The case of the hooking.., p.1
The Case of the Hooking Bull,
p.1
The Case of the Hooking Bull
John R. Erickson
Illustrations by Gerald L. Holmes
Maverick Books, Inc.
Publication Information
MAVERICK BOOKS
Published by Maverick Books, Inc.
P.O. Box 549, Perryton, TX 79070
Phone: 806.435.7611
www.hankthecowdog.com
irst published in the United States of America by Gulf Publishing Company, 1992.
Subsequently published simultaneously by Viking Children’s Books and Puffin Books, members of Penguin Putnam Books for Young Readers, 1999.
Currently published by Maverick Books, Inc., 2013.
1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2
Copyright © John R. Erickson, 1992
All rights reserved
Maverick Books, Inc. Paperback ISBN: 978-1-59188-118-6
Hank the Cowdog® is a registered trademark of John R. Erickson.
Printed in the United States of America
Except in the United States of America, this book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
Dedication
This book is dedicated to the cowboys I have known and ridden with over the years—the Jim Streeters, the Jake Parkers, and the Frankie McWhorters who have shared their wisdom and knowledge with me.
Contents
Chapter One Watering the Shrubbery
Chapter Two Code Name “Abilene”
Chapter Three Emerald Pond
Chapter Four Running Scientific Tests on Strawberry Ice Cream
Chapter Five The Spaceship Episode
Chapter Six Attacked by the Couch Monster
Chapter Seven We Meet the Horrible Hairy Hooking Bull
Chapter Eight What Happened Next
Chapter Nine This Is the Scary Part
Chapter Ten A Buzzard Falls Out of the Sky
Chapter Eleven A Buzzard Family Feud
Chapter Twelve Saved Just in the Nick of Time
Chapter One: Watering the Shrubbery
It’s me again, Hank the Cowdog. It started out to be a normal summertime day. Drover and I were asleep on our gunnysack beds under the gas tanks, although I wasn’t entirely asleep.
Very seldom do I indulge myself in 100 percent sleep because . . . well, just think about it. There’s no telling who or what might come onto the ranch and do who-knows-what.
Let us say that I was in a light doze, listening to Drover grunt, wheeze, and snore in his sleep. Perhaps I had a few matters of business on my mind, but not many, and for sure I wasn’t thinking about the Huge Horrible Hooking Bull in the north pasture.
Maybe I should have been, because before the day was over, that monster of a bull would . . . better not reveal any more of the story. I’d hate to scare the kids too badly too soon.
This bull belonged to the neighbors, see, and he’d been tearing down gates and fences and causing a lot of trouble. Slim and Loper had run him out of the pasture three or four times, but he kept coming back and destroying fences.
You probably know how much your average cowboy enjoys repairing fence in the heat of summer.
Not much. By the second or third time, he starts thinking of naughty things to do to the party who is destroying the fence.
But doing naughty things to such a big, mean, huge horned creature isn’t as easy as you might think. The problem comes from the fact that bulls are pretty good hands at fighting back.
Oops, I wasn’t going to reveal any more.
Yes, this is going to be a pretty scary story, so use your own judgment. If you have a weak nervous system, you might ought to find something else to do and leave this story alone.
Where was I? Oh yes, under the gas tanks. I leaped to my feet and took a deep, luxurious stretch. I was about to kick Drover awake and outline the day’s work when I heard the screen door slam up at the house.
Drover heard it too. His ears jumped, his eyes popped open, and he yelled, “Scraps!” And in a flash he was gone.
“Drover, wait! Come back here.”
He came padding back. “What’s wrong?”
“What’s wrong is that you cheated. Do you think it’s fair for you to leave while I’m in the middle of a stretch?”
“Well . . .”
“Of course it’s not. That’s the kind of shabby trick I would expect from Pete, but I’m shocked that you’d try such a thing.”
“Well . . .”
“If we can’t play fair, Drover, we shouldn’t play at all.”
“I guess not, but I was hungry.”
“Everyone’s hungry, Drover, but the kind of hunger we need in this world is a hunger for fair play and manners.”
“I guess so.”
“Are you ashamed of yourself?”
“Well . . . I guess so. I’ve always wanted to be a good dog.”
“I know you have, son, and I know you will be.” I gave him a pat on the shoulder to make him feel better. “Now, we’ll start this thing all over again and do it right this time. On the count of four, you may race up to the yard gate.”
“Four?”
“That’s correct.”
“I thought everybody started on the count of three.”
“I will leave on three. You will leave on four. That way you won’t be tempted to cheat again.”
“Oh good. Thanks, Hank.”
“Any time, Drover, any time.”
I was the first to reach the yard gate, heh-heh.
There I found . . . hmm . . . no scraps, but the gate was open. Leaving the yard gate open was a transgression of Sally May’s Law, and I could think of only one party on the ranch who might do such a thing.
Hint: He was five years old, walked on two legs, made lots of noise, and often had mischief on his mind. If you guessed Junior the Buzzard or Slim Chance, the cowboy, you’re wrong. The correct answer is Little Alfred.
Yes, Little Alfred was bad about leaving gates open, and I had a hunch that this was some of his work. I confirmed this hunch by subjugating the area around the gate to a Sniffatory Analysis.
I don’t want to scare anybody with these big technical terms. A Sniffatory Analysis means pretty muchly the same as “checking the area for scent,” but those of us in the Security Business, and I’m talking about those of us who live with it day and night, tend to refer to things in heavy-duty technical terms.
I mean, it’s just second nature to us, and I guess we forget that most of the world doesn’t understand big scientific words. I’ll try to keep it as simple as possible, but you must bear in mind that . . .
All at once this seems a little boring.
Okay, where were we? Yard gate, that’s where we were. I had just run an S.A. of the area around the yard gate, and, yes, it turned up positive for Little Alfred. The little stinkpot was running loose, and since I couldn’t hear him making the sounds of bulldozers or dynamite, I suspected that he was up to no good.
I crept up the hill and checked it out. Ah yes, there he was, roping chickens in front of the machine shed. That was good clean entertainment for the boy. Roping cats might have been even better, but I noticed that Pete was nowhere in sight.
Pete was no mountain of intelligence, but he had figgered out that rope business. The moment Little Alfred stepped out the door with a loaded rope in his hands, Kitty-Kitty tended to vanish.
And somehow the world always seemed a better, brighter place when Pete disappeared.
Well, the boy was busy and happy roping chickens, so I went back down to the yard gate to run a more thorough search for scraps. It was then that I heard Drover’s voice.
“Hank, have you counted to four yet?”
“Not yet, son. We’re at 3.5 and holding. Just be patient.”
“I’ll try, but I sure could use some scraps.”
“I understand, Drover, but we mustn’t jump the count. The entire universe is like a giant clock, with mathematics as its spring. If we ignore the numbers, there’s no telling what might happen.”
“What?”
“No!”
I sniffed out the ground just outside the gate. Nothing, not a single trace of eggs, bacon, or even burned toast. For a moment I considered going through the gate into Forbidden Territory—into Sally May’s yard, in other words—but I was well aware that dogs weren’t allowed there. I was also very much aware of the consequences of getting . . .
On the other hand, she was nowhere in sight, and Little Alfred just might have left a few juicy morsels of breakfast scraps within the fence, and rather than run the risk of letting Pete devour all the scraps, I decided to make a small penetration of the yard.
My front paws crossed the line. I waited and watched. No sign of Sally May or her broom. I moved forward, causing my hind paws to cross into the Danger Zone. Still no sign of Sally May.
Well, this could mean only one thing. She had softened her position on Dogs in the Yard and had finally realized that a yard with dogs is a safer yard.
A happier yard. A
Well, now that she had come to her senses on that score, I felt as though a heavy burden had been lifted off of my soldiers. Instead of creeping and cringing, cowering and crouching, flinching at every little sound for fear that I might be thrashed with a broom, I loosened up and began to enjoy my new freedom.
I was SO proud of Sally May for working out a compromise on the yard business. I mean, even your bigger and tougher breeds of dog can admire a nice, well-kept yard, with its mowed grass, edged edges, neat little patches of flowers here and there, shrubbery . . .
And speaking of shrubbery, I passed one of her shrubberies and noticed that it had never been marked. Can you imagine that? This poor little shrubbery had been on the ranch for . . . what? Two years? Three? A long time, and it had never been marked.
The poor, lonely little shrubbery! Well, you know me. As long as I have an ounce of strength and an ounce of fluid left in my body, I’ll be glad to share it with a shrubbery, and I did. And just to be sure that Pete got the message, I gave it two coats.
“LEAVE MY SHRUBS ALONE, YOU NASTY DOG!! SCAT!”
Huh?
The voice sounded a lot like Sally May’s, and when the first rock bounced off my ribs . . . OOF! . . . I was almost sure that it was . . . OOF! . . . Sally May speaking.
You see, she kept a small pile of rocks beside the back door, almost as though she had planned all along to use them on, well, stray dogs or someone who had penetrated the sanctimony of her precious yard.
What we had here was a simple case of mistaken identity, and rather than run the risk of further confusion, I ran for my life and moved my business underneath the car, which was parked just beyond the yard gate.
From this vantage point, I peeked out at the field of battle and noticed that . . . hmmm. Slim and Loper had joined her on the back porch.
Slim was loaded down with suitcases. Loper was carrying Baby Molly, a diaper bag, and a fold-up high chair.
It appeared that someone was leaving the ranch.
Chapter Two: Code Name “Abilene”
From my bunker position, I homed in on their voice frequencies and picked up these bits of information:
1. Sally May and Loper were going to Abilene to attend the wedding of . . . someone. Two people. Two people were getting married—a man and a woman.
2. One of the alleged persons-to-be-wed was Sally May’s cousin.
3. It appeared that Loper had resisted the idea of attending the wedding, arguing that he had a month’s work to do on the ranch and no hope of getting caught up.
4. To which Sally May replied: “If it was a team roping, a rodeo, or a dog fight, you’d be caught up in a New York minute, but when it comes to my kinfolks, you always seem to be snowed under!”
5. Loper seemed to have no answer to that. He scowled up at the clouds and tugged at his necktie and mumbled, “This thing’s choking me to death. I’ll have brain damage before we reach Guthrie.”
6. Slim wore his everyday cowboy clothes and a big smile. I got the feeling that he was enjoying all of this.
7. Sally May pointed out that wearing a tie once or twice a year wouldn’t kill Loper, and even if it did, she “just might enjoy the insurance money”—whatever that meant.
8. Slim laughed out loud. Loper glared at him and his lips formed words I couldn’t hear.
So there you are. Those were the clues I amassed from my observation point beneath the car. Pretty impressive, huh? You bet it was.
Oh yes, one last detail.
All at once Baby Molly began to cry. Loper bounced her around in his arms, then handed her over to Sally May. “Here, Ma, your daughter’s calling you.”
Sally May took the baby and got her settled down. Then she turned a pair of steely eyes on Slim. “Slim, I’ll be honest. I have some misgivings about leaving you in charge of my house and child.”
He nodded. “Yes ma’am, I can understand that, sure can.”
“You will feed my child something while I’m gone, won’t you?”
“Oh yes ma’am.”
“Vegetables?”
“You bet, lots of vegetables.”
“He needs to take a bath tonight and brush his teeth after every meal.”
“You bet.”
“At bedtime, I usually read him a story.”
“Uh-huh.”
“And then I tuck him in and we say our prayers.”
“Yalp.”
“Sometimes he wants a glass of juice at bedtime.”
“Uh-huh.”
“So if you want to make him a glass of orange juice, that will be fine.”
“Okay, orange juice.”
“Slim, can you remember all this?”
“Oh yeah, you bet.”
“Maybe I should make a list.”
Loper eased her down the sidewalk toward the car. “Everything’ll be fine, hon. Old Slim might not look very smart, but he’s really pretty stupid.”
“This is no time for joking.”
“Sally May, we’ll only be gone for two days.”
“Pompeii was destroyed in fifteen minutes.”
“Hon, Slim can’t even find his hip pocket in fifteen minutes.”
“I’m not feeling any better.”
“Shall we go or shall we stay home?”
By this time they were standing right beside the car. Their feet, ankles, etc. were only a matter of inches away from my nose. Sally May was wearing a dress, don’t you see, which meant that her ankles were sort of bare.
For some strange reason . . . it was just an impulse, see, a sudden impulse that happened before I could think about it . . . all at once it occurred to me that I should, well, lick Sally May on the ankle, you might say.
Maybe she hadn’t seen me under the car and maybe she wasn’t expecting anyone to lick her on the ankle, because she sure took it the wrong way.
“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!”
Yes, I’m almost sure it caught her by surprise, the way she jumped back and kicked the car door all in one rapid motion. It appeared to hurt her foot, but the good news was that she missed my nose.
“What’s wrong, hon?”
“Something licked me on the ankle, and I have a pretty good idea who it was.” Her face appeared upside down in the little slot of daylight between the car and the ground.
I, uh, whapped my tail several times upon the, uh, gravel drive and tried to squeeze up a big, friendly cowdog smile, as if to say, “Oh, I guess that was, uh, your ankle, right?”
“STOP LICKING ME! I have to go to a wedding this afternoon and I don’t want to smell like a sewer!”
Okay, fine. If that’s the way she felt about it, by George, I would just pack up my licks and take them somewhere else. But she didn’t need to screech at me like that.
Dogs have feelings too.
In many ways, we’re very sensitive, and all that screeching and yelling and so forth has a dilapidating effect on our . . . something. Inner being, I guess.
So after having my inner being smashed and crushed, I crawled out from under the car and went slinking off with my tail between my legs and sat down beside the fence, some ten yards away from Sally May, and proceeded to beam hurtful looks at her.
She didn’t notice the hurtful looks. Instead, she turned to Slim and said, “And speaking of dogs, I don’t want any dogs in my yard while I’m gone.”
“Yes ma’am.”
“And I don’t suppose we need to discuss dogs in the house.”
Slim shifted his weight to his other leg. “Now, I’m pretty strict on that, Sally May. These dogs don’t get away with much around me, they sure don’t.”
Sally May took a deep, slow breath. “This is probably a mistake. I’ll probably regret this for the rest of my life, but if we’re going to make the wedding, we’d better go.”
Loper turned to Slim. “Can you run that bull out by yourself or would you rather wait until I get back?”
Slim smiled. “One riot, one Ranger.”
“Well, watch him. He’s big enough to hurt somebody.”
