Carmen Dog (3 page)

It is unlikely that he would find her, anyway, since she is soon to be netted by the dog catcher; for, as she flies from the scene of her humiliation, she runs unthinking down the middle of the street, hardly aware of the honking. She is booked for chasing cars, though of course that was the farthest thing from her thoughts, but her protests are in vain. The pound is not exactly the place for a trial by a jury of one's peers, so she is summarily found guilty as charged. And as usual, she does have that guilty look. If only she had twenty-five dollars instead of two seventy-five in quarters (laundry money she hadn't even meant to take, but found in her pocket after she'd left—she would never take money on purpose, even when running away and even when it might have helped to feed the baby). Twenty-five dollars and she could buy her way out and no problem.

Worse yet, they know who she is and will notify her master first thing in the morning, for Pooch is still wearing her collar with the license on it. Being a law-abiding creature, she had not even considered taking it off.

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Music ... carries the soul captive across the rough and stormy sea of life, and stands beyond the vale of time to welcome with angelic voice the wandering soul.

—H. Sherwood Vining

The cages are quite cramped for those creatures who are becoming approximately the size and shape of humans, and of course none of the cages is of a size to hold those tending toward bear or elk. Pooch is squeezed into one on the second tier. At first they don't know quite what to do with the baby. They are thinking that perhaps it can be put up for adoption later if no one calls for it within the week. Young things are always so cute they're hardly ever hard to get rid of. One of the men there has it in his head that Pooch, herself, may be valuable for quite different reasons. He is thinking seriously of stealing her and taking her home with him. He thinks that he might make quite a bit of money in one of two possible ways: her breeding is obvious, and so is her virginity. At any rate, for the time being, she goes into the cage and they decide to put the baby in with her. That way it won't be making a fuss. So the two are left with a bowl of water, a rather dirty bowl in fact, and a dirty bowl of kibbles. Pooch is used to such simple fare as this, having eaten little else all her life, though now and then she's had a tidbit from the table, which frequently she wished she hadn't had. It only whetted her appetite for things she didn't dare allow herself. She is worrying about the baby, though, and what about its vitamins! Now it refuses all but a few mouthfuls of food. Yet it seems the little thing is all screamed out and, thank goodness, soon falls asleep again now that things have calmed down a little. Pooch is too despondent to do more than curl up, hugging it to her budding breasts (which are all coming in shapely, firm, and perky. The best kind).

Above her on the third tier is a brilliantly dressed creature, black, red, and yellow—or rather, what Pooch suspects are those colors, for red she cannot see at all (she has been warned about just such stripes as these)—and who, Pooch soon learns, calls herself Phillip and was picked up for hitchhiking on Route 95. Pooch got a good look at her while being helped up to her own cage. Phillip had looked back at Pooch with a rather scary, hypnotic stare and an ironic grin, tongue between her teeth. Of course, being underneath, Pooch can't see her now. She is trying to remember: “black to yellow, dangerous fellow” or is it “safe fellow” or “black to red, you're dead” or what? And which stripe
is
the red one? But considering that Phillip probably was at one time a pet Pooch thinks she's most likely perfectly safe. But what a gorgeous creature! What sinuous, serpentine grace!

As soon as they are locked in for the night, the bare bulbs blazing overhead, the whole place comes alive with the talk and attempts at talk on several levels of expertise. Phillip, it turns out, has been here longer than anyone else—almost a whole month. “There'th a reathon for that,” she says, lisping seductively. Her tongue, of its own accord it seems, extends farther than is necessary to form the
ess
es. “And you can get anything you want, ath I do. Better food, drink, thigaretteths. You name it, I get it. Not everybody can, but you can, Pooch. You have ... well, nearly the figure for it and you carry yourself well, though you shouldn't look so shy. Men take you for how you present yourself, you know. You have to learn to use your body."

"Yes, but, but, but,” Pooch answers, stuttering a bit more than usual because of her anxiety, “but whatever it is you do, it hasn't brought you any closer to escaping from this dreadful place."

"But will,” Phillip says. “Will too, one of thethe dayth. Anyway, know what's going to happen tomorrow? You may have no choice but to do ath I do or elth."

"What?"

"All thothe who have been here over one week—not counting mythelf; that ith—all but me..."

At this moment a roar of rage from beneath them.

"You're a brute, Isabel,” Phillip calls down, “and don't know it."

"Not so. I love. I always love, more and more."

Pooch wonders whether Isabel is referring to life in general that she loves, or to creatures in general, or to some particular creature. When Pooch had been brought in she had had only the slightest glimpse of sleek black hair, beady eyes, and sharp teeth from the cage below.

"At any rate,” Phillip continues, “love or not, Isabel, you will be taken off to that far room there along with theveral otherth. All female, by the way. If you'll notice, Pooch, the pound ith no longer for any but uth femaleth. And you'll be killed, Ithabel, and then dragged out through here in front of all of uth and out to a truck—I've theen it—then they will take you to be burned or uthed for fertilizer or maybe even made into dog food ... kibbles, for all anyone knowth. All of you, unleth you do ath I do, or can do ath I do, though not all can."

And now groans, moans, and squawks from all over the room and a kind of yawn of rage from Isabel.

"It's political,” someone shouts, “or cost-effective, and something must be done about it."

"Is this what they call a democracy?” Another voice.

"This never was
your
democracy anyway.” Scornfully.

Pooch nearly throws up, thinking of the kibbles she has just gobbled so greedily. She decides she will not eat any sort of meat ever again and that she will especially not eat kibbles, whatever they may say is in them. She makes a silent vow to be a vegetarian from now on even if she has to starve to do it. Better that than even the remote possibility of eating one's friends and fellow sufferers. At the same time, she vows not to be lured into the kind of behavior Phillip is talking about, however much it may seem like something Carmen would do in a similar situation, and however much it may be of benefit to herself. She realizes that, though she would like to play at being Carmen and sing and dance the Carmen role, she herself is of quite the opposite nature. For instance, she is thinking that if she had had Don José in love with her, she, unlike Carmen, would have stuck with him in the first place and then the opera would have come out entirely differently and, Pooch realizes with a sudden little shiver of doubt, probably not even have begun at all ... not got off the ground, or certainly have bogged down in the middle.

Yes, her kind of love is probably too true and steadfast for most people to put up with for very long, either in life or in art. Perhaps it scares them or makes them wonder about their own obligations, and of course it is quite out of fashion. Pooch knows that. Well, she thinks, I shall love my kind of love anyway, doggedly, for I must certainly do the best I can with my own nature and if my nature is to love too well or from afar or to be grateful for crumbs—as the psychotherapist put it, though at the time I thought he meant those scraps under the table, and I was grateful for them—well, so be it. But some day I will find a love that mirrors my own. Pooch resolves then and there to save herself until her true love comes along. For a few moments she falls into a deep and satisfying daydream common to female creatures of her age and experience, or rather inexperience, but soon these thoughts bring her back to thoughts of her beloved master. Certainly she will not be here long, only a few days, if that, because her master is to be notified in the morning. It's hard for Pooch to get the idea out of her head that when he comes, everything will be all right. She has to keep reminding herself that this is not the case at all, that it is she who ran off and when he comes for her, here she will be with the bitten baby, as though having run off with the evidence. But if she apologizes profusely enough and promises to work much harder, to get up very early, eat less, and not take even one little moment for herself or even one little penny ever again for such frivolities as flowers (in spite of what the psychologist said), perhaps in this way she can make it up to him or do penance of some sort. “Anything,” she will say to him, “I'll do absolutely anything: lick your feet, walk one step behind your left heel ... just let me stay and serve you and let me see the baby now and then if only from a distance and, should the mistress bite me, all the better, then.” She hopes that after she says all this and makes the promises, he'll see that she's worth keeping—a thought not uncommon to many creatures of her sex.

This is Pooch's first night away from home (though not away from the family, for she has often been left alone in the house for several days with nothing but a huge bowl of water—plus, of course, the toilet bowl if worse came to worst—and enough dry food for only one day in case she might overeat. No matter how much she protested that she had outgrown such excesses, they never did trust her not to make herself sick by eating the week's rations the moment they were out of sight. (Actually, she tried to make that one meal last as long as possible.) Those times were hard, but Pooch guarded the house very effectively while they were gone in spite of being half starved and feeling rather weak. And anyway, she could sing all day long if she wanted to, and did, and could play the music she preferred and listen to the Saturday afternoon opera.

Oh, the sweet smells of home, Pooch is thinking. Oh, the sweet, sweet, sweet smells of home! The socks, the running shoes, the familiar crotches. And the states of mind, all so well known. Predictable emotions coming around in their predictable cycles. No rages not raged before under similar circumstances. But now, here, nothing but the unknown. Even the master. What will he do? Probably take the baby away and leave her here to be kibbled at the end of the week or to meet a fate like Phillip's, whether she consents to it or not (for she has seen that look in the eyes of the keepers; and the way she had been helped up to her cage was, to say the least, rather lewd). To distract herself from her depression, she tries to think up a Japanese poem of her own and finally, after some effort, comes to this:

—

Willow by the stream leaves fa two by two two by two

Oh, will I ever love such a love?

—

She is glad she gave herself formal artistic limitations; otherwise, she is sure she would have put too much sentimentality into it for any real resonances, especially in her present state of mind.

Just then more yawn sounds from the cage below.

"Isabel's having one of her angry fith again,” says Phillip; but to Pooch, who has always read between the emotional lines, so to speak, the sounds, while distinctly roars, seem more like cries for help.

"Shut up,” says Phillip, “and let uth get some rest."

"Rest for what?” This from the top tier across the room. “Does one rest up to be in good shape to die in the morning?"

"Me. Was one of. Beautiful people,” Isabel is saying.

"Look at yourthelf.” Phillip.

"Had a waist. You'd not believe. Had a coat. Of wolverine."

"Now you have a permanent coat of wolverine. Nice and shiny, too."

"My heels, three inches high. Hairdresser said, never so fine a head of hair."

"Isabel, you committed dreadful crimeth and you know it. I wath here when you were booked.” Phillip. “And I thaw your whole methy attempt to ethcape."

"If I hurt. Never meant to. Not before either. With all my wealth and beauty. Lots of times all I wanted was to die."

"Well, now you'll get your wish."

Incomprehensible animal sounds from below and, “Let her be,” from across the room. “We all feel the way she does. All except you."

"I want to go on loving. I mean live. All the better now. I wanted to die. Not really, though. Now live on. Be. Be! I only just realize. One more change is all. One change! Once chance at it. I mean chance."

Pooch, as is frequently the case, is in the mood for a sacrifice. And surely her master will understand the gesture and appreciate her kindness ... her humanity. Most of all that. Understand, at last, what she's capable of and love her all the more for it. And besides, would any creature who makes such a gesture as she is about to make ever have been able to bring herself to bite anyone, least of all a baby? Of course not!

Pooch takes off her collar and dangles it down from the bottom of her cage door so that it hangs in front of Isabel's cage. “Can you reach this?” She feels long, sharp fingernails scratch her hand and she can see, as they reach up, the half-worn-off red enamel.

"Hmm. Hmm.” Then a triumphant, “Got it!"

"I'd suggest,” Pooch says, “Th, th, th, that if he doesn't know what changes are which. I mean if he thinks you're me, stick with him for a while, but if he suspects something right away, then I suppose there's nothing for it but to tell the truth."

"Can do it,” Isabel snaps back at her. “Let me out and I can do it. Always have. Will."

"Be ... be ... be kind to him. Promise me that. Remember, he's saving your life at least as much as I am."

"Will do."

"Promise."

"Did."

"You'll find him strict and a little bit domineering sometimes, and other times rather distanced—in fact off-putting until you get to know him. Stern, but
usually
fair. I must admit the mistress is difficult, but things are hard for her right now and the psychologist says be patient, so you must. You'll sleep on the doormat."