“Good luck with that,” said Antony.
Henry left the boys in Antony’s yard, ran down the street, and knocked on Letty’s door. When she opened it, he told her the good news about Buddy.
“And to think you did this all on your own,” exclaimed Letty.
“Well, I had a little help,” said Henry.
Letty handed him the collar and the leash, and once again Henry hid them under his bed, in safekeeping for the next day’s lesson. That night he left a cookie outside the back door as usual, and tried to send a thought to Buddy, who he hoped was asleep in his shelter behind the shed. “Buddy,” he whispered, “tomorrow is going to be a very big day for you. You have to try to be cooperative and patient and brave. If you can do that, and learn to walk on the leash, then pretty soon you’ll have a real home.”
But the next morning Henry was surprised to find the cookie exactly where he had left it. It was untouched. Henry snatched it before his parents could see it, then replaced it just before they all left for the day. When he returned from school, it was still there.
Uh-oh, thought Henry. This is a problem.
It was a big problem, he felt, but he didn’t know what to do about it. He couldn’t talk to his parents, so he ran to Antony’s house.
“Have you seen Buddy?” he asked Ginny when she answered the door.
Ginny scratched her left heel with the toe of her right sneaker. “I don’t think so.”
“But you’re not sure?” Henry felt his hopes rise.
Then Antony came to the door and said that no, he hadn’t seen Buddy since the day before.
“He didn’t come to my house last night,” reported Henry. “Or if he did, he didn’t eat the cookie. And he didn’t eat it today either.”
“Uh-oh,” said Antony.
“I know,” said Henry.
“Well, maybe he found some really good food somewhere and he doesn’t want to leave it,” suggested Antony. “I’ll bet he’s not far away. I’ll bet he’ll be back tomorrow.”
“Probably,” said Henry.
That night Henry left the same cookie out for Buddy, and the next morning it was still there. It was there after school too.
“Okay, this is serious,” Henry told Antony and Owen. The boys were sitting on the stoop in front of Antony’s house. The steps had been shoveled after the last snow, but they were still wet, and everything on Tinker Lane looked melty, slushy, and gray. “The last time I saw Buddy was Wednesday,” Henry continued. “Today is Friday—and he hasn’t stayed away overnight since Christmas. Something must be wrong.”
“Maybe,” said Owen. “Or maybe he just decided to move on.”
“No. Not now. Not after all this time. Buddy was here to stay.”
Henry felt like burying his head in his arms. He had absolutely no idea what to do, and he had a feeling this was a problem he couldn’t solve on his own. If Matthew still lived here, Henry would have talked to him. They would have sat on Matthew’s stoop in the cold and the wet and one of them would have come up with an idea. But Matthew was gone, his empty house an unpleasant reminder.
Henry didn’t know Antony and Owen well enough to bury his head sadly in his arms, so instead he said, “Do you think maybe you guys could help me with Buddy?”
“Sure,” said Owen.
And from behind them a voice said, “You should organize a search party.” The boys turned to see Sofia standing in the doorway.
“Hey! That’s a good idea,” said Antony. “And we should leave cans of food around. Maybe he’ll smell the food and come back.”
“If he can,” said Sofia darkly.
Henry ignored this. “It’s a good thing he knows his name and that he learned to come when we call.”
“I’ll go find Sal and Peter and Ginny,” said Antony.
“Maybe Mackey Brannigan can help us,” added Owen.
“Maybe Letty Lewis can help too,” said Henry.
Antony groaned. “Letty? Really? Isn’t she kind of old?”
Henry shrugged. “Let’s ask her anyway.”
Half an hour later Henry was standing on Letty’s porch. Behind him, stretching back to the street, were Owen, Antony, Mackey, Sofia, Salvatore, Ginny, and Peter. Everyone was carrying something: dog chow, cans of dog food, the limited-edition cookies, Buddy’s leash, and his collar.
“My goodness. What’s all this?” asked Letty when she answered the doorbell.
“Buddy’s missing,” Henry announced.
Letty put her hand to her cheek. “Oh, no. Are you sure?”
“The last time I saw him was Wednesday afternoon.”
“And now it’s Friday,” said Letty thoughtfully.
“He’s been coming to my house every single night,” Henry told her. “To eat these.” He held out the bag of cookies. “So I think something might be wrong.”
“We’ve organized a search party,” said Sofia, stepping forward hesitantly.
“And we’re going to leave food all over the place for Buddy,” spoke up Sal.
“Do you want to help us?” asked Henry.
“Well,” said Letty. “I . . .”
Henry realized that Letty was wearing a bathrobe and a pair of moccasins. Her hair looked a bit wild.
“I want to help, but I’m not sure I’ll be much good at searching,” confessed Letty. “I could put some food around my yard, though. Just let me get dressed.”
Henry left Letty with two cans of food and a supply of chow, and he and the others returned to Antony’s house.
“This will be Command Center,” said Owen. “Henry, you give out the orders.”
“Oh,” said Henry. “Okay. Um, let’s see. There are eight of us. I think we should divide into three teams. Antony, you come with me. Owen, you’ll be in charge of Peter and Ginny. Salvatore and Sofia will report to Mackey. Everybody, make sure you take some food with you. Mackey, your team will stay here in our neighborhood. Owen, you guys go into town. Antony and I will look in the yards around Caldwell Street.” Henry checked his watch, feeling very official. “Meet back here in one hour exactly.”
“Hey, what do we do if we find Buddy?” asked Mackey. “We only have one collar and leash.”
“Good point,” said Henry. He thought for a moment. “Well, two teams will just have to use rope. We have some in my garage. But be really careful with it, okay? Put it around Buddy’s middle, not his neck, and don’t tie it too tight.”
Fifteen minutes later the teams set out. Henry and Antony, carrying a bag containing food, cookies, the leash, and the collar, walked through Antony’s backyard and into the backyards of the houses on Caldwell Street. They peeked behind garbage cans. They peered into garages.
“Maybe someone went away on a trip and Buddy got locked in the garage,” said Henry. But most of the garages they saw were open. And Antony pointed out that they couldn’t check all the garages in Claremont anyway.
At the edges of several yards, Henry and Antony furtively left cans of food or small piles of dog chow.
“Don’t let anyone see you,” said Henry in a low voice. “And sort of hide the food. It might attract raccoons, and people won’t like that.”
They asked anyone they met if a medium-size tan dog with short fur and brown eyes had been seen in the neighborhood. But the reply was always a shake of the head or a “No, sorry.”
When they had been searching for forty-five minutes, Antony sighed and said, “I guess we should start back now.”
“Let’s leave a trail of chow behind us,” suggested Henry, no longer caring about raccoons. “Buddy might find it and follow it back to my house.”
“I guess,” said Antony. He sounded doubtful, but they carefully sprinkled chow all the way back to Buddy’s shelter in Henry’s yard.
“There are the others,” said Antony a few moments later, squinting down Tinker Lane. The search parties had returned.
“Anything?” Henry asked, running to his friends.
In answer, six heads swiveled slowly fr
om side to side.
No.
An uncomfortable chilly sensation blossomed in Henry’s stomach and spread down his arms and legs. He wasn’t cold. In fact, all the activity had made him hot and sweaty. But he realized he was very afraid.
The chill that settled into Henry made him feel numb. He couldn’t eat his dinner. And he found that he didn’t want to do anything that evening except peer out into the murky nighttime, hoping to see Buddy lope through the backyard.
At eight o’clock he told his parents he was going to bed. They exchanged a look of concern.
“I think you’re coming down with something,” said his mother, resting her cool hand on his forehead. “You don’t seem to have a fever, though.”
“Anything the matter, son?” asked his father.
Henry shook his head, then fled to his room before tears could begin to fall. He turned out the light and knelt on his bed, now hoping to see Buddy in the front yard, in the glow of a streetlight. Or maybe he was across the street at Matthew’s! Maybe Buddy had discovered a way in and out of the empty house and had made a home for himself there. Henry’s heart leaped. But then he realized that if Buddy were just across the street, he could easily come by for his cookies. He rested his head on the windowsill and began to cry quietly. It had been a long time since he had cried and he’d forgotten how hot the rush of tears would be and how his chest would ache.
When the hand touched his shoulder he jumped.
“Sorry,” said his father softly. “Didn’t mean to startle you.”
Henry wiped his eyes on the sleeve of his pajamas. “I didn’t hear you come in.”
“Do you want to tell me what’s going on?”
“I can’t.” Henry slid under the covers, and his father turned the light on.
“I think you’ll feel better if you talk about it.”
“Not necessarily.”
“Are you in trouble?”
Henry shook his head.
“Is someone else in trouble?”
Henry looked miserably at his father. “Sort of.”
“A friend? Someone at school?”
“The person isn’t a person, exactly. The person is more of a dog.”
There. He had said it.
“A dog is in trouble?” repeated Mr. Elliot. He looked puzzled. “What dog?”
“Buddy,” Henry whispered.
“Henry, I think you’d better start at the beginning and tell me the whole story.”
“Okay,” said Henry, and he sat up straighter and said boldly, “I have a secret outdoor dog.” And then the rest of the story poured out.
Mr. Elliot listened patiently. Henry waited for his father to reprimand him or scold him or at the very least point out that Henry had disobeyed him. But his father rested his hand on Henry’s shoulder and nodded and occasionally asked a question.
At last, Henry, his voice wobbling slightly, reached the end of the tale, winding up by saying that none of the search parties had seen any sign of Buddy. He traced his finger along a wrinkle in the blanket, glanced up at his father, and then looked down at his covers again. And then he burst into tears.
Mr. Elliot drew his son close and said, “You did a good thing, Henry. Tomorrow morning, as soon as it’s light, I’ll help you search for Buddy.”
17. HENRY
Henry was sleeping soundly when he felt someone sit on the edge of his bed. He opened his eyes, but saw only inky darkness. “Dad?” he said.
“We need to get an early start,” his father replied softly.
Henry realized that the sun hadn’t risen yet. He raised himself onto his elbows and yawned. “Okay.”
“By the time we eat breakfast it will be light enough to set out.”
Henry and his father sat at the table in the kitchen and ate eggs and oatmeal and toast. In the east the sky was brightening, turning heavy, dull clouds from black to a deep gray. There would be no sunshine that day.
“Wear your warmest clothes,” Mr. Elliot said as he and Henry cleared the table. “It’s going to be raw.”
“Where do you think we should look?” asked Henry. “Yesterday we looked on Tinker Lane and Caldwell Street and also in town.”
“I think we should start with the woods,” said Mr. Elliot.
Henry dressed for the long cold day ahead and opened the front door. Behind him, the rest of the household was waking. He saw his mother at the top of the stairs in her bathrobe, her hair rumpled from sleep. Amelia Earhart was sitting on the bottom step washing her face with her eyes closed.
Henry reached up to touch the hat Aunt Susan had made. The wool was vaguely scratchy. He wore the hat frequently anyway, and today he hoped it would bring good luck, since his great-aunt was the one who had told him about Sunny, and Henry had a feeling that that moment on Christmas Eve was somehow responsible for this early morning adventure with his father.
Henry looked across the street at Matthew’s house with its dead windows and unshoveled walk, the snow piled high at the bottom of the driveway. Above the house towered clouds so thick Henry thought he might be able to scoop out handfuls of them.
“We’ll see you later,” said Henry’s father to his mother.
“Be careful,” she replied.
Mr. Elliot closed the door softly and looked at the clouds. “They’re talking about more snow,” he said. Henry and his father made their way across the yard to the street, turned left, walked past the DEAD END sign, and managed to locate the snow-covered trail that led up the mountain. “Keep your eyes and ears open,” Mr. Elliot told Henry. “Don’t watch the trail, watch everything around you. Look for movement among the trees and listen for sounds.”
“What kinds of sounds?” asked Henry.
“The crunching of leaves. Barking, whining.”
They walked along in silence, breaking it only to call for Buddy. Henry’s father was wearing a backpack containing dog food. Henry was wearing a backpack containing the lunch they had prepared. They looked and listened, and sometimes Mr. Elliot stood still and cocked his head or stared at things in the distance. Every so often they opened a can of food and dumped its contents near the trail. Henry’s father refused to leave the cans in the woods. “We’ll take them home and recycle them. It’s not fair to the woods to leave our trash behind.”
By noon they were more than halfway up the mountain. Henry was getting used to hearing nothing but their own calls and footsteps, the wind in the fir trees, the cawing of crows, the sudden crack of breaking twigs as a startled deer leaped away through the underbrush. He was hot and sweating and very hungry.
“Should we stop and have lunch?” asked his father.
“Yes!” exclaimed Henry, and Mr. Elliot laughed.
They found a large rock, swept it free of the snow—a layer as thin as a piece of paper—that had managed to find its way through the branches of the pine trees, and spread their lunch on the blanket Henry had packed in case Buddy needed warming up when they found him.
“This reminds me of when I was a boy and Sunny and I would take hikes through the woods,” said Mr. Elliot.
“You and Sunny used to go on hikes?” asked Henry.
“Lots of them. I’d pack lunch and a book to read and we’d spend the afternoon—or sometimes the entire day—in the woods.”
Henry was incredulous. “You and Sunny spent a lot of time in the woods?” When Henry thought of his father as a boy he pictured him as a younger, smaller version of his adult self—a ten-year-old librarian. He had never once pictured his father tramping through a forest with a dog, knowing woodsy outdoor things.
“Yes,” said Mr. Elliot. “Especially after RJ died. We were both lonely then. And Sunny was my . . .”
“Your best friend?”
His father lifted his head but said nothing.
Henry followed his gaze. He squinted at the sky. “No snow yet,” he said.
“We’d better pack up and get going. We’ll only have a few more hours of daylight. Time to head home.”
br /> They left the trail and went slipping and sliding down the side of the mountain. Henry kept falling and grew very annoyed, but Mr. Elliot said there was no point in going back the way they’d come. “We’d be covering the same territory.”
“What about the food?” asked Henry as they neared the bottom. “We have to check to see if Buddy ate it.” His annoyance had turned to panic. They couldn’t go home yet. They were supposed to have found Buddy by now. Henry was wearing his lucky hat. And searching with his father.
“We’ll check some of the food tomorrow when we set out again.”
“Tomorrow?” wailed Henry. “I thought . . .”
Mr. Elliot put his hands on Henry’s shoulders. “Take it easy. We’ll start over again tomorrow.”
And they did. The threatened snow did not fall and Sunday dawned with a brilliant pink sky beyond the mountains. Once again Henry and his father set off with their laden backpacks. They started out on the trail so that they could look for the food.
“I know we left some here!” called Henry. “And it’s gone!” He paused. “But Dad, a raccoon or something could have eaten it.” He leaned down. “There are little tracks in the snow. Little tracks. Not Buddy’s.”
Farther along the trail they found the remains of some more food. “Bigger tracks here!” cried Henry. And then he shouted, “Buddy! Buddy!” but there was no answering bark.
They left the trail then, traveling east instead of west, hiking along through snow and stumbling over rocks. By noon they were on a rise above town and they ate their lunch looking down at Claremont—at the streets and rooftops and treetops. “Hey,” said Henry, “I can see our house from here.” But he found no comfort in this, and when he turned to his father he felt his lip trembling. Only three or four more hours of searching were left and the next day was Monday. Back to school, back to work.
His father gave him a hug. Then he stood up. “Let’s not waste the daylight.”
Henry slogged along through the snow, trying to listen, trying to observe, trying to do everything his father was doing.
But the weekend was over.
“At least it didn’t snow,” said Henry.