Five minutes later Uncle Weldon and I are walking out of Happy Tails with Rain between us.
IV
The Hard Part
35
The Thing I Have to Do
When Uncle Weldon and I park on Hud Road by the plank bridge over the stream and climb out of the truck with Rain, my father, who is working in the yard, gets a look on his face that is most likely surprise. His eyes grow big and at first he doesn’t say anything.
Uncle Weldon takes my hand and we start across the bridge, Rain ahead of us. She picks her way slowly because she isn’t used to balancing on the planks. When she reaches our yard she catches sight of my father, standing among lots of tools and boards. She gives a little wag of her tail.
Finally my father speaks. He says, “Well, I’ll be.”
I’m not sure what that means. I say, “We found Rain.”
“Yes. I see that.”
“Do you feel happy?” I ask my father.
He kneels down as Rain trots closer to him. “I’m just surprised, that’s all. I can’t believe you found her.”
So I was right about feeling surprised.
“I had a plan,” I remind him. “It was a good plan.”
“I guess so,” says my father, who is patting Rain.
“Except,” says Uncle Weldon from behind me, “there’s … an issue.”
My father looks up sharply, and then he gets to his feet. “An issue?”
Uncle Weldon explains about the Hendersons and the microchip.
I look closely at my father when Uncle Weldon says “microchip.” My father is frowning.
“Rain had identification after all,” I point out.
Now my father looks sharply at me. “What are you saying?”
I think for a moment. “I said that Rain had identification after all.”
My father shakes his head. “Look, you got your dog back, Rose. Just let it be.”
On the ride home from Happy Tails, Rain sat in my lap. She barely moved, and she kept her face pressed next to my cheek so that I could feel her whiskers and little puffs of air as she breathed. Every now and then she turned and licked my nose.
I look around the yard. My father and I have cleaned it up pretty well. My father is working on the permanent bridge, and as long as we have the temporary one we aren’t stranded on our property anymore. Our power and phones are back, and school has started again. Most important of all, Rain is home.
I know I should feel happiness. If Parvani’s mother somehow got all her artwork back safe and sound, she would feel happiness. But I don’t feel happiness. Instead, I feel that something is wrong.
I thank Uncle Weldon for helping me, and Rain and I go into the house. Rain sniffs at everything on the way—twigs, logs, weeds, the porch steps, the couch on the porch. Then she sniffs her way through the house and into my room where she jumps on the bed and looks at me. I sit next to her and wrap my arms around her neck.
Then, because something still feels wrong, I start to cry. I cry into Rain’s fur and she sits there patiently, occasionally turning to lick my cheeks, until I get a Kleenex and blow my nose and make the tears stop.
I know what is wrong. It’s what my father said a few minutes ago: “You got your dog back, Rose.”
Your dog back. Your dog back, Rose.
But Rain isn’t my dog. Rain is the Hendersons’ dog. She belongs to them. Or she used to. And they cared enough about her to have her microchipped. I don’t know how she got separated from them, but she did, and they probably want her back. Especially now. Especially if they’ve lost their home in the storm and are feeling very, very sad.
I know what I have to do.
I don’t want to do it, but rules are rules, and I must follow them.
Somewhere a family named Henderson is missing Rain. If they miss her as much as I missed her when she was lost, then they want her badly. And she belongs to them. I don’t know when the shelter will start their search for the Hendersons, but I need to start mine now.
I have to find the Hendersons and give Rain back.
Rain lets out a sigh and flops on my bed. I lie down beside her. I wonder if she knows what I’m thinking.
I recall the information on Rain’s microchip form. Mrs. Caporale didn’t give the information to Uncle Weldon, but I peeked at the form and saw the Hendersons’ phone number and address and memorized them. I know where they live, or where they used to live. The information will help in my new search.
I do some mental calculations. The name Henderson comes out to 102, which is clearly not a prime number. Olivia is not a prime number name either.
I don’t know if this means anything.
36
Mrs. Kushel’s Helpful Suggestions
Ever since the storm Mrs. Kushel has started off each morning in class by asking if anyone has anything they’d like to share. For fifteen minutes, we raise our hands and tell our classmates about things that are troubling us, or things that are getting better. The Monday after Uncle Weldon and I bring Rain home, I say to my classmates, “Rain is back. We found her at the Happy Tails Animal Shelter in Elmara, New York.”
Everyone has questions. “Is she okay?” “Did she remember you?” “Was she happy to see you?” “How did she get all the way to Elmara?” “Why didn’t she follow her nose back to your house?”
I answer the questions as well as I can.
I do not mention the Hendersons or the microchip.
I am privately working on my new plan. I called the Hendersons’ phone number, but just like Mrs. Caporale said, all I got was a strange busy signal. So I’m not sure how to look for the Hendersons. But I know someone I can ask for advice.
One morning Uncle Weldon agrees to take me to school ten minutes earlier than usual. I arrive before Mrs. Leibler does, and so I walk to my classroom by myself. I find Mrs. Kushel sitting at her desk. No one else is in the room.
“Mrs. Kushel?” I say.
She jumps a little. “Rose! You’re here early.”
I stare at her. “I have a question.”
Mrs. Kushel puts her pen down and looks at me very seriously. “Yes?”
“How would someone who found a lost dog look for the owners of the dog?”
“Well, the person could place an ad in the newspaper,” Mrs. Kushel replies, “and also check the paper for ads about lost dogs. He could put up posters with a picture of the dog and information about when and where the dog was found. Also, he could call vets and shelters and put up posts on Web sites for lost pets.”
“Mm-hmm,” I say.
Mrs. Kushel frowns at me. “Did you find a lost dog, Rose?”
I nod my head. “Yes.”
37
Where Rain Used to Live
Secretly, at times when my father is not in the house, I phone the Hendersons’ number. Each time I get the fast busy signal. It’s not the same kind of busy signal I get when I call Uncle Weldon and he’s on the phone. Most people have Call Waiting now, and you don’t get a busy signal at all when you dial them. But maybe the Hendersons are like Uncle Weldon and don’t have Call Waiting. Still, their busy signal sounds strange. I decide that their phone is out of order.
For this reason, I feel grateful that Mrs. Kushel is going to help me with posters. She said she’ll put an ad in the paper for me too, and on some of the Web sites about lost and found pets.
We run into a problem right away, though. This is the conversation in which I realize the problem:
MRS. KUSHEL: Now, the first thing you must do is take a picture of the dog you found. A picture is even better than describing the dog.
ROSE HOWARD: A picture?
MRS. KUSHEL: Yes. Can you do that?
I can but I don’t want to. I don’t want Mrs. Kushel to see that the picture is of Rain.
I nod my head.
MRS. KUSHEL: Good. Now, under the picture we should write “Found” and then you can describe the dog.
ROSE HOWARD: Even though there’s a pict
ure of the dog right there?
MRS. KUSHEL: Yes. You can give a few more details, such as the dog’s approximate age and weight, and also where you found the dog.
ROSE HOWARD: Oh.
I decide that maybe we should wait a bit before we put up posters of Rain. I’m not ready to explain things to Mrs. Kushel.
But I am ready to tell my new plan to Uncle Weldon. I call him one night and say, “I think we need to look for the Hendersons.”
“Who?” he asks.
“Rain’s real owners. It’s only right. And only fair. Rules are rules: No name-calling. Put away the math game when you aren’t using it because someone who finished her worksheets might be waiting for it. And—”
Uncle Weldon interrupts me. “And make sure Rain’s original owners get their dog back.”
“Yes,” I say.
“Oh, Rose. Are you sure you want to do this?”
“We practically stole her,” I reply in a small voice.
“Now don’t get carried away.”
I’m patting Rain while we talk. “I’m not carried away.” I add, “I have another plan.”
I tell Uncle Weldon that I secretly know the Hendersons’ address in Gloverstown. “We could start by looking for their house. Maybe they still live there but their phone is just out of order after the storm.”
We decide to go to Gloverstown the next day, which is Saturday. We get an early start. My father is barely out of bed. We leave him sitting at the kitchen table in his underwear, muttering and grunting and calling the people at the J & R Garage bad names.
Gloverstown is about thirty miles from Hatford in the opposite direction from Elmara.
“It’s one of the towns that got hit the worst by Susan,” Uncle Weldon comments as we drive along. “I don’t think there’s much left of it.”
He’s right. When we reach what used to be the main street through Gloverstown we see that it now looks like a dried-up riverbed. And everything on either side of it is ruined and abandoned. Wooden porches droop and dip, their railings missing. The sidewalks are gone, and broken store windows have been patched with tape, but carelessly, as if the owners don’t expect to be able to salvage their businesses. We don’t see a single person.
Uncle Weldon skirts around the town and finally we come across the road where the Hendersons live. It’s a lonely country road and we don’t see any houses, although we see a lot of storm damage. Finally we spot a mailbox with the excellent prime number 2 painted on the side.
“That’s it!” I say.
Uncle Weldon turns onto a gravel drive and we creep along, avoiding potholes and tree limbs.
We round a bend. “Whoa,” says Uncle Weldon under his breath.
The house that once stood there, Rain’s old home, is now a pile of lumber and rubble, surrounded by fallen trees.
We get out of the car and listen to the country sounds of branches rustling and birds chirping.
Uncle Weldon calls, “Hello?”
No one answers.
We get in the car and drive back toward town.
38
The General Store in Gloverstown
“Do you think they’re all right?” I ask Uncle Weldon as we drive along.
“The Hendersons? I don’t know. I hope they went to a shelter before the storm hit.”
“How will we find them?” I ask.
Uncle Weldon shakes his head. “Let me think about this.”
We drive back to Gloverstown, past the end of the ruined main street, and are about to turn onto Route 28, when I say, “Hey!”
A little country store sits by the side of the road. It looks just like a house—a white house with black shutters, a wide front porch, and a brick chimney. But a sign above the door reads GENERAL STORE.
“Can we stop here?” I ask.
“Sure. Are you hungry?”
“No. I have an idea.”
Uncle Weldon follows me inside. The store is crammed with shelf after shelf of everything you can think of: nails, board games, cans of soup, T-shirts, batteries, aspirin, cereal, Band-Aids, pens, candy bars, thread, socks.
“Can I help you?”
Standing behind the counter is a young man wearing overalls and a flannel shirt.
My heart starts to pound, but I step up to the counter anyway, and I say, “My name is Rose Howard and I’m looking for the Hendersons who used to live at number two Slide Road.”
The man frowns and I think maybe he’s going to ask why I want to find the Hendersons. Instead he says, “Henderson, Henderson. Jason and Carol Henderson? And a couple of little kids?”
I remember the names Jason and Carol from the microchip information, so I say, “Yes.”
“Didn’t know them well.”
“Didn’t know them?”
“They had to move away after the storm. Too much damage to their house.”
I let out a breath. So they’re still alive.
“Do you know where they went?” I ask.
The man shakes his head. “No. But they have relatives somewhere around here. Maybe they’re staying with them.”
“Okay.” I glare into the man’s eyes and say, “Thank you.”
Uncle Weldon and I are on our way out of the store when I see a rack of newspapers, including one called The County Gazette. I point to a copy. “Uncle Weldon? Could we buy that?”
“Sure. But why?”
“If we put an ad in it, maybe the Hendersons will see it.”
39
Found: Blond Female Dog
Halloween came and went, and now Thanksgiving comes and goes. My father and Rain and I have a turkey dinner at Uncle Weldon’s house. Over the weekend I think a lot about the Hendersons. I decide that I must tell Mrs. Kushel the truth about Rain. So on Monday I ask my uncle if he can drop me off at school early again. It’s time for another private conversation with my teacher.
I enter our classroom and find Mrs. Kushel working on a new bulletin board. She’s tacking up large colorful letters that spell HOLIDAYS.
“Good morning, Rose,” she says.
“Good morning,” I reply, looking her in the eye.
Mrs. Kushel steps off the chair she’s been standing on. “Is there something you’d like to talk about?” she asks. “Did you bring the photo of the dog you found?”
She has asked two questions in a row. I answer the first one. “There is something I’d like to talk about.”
I sit at my desk and Mrs. Kushel sits next to me in Mrs. Leibler’s chair.
“I have to tell you something,” I say. “I have to tell you the truth.”
Mrs. Kushel smiles at me, which is a sign of encouragement.
“The truth is that the lost dog is Rain.”
Mrs. Kushel’s smile turns to a frown. “I don’t understand.”
I tell my teacher the whole story of Rain, starting from the night my father brought her home and said we couldn’t look for her owners if she didn’t have any identification.
“So Rain is back,” I finish up. “But she isn’t my dog, and we have to find her real owners—the Hendersons who used to live in Gloverstown, whose house got ruined, and who might be living nearby with relatives.”
Just like Uncle Weldon, Mrs. Kushel says to me, “Oh, Rose. Are you sure?”
I nod my head. “Yes. I am sure. It’s the right thing to do. Happy Tails is looking for her owners too.”
Mrs. Kushel frowns again, and taps a pencil on the edge of my desk. This is an indication that she’s thinking. She says, “I have an idea. Instead of placing an ad in the paper, maybe someone could write an article. An article would get a lot of attention, certainly more attention than a little ad.
“I’ll have to ask your father for permission, of course,” Mrs. Kushel continues. She sounds as though she’s talking to herself. “Then I’ll call a friend of mine, Sheila Perlman, who’s a writer. She’ll write a good story, and it would probably be picked up by lots of the local papers. How do you feel about this, Rose?”
“I feel that it’s a good idea.”
“I’ll call your father tonight.”
“Maybe you should call him in the afternoon,” I say, thinking of all the time my father has been spending at The Luck of the Irish lately. The earlier she talks to him, the less chance there is that he will have had a drink already.
“Deal,” says Mrs. Kushel.
* * *
Three days later I arrive at school wearing the same dress I wore on school picture day. My hair is brushed and Uncle Weldon tied a ribbon in it.
When it’s time for recess, my classmates leave the cafeteria and run to the playground, while Mrs. Kushel and I walk back to our room. Waiting there is a woman wearing a blue wool jacket and matching blue wool pants. Her face looks serious, but when she sees me she smiles.
“Rose,” says Mrs. Kushel, “meet Ms. Perlman. She’s the writer. Ms. Perlman, this is Rose Howard.”
Ms. Perlman stretches out her hand and I know I’m supposed to shake it, which I do.
“Well,” says my teacher, “shall we get down to business?”
Ms. Perlman opens a laptop computer. She starts asking me questions—questions about Rain, about when my father brought her home, about how we lost her and how we found her. And then more questions about what happened after we located her at Happy Tails. I give her a photo of Rain that Uncle Weldon took with his digital camera.
Ms. Perlman looks at the photo, looks at me, looks at the photo again, and when she glances at me a second time I think I see tears in her eyes. “This is a very brave and selfless thing you’re doing, Rose,” she says. “Giving up the dog you love so that her proper owners can be reunited with her.”
I nod. Maybe I’m supposed to say thank you.
Two, three, five, seven, eleven.
When I say nothing, Ms. Perlman says to Mrs. Kushel, “At the end of the article we’ll include a contact number—a number at the Hatford Herald—that people can call if they have any information about Rain or the Hendersons. That way Rose’s personal information will remain private.”
Mrs. Kushel nods. “I’ll explain that to Rose’s fa—” She pauses. “I think I’ll explain it to her uncle, when he picks her up today.”