And Crawling Things Lurk

When Don and Ray walked into the waiting room at Jim McBee’s veterinary clinic, Don smiled at Laura Webster behind the counter. She didn’t miss a word of the spiel of care instructions she was giving the customer before her, but she acknowledged his entrance with a smile and a wink. When she finished accepting payment from a middle-aged lady for Jim spaying her calico cat, Don stepped up and asked, “Hi. Can I see Jim?”

“Hi, Don. Sure, go on back.”

“Thanks. Oh, and last night was really great.” Then, when he noticed the turned-head reaction of the lady with the fixed cat, he thought he’d better clarify it by adding, “Best butt I’ve had in years.”

The woman with the cat just stood there with her mouth dropping open in slow motion, and when he noticed Ray had a similar shocked expression on his face Don realized what he had said and how it could be taken.

Laura picked and patted imaginary stray hairs into place. He loved the way blond highlights played through the light brown tresses. But, right then, he needed to get his mind away from running his fingers through them and clarify what he had said, which sounded absolutely lecherous following his first remark. Laura leaned forward with her elbows on the counter, her chin propped in her cupped hands, and her pale blue eyes wide and innocent as she waited for him to dig his hole ever deeper.

He stammered, “Pork butt – barbecued pork butt, it was. And your buns –.”

The woman’s mouth somehow managed to gape even wider.

“Yeast buns, they were. You made the buns from scratch, didn’t you? Kneaded it yourself and all that. And Potato salad,” he said to Ray, who was doing his best to restrain his laughter behind tightly squeezed lips. “Wonderful potato salad – homemade for sure.”

Maintaining her pose of naïve innocence, Laura smiled, batted her eyes and said, “The doctor is in, officer. You might try Recovery.”

Glad to get out of the reception area and the heat building up there, he led Ray through the door beside Laura’s counter and into a hallway.

He made a mock swipe with his hand across his forehead to remove whatever sweat had accumulated, gave Ray a wry smile and said, “Sometimes...”

With a finally released but muffled laugh as he looked at Recovery on a nearby door, Ray said, “But you did make a remarkable recovery.”

“Hmm.”

Don found Jim tending a miniature chow wearing a large bandage on its right front leg.

“Afternoon, Don...Ray. Be right with you.” Then, as he lifted the dog into a cage mounted on the wall, he crooned, “You’re going to be just fine, Attila. Just lie down there and have yourself a good snooze. You should be going home in the morning.” Then, turning back to Don, he added, “Bad gash that got a nasty infection. Thought we were going to have to take his leg there for a bit. But, he’s gonna be just fine. What can I do for you?”

With Jim on one side and Ray on the other, each one tall and gangly to Don’s less than average height, he felt like a little kid. He was always one to be picked on in school until he started playing football and grew some muscles.

Thumbing Jim towards the back door, he said, “Got something in the car out back I’d like you to look at.”

Outside, before Don popped the lock on his trunk he cautioned, “It’s pretty rank, but it shouldn’t be too bad out here in the open air.”

“I’ve seen plenty of road-kill.”

“No, this is different. It’s got an odor I can’t identify. But, just as puzzling is whatever’s coating it. Take a look.”

As the trunk lid raised and the foul miasma exuded from the tarp-covered bundle, Jim took half a step back and said, “Whew! I see what you mean.” Then Don lifted the edge of the tarp back, exposing the encased head, and the doctor stepped forward again. “Oh, no. Is that Be-Be? I heard he was missing. Damn.”

Don peeled back the tarp to expose the whole bundle and said, “What is it, anyway? It looks like spider webs, but there’s so much of it, and coarser, too. I tried to break it at first, but it’s strong, like nylon. It doesn’t seem to be that, though. It’s not a fabric, just lots and lots of strands. Could it be a couple of spools of fishing line he got tangled up in?”

“Could be, I suppose. But he’s more than just tangled up in it. If you want to leave him here, I’ll see what I can figure out. But we can’t stink up the place, so he’ll have to go into one of the outside kennels. There’s an empty one over there on the end.”

“Before that, though,” Don motioned McBee closer. “What do you think about this? Take a look.” He reached one hand beneath the carcass and lifted. “Light as a feather. It’s almost like he’s nothing but a hide stretched over a frame. Could he have been skinned and stuffed?”

The vet leaned over to get a closer look. “Taxidermy is hardly my specialty, but I don’t think so. It looks like he still has his bones. Looks more to me like he’s just been drained. Did you find a large amount of blood?”

“None. It could have been done someplace else, I suppose. But I turned him every which way before I wrapped him up. No sign of bleeding. No cut or puncture that I could see through all that.”

“Well, maybe something’ll turn up when I can get him cleaned off.”

They hadn’t even gotten Be-Be through the gate before the dogs in the other runs began howling and raising hell. Those that didn’t cower and whimper at the far ends of their runs threw themselves against the gates in attempts to get to the source of the offending odor.

“Damn. Gee, I’m sorry, Don, but you’re going to have to take him somewhere else. I can’t have my patients getting hernias carrying on like this. Sorry.”

After Don got the bundle back into the trunk, he turned back to the only vet in town and said, “I need to find out what it is, what happened to him. Any ideas?”

“Well, probably one of the best resources in the country for something like that is right over at the University of California at Davis, my alma mater. They’ve got quite an extensive agricultural department that includes veterinary medicine. If they can’t nail it down for you, I don’t know who could.”

“Okay, Jim, thanks.”

After leaving the vet’s office, Don called the sergeant on the radio and asked for a meet in the police department parking lot. As the sergeant drove up, Don popped the trunk of his car and pulled the tarp back from Be-Be’s head.

“Christ! What’ve you got in there?” the sergeant said as he walked over from his own car. “It hit me soon as I got out.”

“It’s Be-Be, the Anderson’s dog that went through the window and disappeared. We found him, what’s left of him, in the old Vasov building. Neither McBee nor we can figure out what happened to him. Jim suggested taking her over to U. C. Davis.”

“Gee, I don’t know, Don. That’d be expensive. Isn’t that case closed? Didn’t De Leon say it was college kids or something?”

“Yeah, that’s what he said. But you know as well as I do that he’d say anything to close a case fast – and, if possible, without having to actually do anything. But that was before we found the dog. He doesn’t look like something college kids could do. And, that smell is something that really disturbs me. It’s not just decay. There’s something else, but I don’t know what.”

“But, if De Leon says it’s closed...”

“Someone tried to get through that little girl’s window. They didn’t because Be-Be went out after ’em. But they could be back, and there’s more than one little girl in town.”

“Yeah, you’re right. Why don’t you run it by the chief?”

Don and Ray stopped at the receptionist-dispatcher-secretary’s deck and asked if the chief was in. Gary De Leon was standing there thumbing through a stack of reports on her desk like he was browsing through magazines. Don knew the chief was in because the door was open, and he could see him sitting behind his desk. But it was his long-standing policy for any officer or citizen to ask permission to see him rather than just walking in, even if his door was open.

After permission was granted, De Leon followed him and Ray through the door before Don could close it. He walked around the two uniforms and sat on one end of a leather sofa against one wall, slouching down like he was used to occupying that piece of furniture. Don started to ask him to allow him to speak to the chief in private, but he knew that would have been met with various arguments, from both the inspector and the chief, that, as the department’s inspector, he should be in on anything that came up. What it came right down to was that he was the chief’s pet and could do no wrong. If he wanted to sit in on something, he would do so, and with the chief’s blessing. So, Don gritted his teeth and smiled at De Leon who remained silent while he picked at a hangnail.

“Yes, Evans?” the chief said without looking up from the paper he had picked up to scan when Don approached the door. “What can I do for you?”

“It’s about the attempted break-in at the Anderson’s house. We found their dog in the old Vasov building. He’s dead...killed somehow.”

“Oh, that’s too bad. Gary, didn’t you say that case was closed?”

“Sure did, Chief. What little bit there is points to a college kid prank or wild animal intrusion. Insufficient evidence to justify further expenditures.”

Don shook his head and said, “But that’s crazy, Chief. There’s nothing to point to either college kids or a passing animal. And, now the dog has been located. It’s dead, but what killed it or how is not apparent. It’s covered by some kind of matting that I can’t identify, and it reeks something horrible. It’s that same smell that was noticed at the Anderson’s house. Jim McBee suggested taking it over to U. C. Davis for testing.”

A smirk spread across De Leon’s face. He said, “Testing? For what? You want to spend big bucks for an autopsy of a dog to explain why it’s covered in cobwebs and stinking a week after it died in a place like the Vasov dump? Hell, it’s been lying there soaking up the stink of the waterfront for a week, probably nested on by rats or skunks or God knows what. And this is summer, Don. Dead things puff up and stink in the summer. Remember?”

“This stink is different. You smelled it at the house.”

“And I explained to you then that it smells like something a couple of smart-ass college kids are likely to concoct in chemistry class.”

“But there’s no evidence of that.”

“There’s the smell of it at the window, and now on the body of the dog. I admit it’s a pretty awful thing to do to a dog, but it’s not like it can be traced to anyone, you know? If you come up with a couple of punks with that same smell, that could be evidence. The smell on the dog is a dead end. Let the Andersons bury the poor thing and let this case go, Don. I’m sure there’s lots of other things you can do to serve and protect our community.”

Don was furious at himself for letting De Leon suck him into arguing the case on his terms. Turning back to the chief, he said, “Chief, this case is not a dead end. There is something that can be done, something that may very well lead to other evidence. If the odd covering or the cause of that smell can be identified –.”

De Leon slammed both feet on the floor as he stood. “I told you this case is closed, Officer Evans. I am the Inspector for this department. Now, I did give this case much consideration, giving it more time than a patrol officer is able to devote between writing tickets and arresting drunks. I compared the variables and weighed the chances of anything worthwhile coming of it, and I assure you, I am fully capable of assessing if evidentiary leads are worth pursuing. And I have concluded that this case is closed.”

Turning, again, to the chief, Don ventured, “Chief?”

The chief looked back and forth between the three men in his office, even Ray who had remained silent. He shook his head and said, “Officer Evans, Inspector De Leon is correct. He is the Inspector, and, as such, is in the best position to decide if a case is viable.”

Don opened his mouth to push another argument. There were so many good, solid points to be made, points that no intelligent person could reasonably contest. But the way the Chief leaned back in his chair with his elbows on the armrests and the fingers of both hands laced together across his belly said the discussion of the matter was closed.

Back in the patrol car, Don just sat and gazed out the windshield.

Ray said, “Was it just me, or did the Inspector’s arguments really go in a circle?”

Don looked over at the new officer and gave a two-chuckle laughed. “I keep telling folks how sharp you are. That didn’t take you long to pick up at all.”

“Is the case really closed? Just like that? What happens if –?”

“Yeah – if. That’s too big of an if for me.” He started the car. “Like hell, it’s closed. I need to talk to Jim again.”

Five minutes later, they were back in Jim’s examination room, watching him administer puppy shots to a squirming beast that kept trying to roll over onto its back and bicycle all four legs. Finally, with Ray helping its eleven-year old owner hold it upright and reasonably still, the doctor accomplished his mission, issued advice on flea control to continuous nods of understanding and promises of compliance, and showed them out the door.

Jim closed the door and turned back to the room. “Well, I can see from the way you two’re grinding your teeth that all is not well. What’s up?”

Don shook his head and said, “Department won’t send Be-Be to Davis. Chief says since the case is closed, and with no better new evidence than a stinking, dead dog, he can’t justify the cost.”

“And, of course, the chief wasn’t influenced in any way by our idiot detective – oops, I mean inspector.”

“Ouch.”

“Hell, you’re not the only person in town that knows what an incompetent fool De Leon is?” To Ray he said, “I’m afraid Cedar City’s only hope is for him to land a job as town sheriff in some unsuspecting little burg that thinks a job-title of Inspector means he has a brain and knows how to use it.”

Ray responded with a nod and a chuckle. “A town so small it has nil crime. Yeah, that could work. Something like Mayberry.”

That almost got a chuckle out of Don. He said, “He’s sure got our chief mesmerized. The old man must have thought he was getting something really special for our little hick-town when he saw LAPD Academy on De Leon’s resume.”

“Yeah, we got something special, all right.” Jim led the others to the coffee bar. “You have to wonder, though, if he really did make it all the way through to graduation. So, now what? How can I help?”

Don paused for a moment before answering. “I’m off tomorrow. I’m going to take Be-Be over to Davis. Can you give me an idea where to go and who to talk to?”

“Sure, but are you planning on paying for it yourself? It’s likely to be pretty expensive.”

“I know, but it’s the only lead I’ve got, and I can’t just drop it. If it happens again, it could be the little girl that’s taken instead of the dog.”

“Hmm, I hear you.” Jim got a far-away look in his eyes for a moment, and then he held up his finger as though pointing to a light-bulb flashing on above his head. “Maybe there’s another way, though. I’ve told you about my old biology professor, Carl Sanders, haven’t I? He might be able to help. He’s retired, but still active. And he’s just over in Napa, a bit closer than Davis.”

“Yeah, you’ve mentioned him once or twice. But, I don’t know. Would he be able to do any tests? Does he have a lab available? I need more than just someone agreeing that Be-Be stinks.”

“I’d say so. He still shows up at UCD once in awhile, and their labs are state-of-the-art. When I said he’s active, I meant in his field of study, not golfing. He no longer teaches on a regular basis, just as an occasional guest lecturer, and he still collects and classifies. He’s always traveling somewhere around the world looking for something new and different. He’s got file cases full of all kinds of bugs and spiders, from home-grown to exotic.”

“I remember, now, you talking about him. But, bugs and spiders? Jim, I need someone who knows dogs.”

“Oh, he knows his way around mammals, too. He’s just spending his retirement on arthropods, his first love. But, hey, don’t knock bugs and spiders. That’s how I met Pam. She was a grad student working for Carl when I was getting my vet degree.”

“Well, I guess it sounds okay. But, I’ll still pay for whatever tests he has to run. I can’t expect him to absorb it.”

“Don’t start writing checks yet. Let me take Be-Be over to his place. I’m due to see him again, anyway. We try to get together once a month or so just to down a few beers and laugh at each other’s stories. If he’s home, that is. Now, let’s get Be-Be out of your trunk and into a body bag, and I’ll see if I can make room in my freezer. It might be a few days before I can get together with Carl.”