Read Online Dogs by Nancy Kress - Free Book Online Page A

“adjust.” Whatever that meant. Tyler was a pretty place, and so peaceful after D.C. No traffic on her side street, no people crowding her, nothing moving anywhere at all, which now that she thought about it seemed a bit odd—
    A police car rounded the corner and the patrolman rolled down his window, his face exhausted and incredulous. “Ma’am—what are you doing?”
    â€œI’m walking my dog,” Tessa said. At the Bureau she’d joined in all the usual jokes about inept locals, the run-of-the-mill assumption that federal agents were superior to small-town cops. She hadn’t really believed it. Some locals were good, some weren’t—just like agents. Still, for this guy to ask such an obvious question—
    He said, “Return home immediately with that animal, ma’am, and keep it inside. The mayor has issued an off-the-streets order for all dogs, effective immediately. I guess you didn’t hear about it.”
    â€œAn off-the-streets order? Why?”
    He stared at her, and Tessa realized what he saw: a person so out-of-it, so friendless, that no one had called her to tell her whatever this was about. She said in her most professional voice, “I just moved here from D.C., officer. Please tell me what’s happened.”
    â€œSome kind of disease turning dogs vicious. The CDC is here. Get inside now."
    Tessa saw that was all she was going to get from him. She walked the half-block home; he didn’t move until she’d closed her front door. Tessa turned on CNN, sat on her meditation mat, and watched for ten minutes, Minette on her lap.
    Nothing. But hadn’t the cable guy mentioned a local station.... She fiddled with the remote until she found it.
    â€œâ€”since this morning. This is Tyler Community Hospital,” said a carefully made-up blonde in an unbuttoned parka, a large building behind her, “where the worst of the dog bite victims are being treated. Ten people have already died, seven of them children. Four more are in critical condition. Law enforcement authorities admit to being stymied. Specialists from the CDC in Atlanta, KJV has just learned, have now arrived in Tyler. Stay with us as we follow this breaking story. Meanwhile, the Truman High School Scorpions last night edged out the—”
    Tessa stared at the television. A plague among dogs? Dogs?
    She made a move toward the phone, then stopped. She was no longer an FBI agent. She no longer had access, or rights, to breaking knowledge about threats to the public welfare. She had made that choice.
    Bag that. This was her town, as of three weeks ago. And she didn’t need the Bureau to find out what was going on in it. Her coat was still on; she closed and locked the window, grabbed her keys and gun.
    Minette, quiet now, watched sadly as Tessa left.

» 14
    Ed Dormund peered out the kitchen window. The Samoyeds weren’t visible anywhere in the fenced yard. They’d gone either into their dog house or around to the west side of the house, which had only one small window set into the wall of what Cora called her “crafts room.” Ed didn’t know what she actually did in there, and he didn’t care. But he cared where the dogs had gotten to.
    Cora sat slumped over coffee at the dirty kitchen table. “Stop pacing, you’re making me sick.”
    â€œThat hangover is making you sick.”
    â€œLike you should talk. You drink more than I do. And if you ever hit me again I’ll—”
    â€œYou’ll do what?” Ed was barely listening; this was old ground. Where the hell were the dogs?
    The phone rang and Cora answered. “Yeah?… Oh, hi.” She listened, laughed shortly, and said, “Yeah, right, whatever.”
    â€œWho was that?” Ed finally said when it was clear she wasn’t going to tell him, just to make him ask.
    â€œOld Man Lassiter next door.”
    â€œWhat’d he want?”
    Cora