Read Online Cormac: The Tale of a Dog Gone Missing by Sonny Brewer - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Sonny Brewer
Ads: Link
help. I’m grateful, Pierre. I don’t know what I would have done.”
“God, stop fawning,” Pierre said. “Just be sure I get a part in the movie. Will there be a mud wrestling scene?”
I told him that would be small payment, and I’d write the scene with him in mind. And with a handshake for good measure and to seal the deal, I called Cormac and we headed back to the bookstore. Cormac walked with his head high and his tail sweeping side to side. With a spunky air to his carriage and a spring in my own step, I wasn’t sure either of us could even finish out a week behind the counter.
Diana agreed this was a good plan. She and the boys and I celebrated that night with supper at Benny’s Pizza Shop. It took some talking to get John Luke and Dylan to understand why with me at home each day they couldn’t give up going to school. They became more agreeable when I promised to pick them up early on some days and join them at school for lunch now and again.
“You can go on my field trips,” said John Luke.
“Will you bring the cookies to the birthday parties?” Dylan asked.
“Yep,” I said to them both. I’ll even try my hand at writing a novel, I thought.
The morning of our first day into the new routine, Cormac waited for me at the door, ready to go to the bookstore. “Not today, Mickins,” I said. I went back to the kitchen for another cup of coffee, instead of out the door to the Jeep and town. Cormac stood in the foyer tossing looks at me over his shoulder. He turned to stare at the door, his pose reminding me of the hunting dog he really was. He could have been waiting among the cattails on the shore of an icy lake, ready to jump in to retrieve some duck I’d just shot. But I’m not a shooter, and he’s not a retriever of more than the occasional tennis ball or Frisbee.
He could, however, now be something of a farm dog, romping and playing all day instead of hanging out with me inside a bookstore. He could chase squirrels, bother the cat, and cut up with the next-door dog, Bailey, also a Golden Retriever but almost completely white. Our two-acre place was only six minutes out of town proper and still within the city limits, but with not many houses, almost no streetlights, it felt like another world. Cormac, like Hank the Cow Dog of the children’s books, was placed in charge of “ranch” security.
In his new role, the tiny part of our backyard that had been enclosed by the fence seemed unfair limitation on such important responsibility. I’d take down the chain-link fence that Diana never liked anyway because it was “so ugly” and have an electronic fence installed. With me working at my desk in the study, the Mick could rule the world of squirrels and birds. And with the new fence buzzing away, I’d not worry that he’d wander off.
The man on the phone told me the “fence” would amount to a thin wire buried a few inches deep in the soil. The wire was not expensive, so I’d have the entire two acres circumscribed. With the two ends of the wire connected to a transmitter, and a collar that had a built-in receiver to pick up the wire’s frequency pulse, Cormac would get a mild shock if he tried to cross where the wire was buried. But not before sounding a warning beep so that Cormac could engage his superior intelligence and stay away from the ouch place.
Until then, he was certain that he was supposed to be inside with me. And not only with me inside the house, but that he should take every step I took. Almost literally. If I got up from my desk to get another cup of coffee, he came along. If I walked to a window to enjoy the view of the big dogwood tree just down the hill, he’d have his own look-see.
Three years later, Cormac still does this, follows me all over the house, though I think his clinging to me nowadays is in large measure a consequence of his nightmarish adventure, like the way he sinks flat on the floor when I start packing for travel. Sometimes when I move from
“God, stop fawning,” Pierre said. “Just be sure I get a part in the movie. Will there be a mud wrestling scene?”
I told him that would be small payment, and I’d write the scene with him in mind. And with a handshake for good measure and to seal the deal, I called Cormac and we headed back to the bookstore. Cormac walked with his head high and his tail sweeping side to side. With a spunky air to his carriage and a spring in my own step, I wasn’t sure either of us could even finish out a week behind the counter.
Diana agreed this was a good plan. She and the boys and I celebrated that night with supper at Benny’s Pizza Shop. It took some talking to get John Luke and Dylan to understand why with me at home each day they couldn’t give up going to school. They became more agreeable when I promised to pick them up early on some days and join them at school for lunch now and again.
“You can go on my field trips,” said John Luke.
“Will you bring the cookies to the birthday parties?” Dylan asked.
“Yep,” I said to them both. I’ll even try my hand at writing a novel, I thought.
The morning of our first day into the new routine, Cormac waited for me at the door, ready to go to the bookstore. “Not today, Mickins,” I said. I went back to the kitchen for another cup of coffee, instead of out the door to the Jeep and town. Cormac stood in the foyer tossing looks at me over his shoulder. He turned to stare at the door, his pose reminding me of the hunting dog he really was. He could have been waiting among the cattails on the shore of an icy lake, ready to jump in to retrieve some duck I’d just shot. But I’m not a shooter, and he’s not a retriever of more than the occasional tennis ball or Frisbee.
He could, however, now be something of a farm dog, romping and playing all day instead of hanging out with me inside a bookstore. He could chase squirrels, bother the cat, and cut up with the next-door dog, Bailey, also a Golden Retriever but almost completely white. Our two-acre place was only six minutes out of town proper and still within the city limits, but with not many houses, almost no streetlights, it felt like another world. Cormac, like Hank the Cow Dog of the children’s books, was placed in charge of “ranch” security.
In his new role, the tiny part of our backyard that had been enclosed by the fence seemed unfair limitation on such important responsibility. I’d take down the chain-link fence that Diana never liked anyway because it was “so ugly” and have an electronic fence installed. With me working at my desk in the study, the Mick could rule the world of squirrels and birds. And with the new fence buzzing away, I’d not worry that he’d wander off.
The man on the phone told me the “fence” would amount to a thin wire buried a few inches deep in the soil. The wire was not expensive, so I’d have the entire two acres circumscribed. With the two ends of the wire connected to a transmitter, and a collar that had a built-in receiver to pick up the wire’s frequency pulse, Cormac would get a mild shock if he tried to cross where the wire was buried. But not before sounding a warning beep so that Cormac could engage his superior intelligence and stay away from the ouch place.
Until then, he was certain that he was supposed to be inside with me. And not only with me inside the house, but that he should take every step I took. Almost literally. If I got up from my desk to get another cup of coffee, he came along. If I walked to a window to enjoy the view of the big dogwood tree just down the hill, he’d have his own look-see.
Three years later, Cormac still does this, follows me all over the house, though I think his clinging to me nowadays is in large measure a consequence of his nightmarish adventure, like the way he sinks flat on the floor when I start packing for travel. Sometimes when I move from
Similar Books
