The Case of the Hooking Bull (7 page)

Chapter Twelve: Saved Just in the Nick of Time

“U
h!” said Scraunch. “Not see yummy dog supper in tank. Better we look around windmill.”

Heh, heh. Maybe you thought he would look inside the tank and see me there, huh? And then eat me alive? Well, that could have happened to one of your ordinary ranch dogs, but don't forget that those coyotes were dealing with the Head of Ranch Security.

I had my little bag of tricks, see. When I saw Scraunch's nose appear over the rim of the tank, I took a big gulp of air and
went underwater.
It was just dark enough by then so that he couldn't see me.

Pretty clever, huh?

When I came up for air, I heard them chasing around and yelling at each other. It really had 'em buffaloed. My scent was strong around the tank and they knew I was somewhere close by, but they couldn't find me. And the more they looked, the madder they got and the louder they yelled at each other.

Snort blamed Rip and Rip blamed Scraunch and Scraunch blamed Snort, and after a while they stopped looking for me and got into a big fight. You never heard so much snarling and carrying on.

Well, I was sitting there in the water, feeling pretty proud of myself and listening to the brawl, when I happened to notice a sharp-pointed nose appear over the rim of the tank. Uh-oh. Snort had decided to take a look around.

I took a gulp of air and slipped under the water. I stayed under as long as I could, then had to come back up. The same routine had worked on Scraunch and I felt pretty sure that . . .

I could see Snort's eyes flickering in the moonlight. He was looking straight at me. “Uh! What that swimming around in tank?”

“Quack, quack,” I said.

I could hear his nose testing for scent. “Uh! That goose in there?”

“Quack.”

“Sound more like duck in there.”

“Quack.”

“Sound like duck but smell like dog. Not make sense.”

“Quack, quack.”

“Uh. Sound like pretty stupid duck.”

“Quack.”

“Duck not say quack just like that. Duck have different kind of quack.”

“Quack.”

“Sound berry more like DOG quack than duck quack.”

“Quack, quack, quack.” He was sniffing the air again, and I began to worry.

“Ah ha! Snort solve mystery of stupid duck! Stupid duck not stupid duck at all.”

“Quack?”

“Stupid duck really Hunk dog trying hide in water! And coyote plenty mad for stupid duck-trick in water.”

I had been exposed. “Now hold on just a minute, Snort, I can explain everything.”

“Snort not give hoot for explain everything.”

“I was just taking a bath, see, taking a normal everyday kind of bath, and thought it might be fun to, uh, play ducks.” Two more coyote heads appeared over the rim of the tank. “Well, by George, look who's . . . I was just telling old Snort . . . I'll admit it sounds strange, a grown dog playing ducks in a stock tank, but if you'll hear me out, I'm sure you'll agree . . .”

Scraunch ran his tongue over both sides of his mouth, a real bad sign. “Time for big eat. Hunk get out or coyote get in?”

I studied the faces before me—the gleaming eyes, the gleaming fangs, the hungry looks. “So this is it, is that what you're saying?” Three heads nodded. “There's no chance that we could work this out on paper?” All three shook their heads. “In that case, boys, you'd better come and get it, 'cause there's no free lunch on this ranch!”

I swam to the middle of the tank and prepared to make my last stand. The coyotes yipped and hollered, and Scraunch came diving over the side.

“Scraunch, it's only fair that I tell you that I'm a black belt in Water Karate.” He kept coming toward me. “Listen, that deal with the duck was only a joke, honest.” He kept coming. “It's still not too late to . . .”

Before I could finish my sentence, he sprang at me, clamped his powerful jaws around the scruff of my neck, and plunged my head under the . . . blub, blub.

Gurgle, blub, gargle, blubber.

. . . water.

I had just about checked out of this old world when . . . that was odd, Scraunch released his death grip on my neck and . . . let me come up for air? That didn't make any sense, unless he wanted the fight to go more than one round.

But whatever, I accepted the offer and came up gasping for air, just in time to see three coyotes drag their dripping selves over the side of the tank. They ran through the beam of two headlights and vanished into the night.

Headlights? I hadn't noticed any . . . holy smokes, somebody had come to my rescue! Or was I dreaming?

I heard a car door open and close. Then . . . Little Alfred's voice! “Hankie, here Hankie! I came back for you. Where are you?”

Hey, I barked, I howled, I moaned, I whined, and then I struck out swimming for the edge of the tank. When I got there, I was pulled out by Little Alfred and, I'll be derned, Miss Viola, Slim's lady friend.

And yes, Mister Burden-of-Guilt was there, hopping up and down and spinning around in circles. “Oh my gosh, Hank, when we didn't see you, we thought maybe the coyotes had got you, and boy, you talk about feeling bad about something! I wasn't sure I could make it through the night.”

“Thanks, Drover. In the absence of meaningful action, it's the thought that counts.”

“You bet, and boy, I've done lots of thinking, sure have.”

Well, Miss Viola picked me up and carried me to Slim's pickup and laid me on the floorboard (I was still wet, see). And on the way back to the ranch, I began piecing together the rest of the story.

After they had left me at the windmill, Slim and Little Alfred made the slow drive back to head­quarters, with the boy at the controls and the pickup in Grandma Low. When they got there, Slim crawled on his hands and knees into the house and called Miss Viola on the phone.

She lived down the creek, you might recall, about five miles below our place, and she came streaking up the valley to take care of Slim. She tried to load him up in her car and take him to the doctor, but he didn't have any great love for doctors or hospitals, and anyways, by that time he'd already diagnosed his own case.

He'd been mashed pretty badly by that horse, but the wreck had taken place in soft sand, so he'd come out of it with some bruises and cracked ribs—just the kind of things he could treat with wool fat, salty meat grease, and Absorbine Jr. And no doctor.

So Miss Viola got him loaded into a bed and sent Little Alfred down to the saddle shed for all that high-tech medicine, and after a couple of hours, old Slim was back on the road to recovery.

And it was then that Little Alfred remembered his promise to me and coaxed Miss Viola into driving up into the pasture to get me. So there you are.

When we got back to headquarters, Miss Viola carried me into the house and made a pallet for me on the floor beside Slim's bed. They discussed the pros and cons of letting me stay in Sally May's house, but they decided that since I had saved Slim from the Hooking Bull and had shown incredible courage on the field of battle, it was only right that I should be allowed to stay inside.

Which was plenty fine with me. As beat-up as I was, the thought of camping out on my gunnysack bed didn't excite me much.

And let me tell you, before she went back home that night, Miss Viola made quite a fuss over me and my injuries. She pulled all the burs, moss, and mud out of my coat. She dug a few ticks out of my ears and gave me a good brushing. And what would you say if I told you she fixed me some warm milk with a raw egg mixed in?

Honest, she did all that. Miss Viola not only had good taste in dogs, but she knew how to make invalidism pretty derned attractive. I mean, I could have stood quite a lot of that kind of treatment.

The next morning she came back and fixed us guys a nice big breakfast. Would you believe scram­bled eggs and bacon for ME? Shucks, I made up my mind right then that if Slim didn't have sense enough to marry that gal, I just might give it a shot myself.

Well, everything was just about perfect, right up to the moment we heard the car pull up in front of the house. It was Loper and Sally May, back from their trip, and suddenly I began feeling very uneasy about, well, being in Sally May's house, for one thing, but then there was another little matter that, uh, weighed even heavier on my mind.

It had to do with strawberry ice cream.

Sally May was not overjoyed to see me inside the house. I could tell by the way her nostrils flared and her eyes widened. But Miss Viola handled it very well. She explained that I had saved Slim from being made into sausage by the Hooking Bull, and that she, Viola, had taken it upon herself to let me stay inside.

By George, it worked! Sally May loosened up, smiled a little bit, and even came over and gave me several kind words and pats on the head.

After all the hard times and misunderstandings Sally May and I had gone through, this was major victory, but still, I couldn't enjoy it. I kept wondering what form of execution she would choose for me when she found . . . well, the strawberry ice cream.

But you know what? Just at the time when I was about to have a nervous breakthrough, Miss Viola came over to my bed, bent down, and whispered, “Don't worry, I cleaned it up.”

What a woman! What an angel! I survived the day in grand style and lived happily ever after.

Oh, were you wondering what happened to the Hooking Bull? Three days later, Slim was back on his feet and, shall we say, thirsting for revenge. He and Loper saddled the two stoutest horses on the ranch and went up to the north pasture.

I'm told that to this very day, you can see deep skid marks all the way from the windmill to the gate in the northeast corner of the pasture. The Hooking Bull got invited to a sledding party, and we haven't seen him since.

Case closed.

Further Reading

Have you read all of Hank's adventures?

1
The Original Adventures of Hank the Cowdog

2
The Further Adventures of Hank the Cowdog

3
It's a Dog's Life

4
Murder in the Middle Pasture

5
Faded Love

6
Let Sleeping Dogs Lie

7
The Curse of the Incredible Priceless Corncob

8
The Case of the One-Eyed Killer Stud Horse

9
The Case of the Halloween Ghost

1
0
Every Dog Has His Day

1
1
Lost in the Dark Unchanted Forest

1
2
The Case of the Fiddle-Playing Fox

1
3
The Wounded Buzzard on Christmas Eve

1
4
Hank the Cowdog and Monkey Business

1
5
The Case of the Missing Cat

1
6
Lost in the Blinded Blizzard

1
7
The Case of the Car-Barkaholic Dog

1
8
The Case of the Hooking Bull

1
9
The Case of the Midnight Rustler

20
The Phantom in the Mirror

21
The Case of the Vampire Cat

22
The Case of the Double Bumblebee Sting

23
Moonlight Madness

24
The Case of the Black-Hooded Hangmans

25
The Case of the Swirling Killer Tornado

26
The Case of the Kidnapped Collie

27
The Case of the Night-Stalking Bone Monster

28
The Mopwater Files

29
The Case of the Vampire Vacuum Sweeper

30
The Case of the Haystack Kitties

31
The Case of the Vanishing Fishhook

32
The Garbage Monster from Outer Space

33
The Case of the Measled Cowboy

34
Slim's Good-bye

35
The Case of the Saddle House Robbery

36
The Case of the Raging Rottweiler

37
The Case of the Deadly Ha-Ha Game

38
The Fling

39
The Secret Laundry Monster Files

40
The Case of the Missing Bird Dog

41
The Case of the Shipwrecked Tree

42
The Case of the Burrowing Robot

43
The Case of the Twisted Kitty

44
The Dungeon of Doom

45
The Case of the Falling Sky

46
The Case of the Tricky Trap

47
The Case of the Tender Cheeping Chickies

48
The Case of the Monkey Burglar

49
The Case of the Booby-Trapped Pickup

50
The Case of the Most Ancient Bone

51
The Case of the Blazing Sky

52
The Quest for the Great White Quail

53
Drover's Secret Life

54
The Case of the Dinosaur Birds

55
The Case of the Secret Weapon

56
The Case of the Coyote Invasion

57
The Disappearance of Drover

58
The Case of the Mysterious Voice

59
The Case of the Perfect Dog

60
The Big Question

61
The Case of the Prowling Bear