon that was raiding his garbage cans behind the house. Hmm. They’re Jack’s cans, you know. He hardly ever gets into them because I chase him off, but if he can’t have them, nobody else can. That coon got him, too. Took a nick off his ear. Hmm. He’s not so pretty anymore, but I wouldn’t trade him in for nothing.

Tom looked out the window at the sky growing darker by the minute. In the late afternoon light he could see the spotted gray wet beginning to spread on the concrete driveway. Merle finished putting on one boot and then sat back with the other in his hand. Jack sauntered over to his water bowl for a drink then stretched out full length on his bed against the heating vent behind Merle’s chair. Above the bed hung a curious brown to almost black pocket of fur.

“I don’t think I’ll ever understand that dog.” Merle continued, “Sometimes I don’t know if he’s brave or if he just truly doesn’t have any sense.”

Merle looked over his shoulder at Jack laying behind him and turned a whispering laugh to Tom. “Don’t let him know he’s just a short-legged fool who doesn’t know his own size. He’d take it as an insult, though he’d probably only regard us as the fool, but every time I turn around he’s mixing with something he should let alone.”

Merle sat back again an continued unlacing the boot on his lap.

“I was over at Mabel Petersen’s last summer. Just a social call, you might say. We were sitting out on her deck drinking beer and watching Jack and her dog, Mitzi, run around the backyard. We were just sitting there when we heard a bang and a clatter from the side of her house and Mitzi runs like a streak up between Mabel’s legs. Her tail was down and she was shaking all over she was so scared. Well, hmm, I figured Jack was just into some kind of trouble, and we got up and walked around the deck to that side of the house. At first I didn’t see Jack, but I did see a big black bear ripping up Mabel’s garbage out behind her garage. Then I saw Jack. He was squatted down in the tall grass and sneaking up behind that bear. He was so low in the grass that it folded over him and all you could see from the deck was grass swaying as he moved through and sometimes a glimpse of his back or tail. But he was still. Not even his tail wagged. I could see right away that he was stalking that bear. At first I was going to shout to get him off, but the bear wasn’t paying him any notice and I hoped Jack would have enough sense to pull off. Mabel and I watched him slink up closer and closer to that bear. Mitzi couldn’t watch. She buried her muzzle in Mabel’s shoulder. The bear was so busy with the garbage he never saw Jack. I watched that dog, hmm, and I truly thought he was going to be lunch. He was now only a couple feet from that bear, but he kept low and still.

We held our breath, waiting, when all of a sudden Jack leaps forward and grabs that bear where a bear don’t want to be grabbed. You might say it was a personal sort of grab and once Jack gets ahold of something he wants, he doesn’t let go. That bear let out a squeal that would split wood and took off for the woods with Jack hanging on and flapping around like a hairy red flag. I watched them disappear into the woods and marked their general direction by the frantic bellowing of that poor animal. Mabel gave me her shot gun out of her closet and I took off after Jack and the bear to see what I could do. I never did find the bear. But about a quarter mile back into the woods I did find Jack bullyragging a part of him. That bear must have been awful sore. Jack wouldn’t let go of the part so I had to carry him and the part and the gun back to Mabel’s.”

Merle leaned over to tie his boot. He shook his head and muttered to the floor, “Never will I understand why a twenty-five pound dog would go after a 300 pound bear. Jack was so proud of himself that I didn’t have the heart to throw away his bear part. So I got it mounted and hung it on the wall above his bed.”

He sat up and looked at Tom. “Deer, you say, heh. I guess Jack can track deer. Hmm. As long as there’s blood. Hmm. I’ll get my coat.”

Merle wandered out of the kitchen. Tom watched Jack slowly rise and stretch from his bed as he listened to Merle muttering in the closet, “Where’s that coat. Hmm. Where is that damn coat! Hmm, hmm.” The dog’s ears perked up. He danced around the kitchen as Merle struggled to slip a collar and lead over Jack’s head. With his head in the palm of his hand Tom leaned his elbow on the table and watched Merle and Jack slowly dance. He thought about the orange florescent tape he had used to mark the trail of the injured deer. There was a flashlight in his truck. He hoped the batteries were still good. The old man did a slow shuffle step while the excited dog whirled and whined and rolled across the floor. Finally Merle cornered Jack, slipped on his lead, and looked at Tom as if to say. “Well, we’re ready. How 'bout you?”

Tom went to start the truck while Merle fumbled with the lock on his door, and Jack wrapped his lead several times around Merle’s legs. In the truck Merle sat with Jack on his lap and looked out the window at the deepening wet dusk. Jack pressed white dog smudges on the glass and whined at the passing dark fields. The slow slip-slap of the windshield wipers left wet streaks arcing across the windshield. Merle yawned and reflected, “Better get there soon. The rain’s picking up and if the blood washes away, Jack won’t be much good to you.”

Tom’s grip on the steering wheel tightened ever so slightly as he turned the corner into his drive. It was getting dark, now. His headlights began to light the brush at the edge of the road. Soon they would be there. Soon. His eyes left the road and briefly fell on Jack now asleep in Merle’s lap. Merle’s head nodded on his chest to the rhythm of the car, yet somehow Tom knew it was going to be a good night. A long night, a wet night, but a good night.