牧羊犬案 英文名著｜第3章

I felt the hair rising on the back of my neck. “Number One, I wasn’t asleep. Number Two, I never said anything about a so-called porkchop on the so-called ninth floor.”

“Eighth floor, Hankie.”

“Don’t try to put words into my mouth, cat. I know what I said.”

“I thought you didn’t say it.”

“I didn’t say it, and that’s my whole point. I didn’t say it because it was totally ridiculous. There is no porkchop and there is no eighth floor, but I know what you’re doing.”

“Oh really?”

“Yes.” I stuck my nose in his face. “You’re trying to send up a smoke screen of meaningless words to conceal the fact that you stuck your claws into my tail. Don’t try to deny it.”

“All right, Hankie, I won’t.”

“Huh? Well, I . . . I’m shocked, Pete. I don’t know what to say. I was sure you’d deny it and then try to draw me into an argument.”

He blinked his eyes and grinned. Why was he always grinning? It made me uneasy.

“Oh no, Hankie. I used to do things like that but then I learned my lesson.”

“Oh? What lesson are we talking about?”

He licked his left paw before speaking. I studied and memorized his every move, just in case this was another of his famous frauds.

“I learned that it’s almost impossible to fool the Head of Ranch Security.”

“Well! Imagine that. I can hardly believe my ears. In fact, I don’t believe my ears. Say it again.”

“All right, Hankie, whatever you wish. I’ve learned that I can’t fool you and that’s why I admit that I stuck my little claws into the end of your tail.”

I paced off to the east. My mind was trying to absorb this astonishing piece of news and it needed a moment to catch up.

“You’ve come a long way, Pete, and to be real honest about it, we never thought you’d change. Our profiles and projections showed you in the Normal Range of cats: sneaky, hateful, untrustworthy, treacherous, and, well, not real smart, if I may be so blunt.”

“Oh, go right ahead, Hankie. I realize that I’m only a cat.”

“That’s true, Pete, and you can’t help it that cats are . . . how can I say this?”

“Dumb?”

“Good word, Pete, great word. I wouldn’t have thought of putting it that way but, yes, ‘dumb’ sort of captures the overall . . .”

“Condition, Hankie?”

“Yes, right, exactly. The overall condition of catness.” I marched over and gave the little guy a pat on the back. “Hey Pete, I feel we’ve reached a breakthrough situation. I mean, all these years we’ve been enemies and now, all at once, you admit that you’re stupid and . . . hey, we’ve got nothing left to fight about!”

He purred and continued to grin, only now it didn’t bother me because I realized that he was being sincere.

“At last we’re at peace, Hankie.”

“Right, and it wasn’t so bad was it? Did you ever dream that making peace would be so easy?”

“Never did, Hankie. Oh, is Beulah coming?”

I glared at him. “What did you just say?”

“I wondered if Beulah would be coming with Plato.”

I cut my eyes from side to side. “I hadn’t thought of that, Pete, so how did you happen to think of it?”

“Oh, I heard the cowboys say that Plato was coming. Every time Plato comes around, Beulah is with him. I just wondered.”

I marched a few steps away. My mind was racing. “Go on, Pete. I have a feeling that this is leading somewhere.”

“Well . . . if she comes to watch her bird dog boyfriend perform, I thought it might be nice if you . . .”

He was staring at me with those weird fullmoon eyes. And grinning. And flicking the end of his tail back and forth.

“If I what? What kind of sneaky tricks are running through that sneaky little mind of yours?”

“Oh, you might not be interested, Hankie.”

I stomped over to him and stuck my nose in his face. “I’m not interested, Kitty, but part of my job on this ranch is to stay one step ahead of the cats. Out with it.”

He drew circles in the dust with his paw. “Well, if I were you, I’d want to impress Miss Beulah.”

“Ha! Me impress Miss Beulah? Hey Pete, for your information, she’s crazy about me and . . . impress her in what way? I mean, just for laughs I want to hear the rest of this.”

He blinked his eyelids and grinned. “Well, Hankie, you can show her and everyone else that you can hunt birds as well as Plato. I know a way.”

I almost took the bait. I almost asked him to tell me more, but caught myself just in time. Chuckling, I turned and walked a few steps away.

“Ha, ha, ha. Pete, you’re the champ when it comes to scheming, but there are a couple of holes in your ointment. Number one, Beulah probably won’t come. Number two, if she does come, I plan to be very busy with my routine work. Number three, Plato is just a minor irritation to me. Number four, I don’t need to impress him or Beulah or anyone else. That would be childish and silly.

“Number five, I have no interest in birds. Zero. Zilch. Birds are totally boring. And number six, this conversation is over. Now run along and catch a mouse.”

He started to leave in that sliding gliding walk of his. “Whatever you think, Hankie, but if you change your mind, I’ll be around.”

“Fine. Great. I won’t change my mind. Thanks for trying to be helpful, but I don’t need any help. Good-bye.”

He left. Peace at last. What a crazy idea, me trying to impress Beulah with . . . actually, it wasn’t such a . . . but on the other hand, I didn’t need to impress her—her or anyone else.

Hey, I was comfortable just being who I was: Head of Ranch Security, owner of a huge ranch and many cattle; a heroic guard dog, a fairly handsome feller; winner of countless awards and also unusually handsome and charming.

Wasn’t that enough? Was there more? I didn’t think so. If Beulah couldn’t admire who I was, the real Hank the Cowdog; if she needed circus acts and magic tricks, then . . .

I found my eyes following the cat. He was slinking along with his tail stuck straight up in the air, rubbing on every tree and past he posted. Post he passed. And every now and then, I noticed that he was tossing lazy glances back at me.

Hmmmm. Was it possible that he knew something that . . . no. Simple logic told me that anything known to a cat would be known first to a dog. Therefore . . .

Therefore the little sneak certainly looked as though he knew something important, and the best cure for that false impression was for me to stop looking at him.

Some cats need more ignoring than others. Pete requires a lot. And so it was that I embarked on a new policy of Total Ignoration of the Cat, which turned out to be pretty easy because at that very moment my ears picked up the tiny microwaves of an Incoming Vehicle.

The big question that loomed before me then was, AUTHORIZED VEHICLE OR TRESPASSER?

I did a Direct Downlink Feed to Data Control and got a flashing message on the huge screen of my mind: TRESPASSER!

Well, you know me. There are several things I don’t allow on my ranch and one of them is trespassers and unauthorized intrusions.

Okay, that’s two things but they mean about the same thing and neither one was allowed. That pickup had no business on our outfit and it was fixing to get the whole nine yards of barking and threatening gestures.

“Drover, we have a very important mission ahead of us and we’re fixing to go to Red Alert. Are you ready for some combat?”

He leaped to his feet and began staggering around in circles. His eyes were crooked, his ears were crooked. It appeared to me that his mind might also be crooked.

“Is it my turn to bat?”

“I didn’t say anything about batting, Drover, and Life is not a mere game.”

“Oh my gosh, then who’s on first?”

“You’re still asleep, son. Look at me and tell me how many fingers I’m holding up.”

He turned his eyes in my direction. They were still crooked. “Thirty-seven?”

“Wrong. Dogs don’t have fingers. Therefore, the correct answer is zero.”

“Zero! No wonder I’m so cold. Water freezes at thirty-two.”

“Yes, but you said thirty-seven, so you’re wrong again.”

He blinked his eyes and looked around. “Where am I? What are we talking about?”

“We’re in our bedroom under the gas tanks. You’ve been sleeping your life away and I just asked if you were ready for some combat.”

“Not really.”

“What?”

“I said, ‘Combat. Oh boy.’”

“That’s the spirit. We’ll go to Full Flames on all engines and regroup in front of the house, and don’t get lost.”

“Well, I hope this old leg . . .”

I didn’t wait around to hear about his “old leg.” I had heard it all before, not once or twice but ten thousand times, enough that I was beginning to suspect that he was a hypocardiac.

Anyways, I didn’t have time to hang around and listen to him whine about his leg. I went to Full Flames and roared around the south side of the house, and sure enough, looming up before my very eyes was an unauthorized vehicle.