Tango: The Tale of an Island Dog (7 page)

Just as Tango was about to cross Water Street, a strange, scratchy voice startled him: “Where are you going?”

Tango cringed, smelling for clues.

“Yes, you, little dog.”

From under the branches of a weeping willow tree emerged a skinny, doglike animal with black ears and amber eyes. In the murky light, the halo of thick fur around the animal’s face echoed the eerie beauty of the moon. The animal looked familiar—yes, now Tango remembered: a red fox. Once, when he was a puppy, walking along Cold Creek, he’d seen one. A distant canine cousin, Sadie had explained. Wild—with a reputation for being cunning and sly.

Tango swallowed the lump in his throat. “Uh, um… who are you?”

“Beau is my name. Beau Fox,” the animal said politely, peering at Tango. “And you? You are the dog named Rat-Boy.”

“Rat-Boy?” snapped Tango. “My name isn’t Rat-Boy!”

Beau scowled, reprimanding Tango with his eyes.

Tango dropped his tail. “My name is Tango.”

“The animals in the village call you Rat-Boy—you may as well get used to it.”

Tango’s back hairs bristled. “Why would they call me Rat-Boy? They don’t even know me.”

“Don’t you remember?”

“Remember what?”

“That morning on the beach—when you washed ashore. The humans thought you were a drowned rat.”

“Yeah, I remember … sort of.”

“Nigel Stump made up the name.”

“Who’s Nigel Stump?”

“One of those despicable felines who
think
they rule the wharf.”

The fox circled Tango. Tango stiffened when the bristles on Beau’s tail brushed across his back.

“And who are you—other than Tango?” Beau shook his head. “Such a strange name.”

Cousin or no, could Tango trust the fox? If not, he could probably outrun him. The fox’s joints squeaked with every move he made.

Tango relaxed. “I’m Tango LaTour. My mistress is Marcellina LaTour, the most beautiful woman in all of Manhattan.”

“LaTour? Manhattan?”

“Yes, where all the—” Tango started to explain.

“Never mind.” Beau dismissed Tango with a swish of his tail. “Few affairs of the human world either interest or concern me. Humans hurry past all that is good. Too many humans destroy what is beautiful and dear.”

Tango cared little for the deep philosophizing of the fox. Also, Tango wasn’t sure that he agreed. Augusta was good, and Marcellina was beautiful and ever so dear. However, Tango didn’t wish to argue; he was in a hurry to get to the lighthouse.

“You want to go home,” Beau remarked.

“How do you know what I want?”

“Little one, I’ve seen it in your eyes. How, when the sun is shining, you drag a long shadow wherever you go.”

Had the fox been spying on him? Why? When?

“I’m waiting for Marcellina to come and take me home.”

“Ah, yes, home. And you believe that she will?”

“Of course.” Tango hesitated. “I mean, I think she will.”

Truth be told, recently Tango had questioned whether Marcellina was, in fact, even searching for her lost dog. Perhaps he’d been no more precious to Marcellina than one of her expensive signature handbags. Marcellina and Diego might’ve survived the storm and sailed back home—without giving Tango so much as a second thought. Diego probably bought Marcellina a new dog—a dog much smaller, cuter, and far more costly than Tango.

A dog that was “in” this season.

“The moon has waxed and waned since you arrived,” noted Beau. Snout up, he studied the deep purple sky, speckled with stars. “Tonight, the moon is full, as it was on the night of the big storm. If your mistress was looking for you, wouldn’t she have come by now?”

“What can I do?” Tango whined. “I don’t belong here!”

“Maybe I, or someone I know, can help you.”

Tango’s spirits lifted. “You can? But—how?”

“I’ll need time to work it out. Perhaps my dreams will guide me.”

The lighthouse beacon flashed on-and-off, on-and-off, beckoning Tango. He raised his paw, ready to take a step. “I’m going to the lighthouse now.”

Beau sucked in a breath of air. “I … would… advise… against … it.”

Beau’s tone of voice sent shivers up and down Tango’s spine.

“There’s no need to hurry, Tango. Trust me,” implored the fox. “Wait. Meet me at the lighthouse tomorrow night.”

Afraid to discover what Beau Fox feared, Tango abandoned his plan.

Esperanza would have to wait.

Greeted by the fresh light of a new day, Augusta felt lighter in spirit than she had for weeks. Like she did each summer, Augusta had transformed her three-season porch into a shop she called One-of-a-Kind.

Wool sweaters, fuzzy scarves, thick mittens, striped socks, crib dolls, sock monkeys, booties, and itty-bitty hats—made with the smallest of stitches and softest of yarns—filled shelves, tables, baskets, and bookcases.

Now she placed a pair of newly knitted argyle socks on a tall stack, stepped back, and admired the fruits of a year’s worth of labor.

“I’m ready for the Season, Pup,” she announced with a satisfied sigh. “What do you think? How about a walk?”

Pup put his paws over his snout, signaling his disinterest.

Augusta sighed. If only she knew the dog’s real name—or where he came from. Or why he goes out into the dark of night, but not into the sunshine of day. The dog
was
a quirky little beast, to be sure, but like many of the young children she used to teach, all the more likeable because of it.

Walking down Main Street toward the post office, Augusta sensed anticipation among the villagers. Soon the playhouse would open—the unofficial start of tourist season in Victoria-by-the-Sea.

Augusta pictured mountains of chocolates filling the glass shelves in Island Chocolates; thick chowder simmering on the stove at Lobsterland; young women in swishy skirts and bright scarves reading tea leaves in Landmark Café; and out-of-school children, eyes sparkling like dragonfly wings in the sun, playing in the street.

Mail in hand, Augusta circled the village, greeting people she’d known all of her life. “Lovely day, isn’t it?”

“It is indeed,” her neighbors agreed.

Since Pup washed into her life, Augusta had noticed something. Much to her surprise, people seemed more interested in her. Now, she was
the
Miss Gustie who’d rescued a shipwrecked dog and nursed him back to health.

Ambling along, Augusta passed McKenna Skye’s
shed. With its sea green walls, butter yellow trim, and rose-colored shutters, the shed looked like a home for whimsical characters that existed only in storybooks.

On a cardboard sign tacked to a stick in the ground, Augusta read the words: “Opening soon.” Feeling a little foolish, but unable to stop herself, Augusta peeked through the paned window. Except for a row of glass jars, the shelves were empty. McKenna’s sleeping bag was unzipped, but the girl was not in sight.

Probably out walking, Augusta decided, shoulders slumped, hands stuffed into the pouch of her sweatshirt, its tattered hood hiding her face. Always alone, wandering, as if searching for something she might never find.

Seeing the shed that McKenna had so beautifully brought to life devoid of inventory took all the joy out of Augusta’s own sense of accomplishment. She experienced a distressing pang of guilt:
candles…

“Wouldn’t you just know it,” Augusta muttered to herself.

Anyway, just because Augusta knew
how
to make candles—she’d helped her mother often enough—that didn’t mean that
she
had to teach a stranger how to make candles, did it?

Yes, yes, Augusta knew that Victoria-by-the-Sea
was the kind of village where friends and neighbors shared what they had, be it food, or goods, or skills, but Augusta was under no obligation, was she?

No, it wasn’t her responsibility to teach Big Bart’s niece how to make candles—especially
enchanted
candles. She’d never heard of anything so foolish! Tourists could be irritating, but for heaven’s sake, they weren’t fools! Enchanted candles, indeed.

But later, while bathing Pup, Augusta couldn’t get McKenna off her mind. Should she help the girl or not? What with the dog and the shop—she
was
busy, everybody said so, but …

Augusta’s good heart won out. “Oh, Pup, I’ve been a mean and selfish old woman,” she confessed. “Do unto others …”

She rinsed, toweled, and brushed Pup’s hair until the strands gleamed like the sand flats on a sunny day. She tied a fringed scarf—melon orange with crocheted buds of purple lupine—around Pup’s neck. She hung an “Open in 10 Minutes” sign on her shop door and with Pup at her heels, went to an alcove between the mudroom and the kitchen.

Augusta leaned over and grabbed a brass ring in the floor. “Get back,” she warned Pup. “I don’t want you falling down these steps; they’re steep.”

With a strong pull, she lifted a heavy door. Grasping the handrail, she took one step at a time
until her right foot landed on the wobbly bottom stair.

How many times had she told herself to fix that stair? Too many to count…. She’d do so soon, she vowed.

Rain had seeped through the cellar’s stone wall, forming puddles on the floor. Augusta shuddered, pulling her cardigan close.

Ever since she was a child, she’d disliked being down in this dank, dirt-floored cellar. She’d caught mice down here, but feared that she could encounter a rat—like the one she saw, or thought she saw—on the roof of the Pitiful Place last winter.

The rat was big and white, about the same size as Pup. She’d told Bart Cody about the creature, but he’d scoffed, “Gustie Smith, there’s no big, white rat living in Old Ada’s place. Not anymore.”

Now Augusta scanned the shelves, filled with jars of dark red jam and green pickles. With a bristle broom, she whisked away cobwebs. Tiny black spiders scuttled across the stone walls. Pushing aside a row of dust-covered blue canning jars, Augusta spied the cardboard box she was looking for. As she jimmied the box out of the tight space, steel clanked against steel.

Augusta’s eyes misted. How she had loved selling candles at the old railroad station with her
mother. Holding the box of candle-making equipment with one arm, Augusta trudged up the stairs.

Above her stood Pup—a loyal soldier keeping guard.

“Oh, Pup, what am I getting myself into?” she asked. “What
am
I getting myself into?”

Late the next night, Tango—ears erect, eyes alert—made his way to the Victoria lighthouse. The air was chilly, the winds silent. Gentle waves lapped across the sandy shore. In a patch of wild roses, two pale lights flickered.

“Is that you, Beau?” Tango called.

Thorny branches snapped as Beau Fox came into view. “It is.”

Much to his surprise, Tango felt no fear. In fact, he was eager to reconnect with his distant kin.

Beau leaned back on his haunches. “Tango, I have considered your situation.”

“Tell me! Tell me! I’ve been waiting all day! Can you help me? Can you?”

Beau reprimanded Tango: “Be still.”

Tango willed his body to stop bouncing, but his mind was buzzing.

“If your mistress were looking for you,” said Beau thoughtfully, “she would have been here by now.”

Tango’s ears drooped. “I guess she didn’t care about me as much as I thought she did.”

“No, no, that’s not what I meant,” Beau reassured Tango. “Quite the contrary.
I
believe that
she
believes that you are dead.”

“She does?”

“When you slipped into the sea, she decided that you would not—that you could not—survive.”

“But why?”

“Your rescue
was
a miracle—perhaps your mistress does not believe in miracles.”

Tango wasn’t sure
he
believed in miracles. He didn’t know about Marcellina.

“She does not understand the animal world,” Beau said, “where other forces are at work.”

Neither did Tango. Tango no longer knew who he was, or where he belonged.

“The night of the storm I heard a voice,” explained Beau. “It thundered, ‘Save the dog!’ “

A voice in Tango’s head sneered:
That’s nonsense, and you know it.

“I believe the animals of the sea carried out the command,” Beau continued. “Jellyfish banded together under the waves. Their tentacles formed a raft that supported you until the seals woke up and
they swam you to shore. Somehow, when the waves broke, you got tangled up in that lobster trap.”

Tango’s head was spinning. Rescued by seals and jellyfish? A voice that commands the animals of the sea?

“You lived for a reason, so here’s what you must do: you must let your beloved know that you are alive—that you wish to come home.”

“Why, that’s impossible,” Tango grumbled. “And you know it! If I were human, I could call Marcellina on the phone, or write her a letter, but—”

“I am talking about hope. Hope is the first step on any significant journey.”

“What if Marcellina never comes? What if I have to spend the rest of my life on this island, where I don’t belong?”

“I truly believe that your kindred spirit will come looking for you. Perhaps at the moment you least expect it.”

“But …”

Beau spoke softly. “Hope is a simple heart’s song.”

With a swish of his tail, the fox slipped out of sight.

Distressed and disheartened, Tango retraced his steps. Above him, tiny, black, web-winged animals soared in confused patterns.

Kindred spirits? Miracles?

“The old fox’s brain is addled,” Tango muttered.

But as Tango passed under the giant oak in Augusta’s backyard, he heard Esperanza whisper:
Without hope… without hope… nothing … is possible.

When Jack Tucker appeared on Augusta’s doorstep carrying two large paper bags, Pup didn’t bark. Wagging his tail, he sniffed Jack’s slacks, his eyes on the vet’s pocket, where, Augusta knew, a treat was waiting.

“I got your message,” Jack told Augusta. “Since when is Gustie Smith in the business of making candles? I mean, I was glad to pick up the stuff, but …”