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But, hell, it was a living, and not a bad one. Another plus was after several months of trying, he was able to lick his balls.

At night, when everyone was in their bunks and there were no fires, Spot would read from
Call of the Wild
,
White Fang
,
Dog Digest
, or such, or lie on his back with all four feet in the air, trying to look cute.

He loved it when the firemen came in and caught him that way and
ooohheeed
and
ahhhhhed
and scratched his belly or patted his head.

This went on for just short of nine years. Then, one day, while he was lying on the couch, licking his ass—something he cultivated after three years on the job—the Fire Chief and a guy in a dog suit came in.

"This is your replacement, Spot," the Chief said.

"What?"

"Well, it has been nine years."

"You didn't tell me. Has it been? You're sure? Aren't you supposed to warn me? Rex knew his time was up. Remember?"

"Not exactly. But if you say so. Spot, meet Hal."

"Hal? What kind of dog's name is that? Hal?"

But it was no use. By the end of the day he had his personal dog biscuits, pinups from
Dog Digest
, and his worm-away medicine packed. There was also a spray can the firemen used to mist on his poop to keep him from eating it. The can of spray didn't really belong to him, but he took it anyway.

H
e picked up his old clothes, went into the changing room. He hadn't
worn
anything but the fire dog suit in years, and it felt odd to try his old clothes on. He could hardly remember ever wearing them. He found they were a bit moth-eaten, and he had gotten a little too plump for them. The shoes fit, but he couldn't tolerate them.

He kept the dog suit on.

He caught the bus and went home.

"What? You lost your job?" his wife said.

"I didn't lose anything. They retired me."

"You're not the fire dog?"

"No. Hal is the fire dog."

"I can't believe it. I give you nine great years—"

"We've been married eleven."

"I only count the dog years. Those were the good ones, you know."

"Well, I don't have to quit being a dog. Hell, I am a dog."

"You're not the fire dog. You've lost your position, Spot. Oh, I can't even stand to think about it. Outside. Go on.
Git
. Outside." Spot went.

After a while he scratched on the door, but his wife didn't let him in. He went around back and tried there. That didn't work either. He looked in the windows, but couldn't see her.

He laid down in the yard.

That night it rained, and he slept under the car, awakened just in time to keep his wife from backing over him on her way to work.

That afternoon he waited, but his wife did not return at the usual time. Five o'clock was when he came home from the fire house, and she was always waiting, and he had a feeling it was at least five o'clock, and finally the sun went down and he knew it was late.

Still, no wife.

Finally, he saw headlights and a car pulled into the drive. Sheila got out. He ran to meet her. To show he was interested, he hunched her leg.

She kicked him loose. He noticed she was holding a leash. Out of the car came Hal.

"Look who I got. A real dog."

Spot was dumbfounded.

"I met him today at the fire house, and well, we hit it off."

"You went by the fire house?"

"Of course."

"What about me?" Spot asked.

"Well, Spot, you are a little old. Sometimes, things change. New blood is necessary."

"Me and Hal, we're going to share the house?"

"I didn't say that."

She took Hal inside. Just before they closed the door, Hal slipped a paw behind Sheila's back and shot Spot the finger.

When they were inside, Spot scratched on the door in a halfhearted way. No soap.

Next morning Sheila hustled him out of the shrubbery by calling his name. She didn't have Hal with her.

Great! She had missed him. He bounded out, his tongue dangling like a wet sock. "Come here, Spot."

He went. That's what dogs did. When the master called, you went to them. He was still her dog. Yes
sirree
, Bob.

"Come on, boy." She hustled him into the car.

As he climbed inside on the back seat and she shut the door, he saw Hal come out of the house stretching. He looked pretty happy.

He walked over to the car and slapped Sheila on the butt.

"See you later, baby."

"You bet, you dog you."

Hal walked down the street to the bus stop. Spot watched him by turning first to the back glass, then rushing over to the side view glass.

Sheila got in the car.

"Where are we going?" Spot asked.

"It's a surprise," she said.

"Can you roll down the window back here a bit?"

"Sure."

Spot stuck his head out as they drove along, his ears flapping, his tongue hanging.

They drove down a side street, turned and tooled up an alley.

Spot thought he recognized the place.

Why yes, the vet. They had come from another direction and he hadn't spotted it right off, but that's where he was.

He unhooked the little tag that dangled from his collar.

Checked the dates of his last shots.

No. Nothing was overdue.

They stopped and Sheila smiled. She opened the back door and took hold of the leash. "Come on, Spot."

Spot climbed out of the car, though carefully. He wasn't as spry as he once was.

Two men were at the back door. One of them was the doctor. The other an assistant.

"Here's Spot," she said.

"He looks pretty good," said the doctor.

"I know. But . . . Well, he's old and has his problems. And I have too many dogs."

She left him there.

The vet checked him over and called the animal shelter. "There's nothing really wrong with him," he told the attendant that came for him. "He's just old, and well, the woman doesn't want to care for him. He'd be great with children."

"You know how it is, Doc," said the attendant. "Dogs all over the place."

Later, at the animal shelter he stood on the cold concrete and smelled the other dogs. He barked at the cats he could smell. Fact was, he found himself barking anytime anyone came into the corridor of pens.

Sometimes men and woman and children came and looked at him.

None of them chose him. The device in his tail didn't work right, so he couldn't wag as ferociously as he liked. His ears were pretty droopy and his jowls hung way too low.

"He looks like his spots are fading," said one woman whose little girl had stuck her fingers through the grating so Spot could lick her hand.

"His breath stinks," she said.

As the days went by, Spot tried to look perky all the time. Hoping for adoption.

But one day, they came for him, wearing white coats and grim faces, brandishing a leash and a muzzle and a hypodermic needle.

I'
ve been fascinated by the West since I was a kid. First the Western movies, then Western legend and history, and finally Western fiction.

As I studied the West, I was amazed at how much of a contribution was made by blacks. This was never part of the movies or books I read, and they were seldom mentioned in the history books. The more I researched, the more I realized that much of the Indian fighting was left to black regiments, and that it was black soldiers that actually took San Juan Hill for Teddy Roosevelt. He acknowledged this early on, but by election time, the blacks' contribution to this event suddenly became less important.

Anyway, I've always thought it was a shame that this part of our history has had so little attention. It has had some, and that attention is growing. But when I wrote this, nothing much had been said.

There's very little to the story. I think that maybe I was just getting something off my chest.

I
got off the plane at Atlanta and caught the shuttle to what I thought was my hotel. But there was some kind of mix-up, and it wasn't my hotel at all. They told me I could go out to the curb and catch this other shuttle and it would take me over to another hotel in their chain, and that it was a short walk from there to where I wanted to go. I thought that was okay, considering I had gotten on the wrong shuttle in the first place.

I sat outside the hotel on a bench and waited for the shuttle. It was October and kind of cool, but not really uncomfortable. The air felt damp.

I had a Western paperback and I got it out of my coat pocket and read a few pages. From time to time I looked up for the shuttle, then at my watch, then back at the paperback. It wasn't a very good Western.

While I was sitting there a little black boy on skates with an empty toy pistol scabbard strapped around his waist went by. He looked at me. His head was practically shaved and his snap-button cowboy shirt was ripped in front. I guess he was about eleven.

I looked back at my book and started reading, then I heard him skate over in front of me. I looked up and saw that he was looking at the picture on the front of the paperback.

"That a cowboy book?" he said.

I told him it was.

"It any good?"

"I don't care much for it. It's a little too much like the last three or four I read."

"I like cowboy books and movies but they don't get some things right."

"I like them too."

"I'm a cowboy," he said, and his tone was a trifle defiant.

"You are?"

"You was thinking niggers can't be cowboys."

"I wasn't thinking that. Don't call yourself that."

"Nigger? It's okay if I'm doing it. I wouldn't want you to say that."

"I wouldn't."

"Anyone says that they got me to fight."

"I don't want to fight. Where's your pistol?"

He didn't answer that. "A black boy can be a cowboy, you know."

"I'm sure of it."

"They weren't all cooks."

"Course not."

"That's way the movies and books got it. There any black cowboys in that book?"

"Not so far."

"There gonna be?"

"I don't know," I said. But I did know. I'd read a lot of cowboy books.

"White boys at school said there weren't any black cowboys. They said no nigger cowboys. They said we couldn't fight Indians and stuff."

"Don't listen to them."

"I'm not going to. I went over to the playground at the school and they took my pistol. There was three of them."

It came clear to me then. His shirt being ripped and the gun missing.

"I'm sorry. That wasn't nice."

"They said a nigger didn't need no cowboy gun. Said I needed me a frying pan or a broom. I used to ride the range and rope steers and stuff. They don't know nothing."

"Is that all you did on the range, rope steers?"

"I did all kinds of things. I did everything cowboys do."

"Was it hard work?"

"It was so hard you wouldn't believe it. I did all kinds of things. Cowboys don't call one another nigger."

"Do your mom and dad work on the range with you?"

"No, my mama has a job. She does cleanup work. My daddy he got killed in Vietnam. He got some medals and stuff. He wasn't a cowboy like me."

I looked up and saw the shuttle. I picked up my suitcase and stood.

"I got to go now," I said. "I hope you get your gun back. Lot of good cowboys lose fights from time to time."

"There was three of them."

"There you are. Adios." As an afterthought I gave him the Western book.

"It hasn't got any black cowboys in it I bet," he said, and gave it back to me. "I want one with black cowboys in it. I'm not reading any more of 'em unless they got black cowboys in them."

"I'm sure there are some," I said.

"There ought to be."

I got on the shuttle and it carried me to the other hotel. I got off and walked to where I was supposed to be, and on the way over there I put the book in one of those wire trash baskets that line the streets.

I
did this one for Roger
Zelazny
. It was the last anthology he edited.

It was a martial arts anthology, and I was proud to be in it. I love the martial arts and have been a student of the arts all my life. To know about this, check out
www.joerlansdale.com
, and click on THE MASK OF SHEN CHUAN.