Hal Borland - Penny: The Story of a Free-Soul Basset Hound

Penny

The Story of a Free-Soul Basset Hound

Hal Borland

One

It was March, with a foot of snow on the ground, and we were hungry for spring. It was only two more weeks till the vernal equinox, and change was inevitable; but we wanted warm days and opening buds and singing birds. This day had started out cold again, with no sign of that thaw we wanted. I went out after breakfast and filled the bird feeders again, for the chickadees and tree sparrows were parading their hunger, the chicks coming to the kitchen window and as much as demanding a handout. So I filled the feeders and came back indoors and we started going over the market list. I had a couple of errands in the village and might as well do the marketing while I was there. And Barbara glanced out the window and asked, Whose dog is that?

I looked and saw a black and tan dog, long as a beagle but with even shorter legs and longer ears. It was standing in the snow beneath the old apple tree where I had just filled the bird feeders. Darned if I know, I said. Stranger to me. And I wondered why she is the one who always sees the unusual, the unexpected. Long ago I learned to look first when she says, Whats that out there? and ask questions, if any, afterward. She saw the woodcock beside the woodshed and the wood duck in the apple tree. She saw the snowy owl in the pear tree not twenty feet from the window. She saw the wild turkeys out in the pasture, and the family of otters looping along the pasture fence on their way over the mountain from the river to Twin Lakes. Now I looked, then asked, Why dont you ever see ordinary dogs, or birds?

Isnt that an ordinary dog?

Well, it is a dog, Ill admit that. But

Its cute. What kind is it?

Looks like a basset hound, Id say.

Funny looking. What is a basset hound?

A hunting dog. Away back, in England, they used them to hunt badgers. Maybe thats where the name came frombadger, basset. I dont really know. Nowadays they hunt rabbits, like beagles. But their legs are so short they cant run very fast.

The strange dog was looking hopefully up at the suet can, hung from a wire in the apple tree. But it seemed to know there wasnt a chance of getting that suet. It turned and looked at the house. It had a face something like that of a bloodhound, but not so wrinkled. The tan and white markings on its face made it look almost clownish rather than sad. Bloodhounds always look sad and worried.

I looked at the market list again. What does black puppie mean? Spelled with ie instead of y.

Barbara looked at the notation. Black pepper, she said. Youve got dogs on your mind. We went through the list, I got my coat and when we looked out again the strange dog had disappeared. The furrow it had plowed in the snowyou couldnt call it a set of tracks; that short-legged dog almost had to swim through the snowled around the house to the driveway and disappeared on the freshly plowed road. When I went out to the garage I looked up and down the road and saw no sign of a dog. Nor did I see any but the familiar dogs of our neighbors as I went to the village. That dog had vanished as though into thin air.

I did my errands and the marketing and came home, and the day went pretty much as usual. By midafternoon the sun went under a cloud cover and it turned chilly again, so instead of going for a walk we settled down to a game of Scrabble. About five-thirty Barbara went to the kitchen and put a pot of vegetable soup on to heat. On the way back to our game she passed the front door, paused there a moment and exclaimed, Oh, heres your friend again.

I couldnt imagine which friend she meant. I got up and started to the door, and before I got there she opened it and in came the black and tan dog we had seen under the bird feeders that morning. It came in head up, tail wagging, like an honored guest accepting hospitality. It didnt cringe or skulk or even hesitate. It came in expecting to have a great big welcome, maybe a speech and a banquet.

I stopped and stared, and it looked at me with those big brown eyes and a face that was absolutely self-possessed. It practically said, Here I am, you lucky people!

Barbara looked at me, and I said, Its all yours. You let it in.

I just opened the door and he came in! But hes hungry. You can see that. He probably hasnt had a thing to eat all day.

So you want a dog, huh? You didnt tell me.

No, I dont want a dog! This one isnt a tramp. Somebody owns him and probably is out looking for him right now. See, he even has a collar.

She was right. It had a red leather collar. I bent down to look at the license tag, but there wasnt any tag on the collar. The dog licked my hands. I lifted one long ear, then the other, looking for a tattoo mark that might identify it. There wasnt a mark. It was totally anonymous. I wondered why the owner of a dog obviously of good stock, by no means a mongrel, hadnt put some identification on it.

I stood up, and Barbara said, Im sure somebody owns him. She spoke to the dog. Hungry? Want something to eat? and the dog wagged enthusiastically, licked its chops.

See! Hes starved!

She, I said. Its a bitch.

All right, She. How about it, She? Come on, and Barbara led the way through the living room. The basset followed, curious about everything but most mannerly, like a princess inspecting a strange hostelry. I was glad to see that she seemed to approve. They went through the hallway to the kitchen, and the basset saw the refrigerator. She went to it and stood waiting, obviously expecting Barbara to open it and work magicproduce marvelous things for a dog to eat. She knew refrigerators and what they meant.

Something warm, Barbara said, on a day like this, and she got out a carton of milk, poured a pint or so into a pan and set it to heat. The basset watched as she took an old bowl from the bowl closet, poured corn flakes into it and waited for the milk to warm. Then she asked me to bring a newspaper, put it on the floor in the enclosed back porch, poured the warm milk over the corn flakes and set the bowl out for the dog. The basset ate as though she had been starved for a week, licked the bowl clean, then went back to the kitchen. When she got no second helping she returned to the living room. We watched to see if she would try to climb onto the couch or the chairs, forbidden territory to any dogs in this house. She didnt. She explored the whole room, finally found the place she wanted and lay down on the rug under a bench that stood against the wall. She stretched out, sighed deeply, closed her eyes and settled into a nap, completely at home.

We closed the living room doors, went back to the kitchen and took trays and bowls of soup to the library. We talked as we ate. No, we agreed, we didnt want a dog. And we agreed that we hadnt just acquired a dog. We had done an act of charity, taken in a lost dog, warmed, fed and sheltered it for the night. If we couldnt find the owner in the next few hours we would find someone who knew where the dog belonged by tomorrow. A dog like that certainly would be reported missing.

When we finished eating I called my friend Dave, the local dog warden. No, Dave hadnt any report of a missing basset hound, but he would take a note of it. He asked about color, markings, any identification. We discussed bassets. Not many of them around, so it shouldnt be hard to locate the owner. Dave would be in touch.

Then I called the Little Guild of St. Francis, which cares for lost dogs and cats and finds homes for strays and waifs. No, they didnt have any report of a lost basset either. But if the owner didnt turn up they would be glad to take the dog and find a good home for it. Bassets were even-tempered, gentle around children. A little inclined to wander, but good pets for all that. And we, too, discussed bassets.