HOWLING DOG FARM
By
Actress-Author BARBARA LAWRENCE
and
Melinda Murphy
Published by Barbara Lawrence at Smashwords
Copyright 2010 Barbara Lawrence
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Special thanks from the Author Barbara Lawrence:
Many many thanks to my daughter Melinda Murphy who's selfless work in dog rescue inspired me to write Howling Dog Farm. Special thanks to Elise St. Clair for the cover.
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Smashwords Edition, License Notes
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
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The Dog
I've never known a dog to wag
his tail in glee he did not feel,
Nor quit his old-time friend to wag
at some more influential heel.
The yellowest cur I ever knew
Was to the boy that loved him true.
I've never know a dog to show
halfway devotion to his friend;
To seek a kinder man to know,
or richer; but unto the end
The humblest dog I ever knew
was to the man that loved him true.
I've never known a dog to fake
affection for a present gain,
A false display of love to make
some little favor to attain.
I've never known a Prince or Spot
that seemed to be what he was not.
And I have known a dog to bear
starvation's pangs from day to day,
With him who had been glad to share
his bread and meat along the way.
No dog, however mean or rude,
Is guilty of ingratitude.
-Anonymous
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Chapter 1: The Farm
Chapter 2: The Sign
Chapter 3: The Will
Chapter 4: The Trip
Chapter 5: The Detouri
Chapter 6: The Stranger
Chapter 7: The Chores
Chapter 8: The DOGS
Chapter 9: The Farmhands
Chapter 10: The Town
Chapter 11: The Woods
Chapter 12: The Journal
Chapter 13: The Sheriff
Chapter 14: The Fourth
Chapter 15: The Stone
Chapter 16: The Secret
Chapter 17: The Trail
Chapter 18: The Plan
Chapter 19: The Ceremony
Chapter 20: The Answer
Chapter 21: The Name
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Howling Dog Farm
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Chapter 1
ON A DARK AND LONELY night in northern Idaho, the windshield wipers of the Patterson’s little station wagon fought a losing battle with the pelting rain - the whish and whoosh of the wipers being no match for the downpour’s splash and splat.
Claps of thunder on their way to faraway places shook the wagon as Meg Patterson and her kids, Cassie and Pete, swiped at fogged windows as they desperately looked for Grandpa Cassidy’s farm in the rain-swept loneliness.
Passing miles of split-log fences that had been laid in zigzag patterns to enclose meadows and pastures, the looming forests that pushed in from every side were hundreds of feet high. Most farm buildings were long distances from the road and their windows were dark and unwelcoming at such a late hour.
When the Pattersons left California three days earlier, little American flags waved proudly from their wagon’s roof rack; now, they were hanging on for dear life.
Another crack of deafening thunder shook the wagon and Pete’s Siamese cat, Duchess, yowled in fear: feeling unsafe in a pet-carrier that was held together with strips of duct tape.
Pete yelled at his sister, “We’re gonna get hit by lightning if you don’t take off that dumb crown! And you’re gonna scare the donkey with that pink hair!”
Tired and annoyed, Cassie re-positioned the rhinestone tiara on her head. “We’re not at the farm yet,” she yelled back, “I can wear whatever I want! And in case you haven’t noticed, I’ve got on overalls and boots. What’s on my head is none of your dumb business!”
With a mocking tone, Pete looked down his raised nose to remind her, “Just because you turned thirteen, doesn’t make you a queen, you know?”
“Being all of ten years old,” she shot back, “your opinion’s as important to me as a frog’s!”
“Hang in there guys,” Meg interrupted, trying to sound calm. “We’ll find the farm soon, I promise.” Far from calm inside, she wondered what they’d do if they didn’t find her father’s farm? She looked at her watch. Could her fears become a reality? Could you get shot for driving onto a stranger’s property in the middle of the night?
The wagon’s headlights shimmered through the sheets of rain, Cassie squinting to look out her window on the car’s passenger side. “Maybe we’ve been looking on the wrong side of the road,” she said. “Maybe the farm’s on this side. How can we see anything through this rain? It’s like a car-wash!
“Wait,” Meg said, “I think I see a mailbox up ahead there. Get the flashlight, Pete.”
Frustrated as he reached for the light, Pete whined, “We’ve stopped at three farms, Mom. Where are we? Try calling again.”
“I told you the cell phone doesn’t work out here. Homer Hyde said nine miles on the first road and four-and-a-half miles on this road. He said it’s on the left. That’s got to be Grandpa’s farm up ahead there!” Meg was hopeful their journey had finally ended.
Already fed up with ‘country’ living, Pete continued his complaint, “How does the mail get delivered with no address?”
Opening his window to train the flashlight on any signs that might identify his grandfather’s property, a gust of wind blew rain in his face and also splattered Duchess through a large split in her carrier. If a cat could sing, she’d be singing “RESPECT”!
“Oh m’gosh,” Cassie yelled, wrapping herself in a picnic blanket. “Don’t open the window until you have to, it’s raining into the car!” Pete closed the window but couldn’t close his sister’s mouth: “Only a fungoid would do something like that!” she said.
“What’s a ‘fungoid’ supposed to mean?!”
“I saw it on a bottle at the drugstore. I hope it means something totally disgusting!”
“It’s medicine for fungus,” Meg said, answering her kid’s questions out of habit, her eyes fixed on the approaching break in the fencing.
“Fungus? Perfect!” Cassie said, shooting Pete a look that could wither a weed.
“If you’re so worried about getting wet,” he argued, “you should‘a worn that dress you made out of a shower curtain!”
“Chill out!” Meg shouted, hoping kid-speak would have a quicker response than, “Be quiet!” It did. She turned the steering wheel to the left and pulled the wagon off the paved road. As it came to a stop, its headlight’s shimmered through the rain onto a gate and mailbox.
“The flashlight, Pete,” Meg said anxiously.
Opening his window again, Pete aimed the flashlight at the mailbox: Nothing. He aimed it at the gate: Nothing.
Cassie said, “On that tree over there. I think I see something!”
Pete aimed the flashlight on a tree where a long and bent old nail held a wobbly old sign. Barely readable, its faded letters spelled, CASSIDY. Another clap of thunder shook the car.
“Thank you, God!” Meg said to the heavens. “Pete, get out and open the gate!”
Pulling his jacket over his head in the downpour, Pete pushed the gate to one side then quickly jumped back in the car.
Meg peered into the darkness. “I don’t see a single, solitary light. Maybe the storm knocked out the electricity. As I
remember, it’s several hundred yards from the gate to the house. We’ll soon find out,” she said, smiling. “Let’s go, gang!”
As the wagon proceeded onto the farm rode, the non-stop yelps from barking dogs penetrated the din of the storm, getting louder and louder. The headlights shone on the fence of a dog-run on the side of the road where two large dogs raced back and forth along the wire fencing. Even in the pouring rain they were having fun barking and wagging their tails like dogs do.
“Why are they out in this terrible rain? Don’t they have any shelter?” Cassie wondered.
Meg looked past the dogs. “They’ve got dog houses in the back of the run. Over there, see.”
“Thank goodness,” said Cassie.
The wagon slowly passed a small garage: a tractor and truck were parked outside. Immediately, more barking started.
Peering through the darkness, Pete squinted, “All I see are eight yellow eyes.” Four identical black dogs ran and tumbled along the fence of their run, following the wagon down the road as far as their enclosure would allow.
The windshield wipers were going full throttle as the wagon headed toward a large maple tree in the middle of the road’s “turn-around” which allowed cars to go back down the farm road.
“Where’s the caretaker?” Cassie worried. “Why don’t you honk, Mom? I don’t want to get out of the wagon. There may be some dogs running loose. And they might not be as nice as they look.”
“Today was supposed to be the caretaker’s last day,” Meg answered. “But... who knows?” She tapped on the horn a couple of times and more dogs started barking. “Oh, no,” she said as he shoulders slumped.
As the Patterson’s wagon rounded the tree, the headlights picked up a series of dog pens and runs. Dogs were running all over the place, each trying to bark louder than the others.
Managing a faint smile, Meg said, “Protective, aren’t they? That’s a good thing.”
Cassie pointed, “Look, one of the dogs has only three legs. The poor thing.”
Meg peered through the rain. “I think I see the big barn over there behind the runs. The house should be practically in front of us. Everything’s so dark… Yes, there it is! There’s the farmhouse!” A sadness crept into her voice, “It looks just the same.”
~~~
An old farmhouse sat on the other side of the turn-around tree, and its covered front porch was stacked to the top with split logs. The house was small and had second-story windows in a steep-sloping roof. All was dark inside. Pete asked, “What if the house is locked?”
“It’s going to be open,” Meg answered, reassuring herself as well as Pete. “Mr. Hyde said it would be open.”
Alarmed, Cassie pointed, “Look, there!” Two dogs were standing in water above their ankles: their dog-run was next to the farmhouse and was being flooded with rainwater from a low spot in the roof pouring down like a spigot.
Cassie cried, “We’ve got to get the dogs out! The water’s flooding their houses! It’s like a waterfall!”
Meg skidded the wagon to a stop in front of the house, its headlights spreading across the porch and the adjacent dog run.
As the dog whined for help, Cassie ran to the dogs holding the picnic blanket over her head as she ran. Flying out behind her like the cape of a witch, the makeshift covering let the rain hit her full force. “Ohhh, she said in disgust, throwing the flapping blanket to the ground.
Meg and Pete ran up to Cassie, huddling together at the gate of the run. The dogs were jumping around, barking in anticipation of help, knowing they were in danger.
Pete tried to calm them, “Hey, guys! It’s okay! It’s okay!”
Over the noise of the dogs and the drone of the rain, Cassie shouted to be heard, “What’ll we do? Do you think we can get ’em to the barn?”
“We’ll need a rope,” Meg yelled. “Pete, get the flashlight and look on the porch. I’ll look along the fence. Turning to Cassie, “Try to get the dogs settled down or we’ll never get control of them!”
Pete ran to the porch while Meg looked along the pen for something to lead the dogs to safety.
Touching their noses through the fence, Cassie tried to comfort the whining dogs. “Don’t worry. You’re going to a nice dry barn!” She looked toward the barn, just as a large, dark figure of a man stepped in front of her. “Aieeee!” she screamed in terror. “Mom!!!”
The stranger squinted at Cassie through a waterfall of rain dripping in front of his face from a hood over his head. The part of his face that was visible was lit by the wagon’s headlights and was cast in ghostly streaks and shadows that distorted it like a Halloween mask.
Meg and Pete ran to Cassie, and Pete shone his flashlight on the man who quickly turned away shielding his face.
Cassie implored, “Who are you? What do you want? Take our money! Take my crown!”
It’s said that in time of danger, your whole life can flash before your eyes. That very thing happened to Cassie. Well, not exactly her whole life... just the last five days!
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Chapter 2
Five days before in sunny California...
Tall, skinny palm trees lined a narrow street called Oleander Lane in the Hollywood hills. Some of the modest bungalows on the street were cottage-like apartments that surrounded courtyards filled with flowers.
Cars on Oleander Lane were parked facing a nearby hill where fifty-foot letters mounted in the earth spelled HOLLYWOOD. The cars seemed to be gazing at the landmark sign and tourists did the same thing every day. The sun had moved away from the street and all the tourists had gone. It was late afternoon, and a long way from Howling Dog Farm.
~~~
Meg Patterson and her children lived in one of the tiled-roof cottages on Oleander Lane and Meg lounged on a comfy sofa in the living room opening the day’s mail. The furniture was casual and welcoming, and Duchess, the family cat, snoozed in the plumpness of an overstuffed chair. Soft music muffled the laughter of Meg’s children in the kitchen.
In her mid-thirties, Meg looked somewhat older: “At least thirty seven,” Cassie had told her. Her hair was pulled back, tightly braided and twisted in a knot, and she grudgingly wore a dab of lip color. Cassie couldn’t understand her mother’s disinterest in the whole makeup-thing, because she, herself, couldn’t wait to try every type of cosmetics in the drugstore.
Meg’s legs were up on a sofa and a slipper dangled off one of her feet. Slightly grimacing, she rotated that ankle: it had been twisted at the hospital when she ran to assist a hollering patient only to find that he’d dropped his TV remote.
A framed photo of a young fireman sat on a nearby table. He looked happy and proud. Meg smiled and winked at the photograph, looking lovingly at his friendly face. It had only been six years since her husband had died in a warehouse fire but it seemed like she’d lived a whole lifetime without him. He was interested in photography, and the photos he’d taken of her and the kids and his firehouse buddies were displayed all around the room. When she became a widow, Meg became a hospital nurse. She learned that a good nurse is organized, clean, efficient, conscientious, and orderly. And even if she didn’t feel like smiling, a good nurse always smiled ... even when she was sticking in needles. When Meg told that to her kids, they thought the last part sounded like fun. Pete and Cassie were only four and seven at the time.
Meg looked out a nearby window. Her eyes followed the sun on its way toward the nearby Pacific Ocean. It would set shortly and her thoughts seemed as far away as the sun.
Since becoming a nurse, Meg had gotten into the hospital routine so completely that she acted like a nurse no matter where she was, or what she was doing, or what she was wearing. She had often thought: “I guess that’s what keeps me in a uniform instead of a party dress.”
In the small kitchen of the house, Cassie and Pete were kidding around as usual. Cassie posed while Pete took pictures of her doing the dishes. Pete took an after-school photography class and he and his sister treated the dishwashing chore like a professional “photo shoot.” In other words, they were acting like a photographer and a model. Pete snapped away.
An apron couldn’t hide Cassie’s personal fashion style - “Anything as long as it’s funky,” she would explain. Since school was out, and she was out of her uniform, Cassie was like a flower bulb that had been waiting all year to bloom - and she was “blooming” with all of her might. Even her bedroom door was decorated with flashing string-lights in a sparkly bubble-gum pink.
Cassie had happily joined the MTV “wannabe outrageous” teen culture the minute she woke up on her thirteenth birthday. And her tag-along best friend forever, Tiffany - “Tiff” for short - would rather be like Cassie than anyone else in the whole world.
Meg had talked to other mothers about the changes in their daughters and they’d agreed that the girls were like worms turning into butterflies. Meg knew that Cassie had never been the worm type - she’d always been a butterfly - and she’d point out that the colorfully winged insects were originally called “flutter-bys,” not “butterflies.”
If there were two sides of a coin, one side was Cassie and the other side was her mother. While Meg was uncomfortable calling attention to herself, Cassie had begun to change the color of her hair at least once a week with food dye, Meg quick to explain that Cassie was not allowed to color her own short, blonde hair. Instead, she bought cheap, on-sale wigs, cut them in a scissor’s-chop style and soaked them in a bowl of dye. The wigs usually de-colorized after a tumble in the washing machine.
The kids had been out of school for almost a month and it was their summer vacation. Meg knew it was a time when creative energy came out of them like bolts of lightning.
One day, Meg sat Cassie down and asked her about the “new girl” who lived in their house. “Her hair and clothes have changed so much, I hardly know who she is,” Meg said. “I’ve been wondering if you know her.”
Cassie thought for a few seconds. “Well,” she answered, “according to all the teen magazines, I’m just looking for my ‘identity’.”
“Your identity?” Meg questioned, surprised.
“I have to wear a school uniform every year, right? And according to the dictionary ‘uniform’ means ‘all the same.’ But, I don’t want to be the same as everybody else. I want to be me - but who am I? So,” she smiled, “I’m looking for my ‘identity’.”
Meg paused to think over what Cassie had said. “You know,” she told her daughter, “you don’t need to find something that isn’t lost. Everybody’s one-of-a-kind. There’s no one like you in the whole world. You couldn’t lose your identity if you tried. Nothing in the world, not snow flakes, the leaves of a tree, not people or ants can be duplicated.”
Meg watched Cassie’s smile turn into a droop, and realized that she’d started lecturing her daughter again – making her own point instead of responding to Cassie’s.
Meg lifted her chin and smiled, “I’m not saying that being ‘different’ is bad. Sometimes, it’s a lot of fun.”
Cassie brightened, “You’re so totally right! My hair, for instance. I just want to color-coordinate it with my new look!” She jumped up and twirled around and around, letting Meg get the full impact of what she was wearing. Meg thought that Cassie’s new look consisted of a lot of old looks: 70’s retro, 60’s flower-child, and Salvation Army.
“I just freaked out when I saw what you can get on Melrose Avenue’s ‘Final Sale’ racks. And at thrift stores!
Imagine being able to buy all of this with baby-sitting money. You know, it’s not easy putting this look together.”
Meg scrutinized Cassie’s clicking plastic beads, the bridesmaid’s dress of flowing chiffon over multi-colored tights, the sequined ribbon that held her pink hair close to her head, and the leopard-patterned tennis shoes. The thought occurred to Meg that maybe Cassie’s mismatched collection of clothes were no more bizarre than pictures she’d seen of current designer-fashions. Actually, she believed that Cassie had a natural talent for design.
Meg knew that Cassie’s dad would have thought his daughter looked beautiful, no matter what she wore. And he would have been right. Even though he was a “tough-guy” fireman, he had the creative gene that was passed to his daughter.
A noise jolted Meg from her thoughts. “Yeoooow,” Pete yelled from the kitchen. Cassie was snapping her towel at him. He dodged the towel and jumped around playfully.
Meg picked up the remainder of the unopened mail and looked through it. One of the envelopes caught her eye. She looked at the return address - squinting to read it more closely - and took out the several enclosed pages of a type-written letter.
In the kitchen, Cassie announced with a flourish, “You can’t get away, you little twit of a boy.” With each flip of the towel, she struck a martial-arts pose. Pete tried to grab the towel, laughing as he grabbed at the air.
Pete was a very likeable ten-year-old, but when compared to his sister - who someone said, “glows in the dark” - he was just a regular kid. And that’s okay with him. With his homework; lots of playground games; his photography assignment to make a photo album of his summer activities, and his cat, Duchess, Pete didn’t have time to worry about who glows in the dark.
To tease him, his friends called him Little Peter Pat - fooling around with his name. Pete liked his name. It was the same as his father’s. That made him Peter Patterson, Jr. What his friends called him didn’t bother him at all. They’re still my friends,” he’d say. “I call them goofy names too.”
When Pete turned ten, Cassie asked him to be her “confidant.” He thought that sounded really cool and she kissed him on both cheeks to “seal the deal.” When he looked up the word in the dictionary, he found out that a confidant was someone who didn’t tell someone else’s secrets.
“Heck,” he told Cassie, “I thought it was something better than that. I thought it was something you do, not something you don’t do.”
“It is,” Cassie said. “I talk and you listen. That’s what you do.”
Sometimes, instead of just listening, Pete had tried to talk his sister out of doing dopey things like when she found out they were looking for Go-Go dancers at a Sunset Strip nightclub. When Cassie showed up for the audition, the manager could see that she was just a kid and chased her out of the club. He told her that if she ever came back, he’d call the police.
“I told you, so,” Pete had said.
“Well, it was worth a try,” Cassie shrugged her shoulders. “How many girls from middle-school get to be Go-Go dancers?”
Sometimes, Cassie, Tiff and Pete hung out at a movie premier, a “Walk of Fame” star-dedication, or an Awards ceremony in Hollywood. If the red-carpet arrivals took place at night, Meg wouldn’t let them go. But most events are planned during the day in California since TV coverage plays to different time zones around the country. The celebrities would arrive in their limos and fancy clothes while the fans stood around getting a suntan in tee shirts and shorts.
Nobody yelled louder than Cassie, Pete and Tiff: “Zac!” “Dakota!” “Miley!” “Over here!” They’d get hoarse from all the screaming. Pete took photos while Cassie and Tiff begged for autographs.
For the first time since her husband died, Meg thought her kids might need a change. She’d been thinking about moving her family somewhere else to live, not only to find a solid foothold for them but for herself as well. She’d begun to feel burnt-out at the hospital and hadn’t felt like “smiling” for a long time.
Meg thought she could find a job in a related field almost anywhere – at a small clinic, a doctor’s office, maybe a pharmacy. But where? More than once she’d thought, “Maybe I’m the one who needs a change, not the kids. Hmmm, I’ll have to think about that.” But there was no rush.
A big dose of reality forced Meg to think otherwise; the letter she’d been reading made her catch her breath. She called to her kids, “Will you come in here please.”
Cassie and Pete stuck their heads through the kitchen doorway. “Quickly!” Meg prompted them.
******
Chapter Three
Surprised by their mother’s urgent tone, Cassie and Pete hurried into the living room, bombarding her with questions. “What’s the matter?” “What happened? “Is it something good?” “Is it something bad?” Duchess jumped off a nearby chair to find a more peaceful place to snooze.
“Slow down,” Meg said, “I have something important to tell you. Sit here next to me.” Cassie and Pete settled themselves on the sofa and Meg showed them the letter that had been in the envelope. “I just got this from Grandpa Cassidy’s attorney. He... died.”
“Grandpa’s attorney died?” Pete asked.
Cassie looked at him with big-sister impatience, “How could he write a letter if he died?”
Pete shrugged, “Maybe he wrote it before he died. How’m I supposed to know?”
“Just listen, will you?” Meg quieted them. “It was your Grandpa who died.”
Cassie and Pete grew silent. They seemed unsure about the news and how they were supposed to feel. After waiting for a response, Meg asked them, “You remember Grandpa don’t you?”
Cassie hadn’t thought about him for a long time. “Yes, “I remember Grandpa. And I remember Grandma too. One summer, Dad drove us up to their farm in Iowa.”
“That’s the summer they moved there.” explained Meg. “But the farm’s in Idaho, honey, not Iowa. Those are Indian names; they sound alike don’t they?” Meg thought of another place and another time. “Do you remember all the trees on the farm, and the big red barn behind the house?”
Excited, Pete chimed in, “And the creek where the wild animalsdrank at night?”
“Right!” Cassie recalled. “Didn’t we have Pete’s third birthday there? Didn’t Dad let him ride a donkey?”
Pete laughed, “He told me it was a moose!”
Cassie remembered something else. She frowned, “Didn’t you tell us we couldn’t go back to the farm after Grandma died because Grandpa got weird?”
“I never said he got weird,” answered Meg. “He just ... preferred animals to people.”
Pete picked up Duchess, who was rubbing against his leg. He nuzzled the cat saying, “Sometimes, I prefer animals too.” Duchess curled up in the warmth of his lap.
“But Grandpa was your father,” Cassie said to her mom. “Why wouldn’t he want to see you?” She looked at the framed photo of her own father on the table, “I know Dad would want to see me.”
Meg looked at the photograph. She knew how much her children missed their Dad. “He does see you. He sees you and loves you. That’s why when we tell him goodnight, we say that we’ll always love him. And Grandpa saw you too. I sent photos all the time ... to all the relatives.”
With a catch in his voice, Pete said, “Now we’ll never see him or the farm again.”
“Would you really like to see the farm?” Meg asked, a sly look on her face.
“Sure,” Cassie answered. “Who wouldn’t?”
Pete broke into a big smile, “Could we? Could we?”
Meg couldn’t keep the secret any longer. “I’ve saved the good news for last. Grandpa left the farm to us!” Showing them a page in the letter, she said, “Look at this.”
Cassie and Pete couldn’t ask enough questions, “How?” “What?” “Why?” “Maybe somebody’s foolin’ with us!” Duchess jumped out of Pete’s lap, once again looking for a quiet place. If she’d had hands, Duchess would’ve put them over her ears.
Pete couldn’t keep still. Jumping around in excitement, he begged, “Can we go to the farm this summer? Can we? Can we?”
Unlike her brother, Cassie’s enthusiasm deflated like a pierced balloon. Wrinkling her nose, she asked, “We aren’t actually going to live there, are we?”
Pretending to be unaware of her daughter’s contrary attitude, Meg smiled. “Won’t it be fun? Remember how we agreed that change can be fun?”
When she’d read the letter, Meg was faced with her own mixed emotions about the end of her father’s life and the beginning of a new life for her little family. But she felt an opportunity that had come out of the blue like that had to be “fate,” and she made up her mind almost instantly. The only problem was Cassie.
Many times before, Meg had seen her daughter dig in her heels when there was something she didn’t want to do; she was stubborn even when she was a little girl. “Well,” Meg thought, “she probably got that from me, and I can dig in my heels too!” She picked up the letter, “According to the will, there are certain conditions we have to meet. The first is ... we have thirty days to decide if we’ll take the farm or not.”
“What happens if we don’t?” Cassie asked hopefully.
“Then Grandpa’s leaving the farm to his dogs!”
“His dogs?!” Pete asked in disbelief.
“Is that legal?” Cassie frowned.
Shrugging her shoulders, Meg said, “I read about a man once who had a dog and a cat and he left his boat to the cat.”
Pete laughed, “That must have made the dog mad.”
Cassie stood up, pacing in and out of the surrounding rooms, Meg casting her a wary glance. “Okay, here’s what I think,” she said. Pete was all ears.
“We take the farm and sell it! And we buy a house here in Hollywood ... instead of ‘renting’ all the time.” Cassie raised her arms gesturing grandly, “Imagine having a big place where we could do anything we wanted!” She giggled, “We could have parties. Maybe even ‘Prom Night.’ Or a reality show!”
“Cool!” Pete exclaimed.
Meg was quick to respond, “The farm’s on thirty acres, Cassie, that’s reality! You’re talking about dreams.”
“Why not? What’s wrong with dreams?”
Pete looked at his mother for her response, hoping the back-and-forth would turn into a ping-pong match.
“Do you know how many people dream of owning a beautiful old farm?” Meg asked.
“No,” Cassie admitted with rolling eyes. “I don’t.”
“Well, there are a lot of them. But, the farm’s not a sure thing. There’s another condition in Grandpa’s will.”
“More?” Cassie frowned.
“If we sell the farm before one year’s time, the money from the sale will be put in a bank for the dogs and they’ll be cared for until they all die. And the attorney says that if we don’t want the farm, he already got us a buyer.”
Pete was worried. “But we do want it,” he said. “I want to live on the farm. I could ride a donkey to school. I could take care of the dogs and all the animals.” He had a second thought. “How many animals are there?”
“A few dogs and maybe a donkey.”
“How hard can that be?” he said with a big smile.
“The attorney also wrote that he hasn’t been out to the farm in a long time because Grandpa never wanted him ‘hanging around.’ He’s hired someone else to look after the place until we get there, but the phone was disconnected a long time ago.”
“What does the Will actually say?” Cassie asked. “Maybe there’s a way out?”
Meg was getting impatient with her daughter’s obstinate questions. “It’s just one paragraph. It says, ‘Us or the dogs’!”
Seeing Cassie’s back stiffen, she added, “You’re the reason Grandpa left the farm to us, Cassie. You should be proud instead of acting like ‘Miss Fancy-Pants’.” Embarrassed, Cassie looked down at the iridescent pants she was wearing and her face turned the color of her pink wig.
Pete loved to see Cassie put in her place once in a while, but didn’t want to jeopardize his status as a “confidant.” The muscles in his face strained to keep a grin from breaking out.
“What do you mean, I’m the reason?” asked Cassie, her jaw set like a bulldog’s.
“You’re the reason because I named you Cassidy after my side of the family. Grandpa appreciated that. We are going up to the farm! And we’re going to find out all about it before we decide what we do.”
“You go, you go!” Cassie blurted out. “I’ve got plans for the rest of the summer.”
“Oh really? Like what?”
“I’m going to work for a record producer!”
Meg wondered how gullible Cassie thought her mother was? “You’re going to work for a record producer? Could you tell me how that happened to come about?”
Cassie wavered, “Well, it hasn’t exactly ‘come about’ yet. But it will!”
“How lame,” Pete said under his breath.
Meg played along. “Who is this record producer?”
“He’s a good friend of ... Tiff’s cousin’s father’s dentist. And it’s for sure that we can work at his recording studio this summer. So, you see, I can’t go away. This job could happen at any time. I can’t be off somewhere in Ohio.”
Crossing her arms, Meg said, “It’s Idaho. Dudley, Idaho.”
“Dudley?” Cassie wrinkled her nose again. “Who lives in a town called Dudley?”
As Meg’s expression soured, Cassie’s suddenly brightened, “Did I forget the most important thing of all? The ‘Miss Melrose Avenue Teen’ contest? I’ve got my pictures ready and everything. Haven’t I shown them to you, Mom? Pete took them. He’s really an artist, you know. I think he’s even better than Dad.” She looked at Pete, “How can I ever thank you?”
Turning away, Pete snickered.
Meg ran out of patience. “The contest consists of an application form that you fill out and mail in.” Sounding more like a drill sergeant than a nurse, she barked, “Fill it out! Mail it in!”
Cassie begged, “Please Mom, you go. I’ll stay here and water the plants!”
Meg locked eyes with her daughter but after a few seconds she seemed to have a change of heart. She suddenly smiled, “We don’t have to make a decision this very minute. I’ll think about it some more.”
Cassie looked relieved. Pete looked disappointed. And Meg looked like Wile E. Coyote.
******
Chapter Four
On the outskirts of Los Angeles in the San Fernando Valley, the Patterson’s station wagon was slowly making its way along a jammed freeway toward a freeway interchange. Its roof rack, topped with a luggage carrier that looked like a space capsule, was decorated with little American flags that flitted in the wind. Meg was at the wheel of the wagon with Cassie on the passenger side, and Pete shared the backseat with piles of take-along stuff, and Duchess. Seething in her cat carrier, the Siamese looked asleep but wasn’t - her eyes were like slits watching for a way to escape. She and Cassie were so not where they wanted to be.
Cassie’s wig was blue and so was she. With earphones connected to her small radio, she leaned against the window listening to “life’s-so-unfair music,” her eyes half-closed in boredom. “Silence is a form of protest,” she’d declared when they drove away from their house on Oleander Lane. And she had vowed not to speak during the entire trip to Dudley.
An approaching freeway disappeared through the foothills of a mountain range that grew larger and larger in the distance. The smaller Santa Monica and San Gabriel mountains that circled the Los Angeles area were being left behind, and nobody even waved goodbye.
Cassie had said goodbye to Tiff though, and thought her best friend was going to “just die” when she was told about her leaving - Tiff hadn’t stopped balling for a good twenty minutes. Cassie had to promise she’d be back before Tiff could check out all the sales on Melrose Avenue.
Doing the same math Meg had done, Cassie told her best friend, “three days up, maybe three days there and three days back.” The hospital had given her mother “Emergency Leave” because of a death in the family. And that proved to Tiff that Cassie wouldn’t be gone long.
As Cassie rattled off the itinerary to Tiff, the worm of a doubt wiggled into her brain. But if she had to bet her army camouflage pants on an old farm in the middle of nowhere, a couple of straggly dogs would soon own the farm.
As the station wagon inched its way into the intersection of the two freeways, overhead signs, hanging signs, standing signs, and overpass signs were an eye-crossing display.
There were signs with colors, signs with names, signs with arrows, and signs with numbers. They were placed above, to the side, farther ahead and everywhere in between. The signs were confusing, disorganized, contradictory, and distracting. It was just another day on a Los Angeles freeway.
The wagon made several lane-changes weaving through lines of horn-honkers who were trying to enter or exit one of the freeways. A wave of Meg’s hand said, “Thank you,” to considerate drivers who were few and far between.
Some of the drivers were on cell phones or texting, looking for maps or DVDs. Some were having an early dinner, or a late lunch. With big-rigs, pickups, SUV’s, busses, and motor homes, the Pattersons joined the flow of humans and machines heading north for the three-day Fourth of July weekend. Whew!!!
~~~
After a motel stop the first night, Meg and the kids loaded up the wagon and were on the road early the next day. Meg checked and re-checked her maps of California, Oregon, Washington and Idaho before they left; there were different routes she could take to Dudley and she wanted to be sure they were taking the shortest one.
When she got up, Cassie decided that she’d made her point about Dudley with her “silent protest” ... keeping her mouth shut had really made the trip boring. Her wig was a happy orange color instead of the depressing blue it had been the day before, and Meg suspected the food dye must have been left over from last year’s Halloween. They were going through the Central Valley of California and were on their way to Idaho.
Inside the wagon, Pete took pictures of mountains and valleys, then mountains and valleys again. In the distance, changing mountain elevations appeared as waves of higher and higher blue-gray shadows. Even in the summer there were still patches of snow on the highest mountain tops.
Cassie still preferred earphones to conversation but her curiosity wouldn’t let her miss too much of what was going on.
Meg slid a CD in the car’s player, something soft and mellow.Cassie listened for a moment, and with a teenager’s predetermination to dislike her parent’s taste in music, she faced her mother. “Mom! Didn’t you bring anything less totally ancient? For the sake of your children, shouldn’t you stay awake while you’re driving?”Meg cast a glance at Cassie but didn’t answer her question because she knew it wasn’t a question.
The back of the wagon was jammed with duffel bags that held clothes and personal items for the motor trip to Dudley. The luggage-container on top of the wagon held more of everything for the stay at the farm. According to weather forecasters the weather in Idaho was mild.
In the back seat, Pete’s legs were propped up on the jumble of bags in as close to a lying position as he could manage. In the front seat next to her mother, Cassie appeared to have emptied a magazine stand of teen magazines that were on the front floor next to her legs sharing space with a roll-up beauty bag, a sack filled with papers and enlarged photos of herself, and general stuff.
Cassie grabbed the sack from beneath her legs, and emptied it in her lap. She found what she was looking for and waved a large piece of paper in the air, announcing, “Alright, here it is ... the ‘Miss Melrose Avenue Teen’ application! I’ve got to get this mailed before we get to Dudley. I don’t want it to say Dudley on the envelope, or Fudley, or ...”
“Mudley!” Pete chimed in, laughing.
Cassie continued, “They’re not going to open it if it’s from some little ‘nowhere’ town.”
Shaking her head at their silliness, Meg said, “You can put Hollywood on the application form but the envelope is going to be postmarked where it’s mailed. And on this trip, that’s likely to be a small town.”
“You know, this is the only chance I have to do something totally life-changing and you don’t want to help at all,” Cassie answered with a pout.
“Do you really think the contest will ‘change your life’?” Meg asked. “Are you sure about that?”
“Well, if I win it, I could like, maybe, win ‘Miss Teen USA.’ Isn’t that life-changing?”
“You could also win the lottery,” Pete said slyly.
Meg urged, “C’mon Cassie, it’s a fun thing. Don’t take it so seriously. They aren’t about to throw out applications from small towns: those kids buy magazines too.” Her attention was drawn to familiar-looking scenery. Maybe, she figured, it was because the fields and roadside stands all looked alike.
“There is something I don’t understand,” Cassie admitted. “How can you be ‘Miss Melrose Avenue Teen’ if you haven’t even been on Melrose Avenue?”
Meg thought about the dilemma moms face when they try to have an answer for everything ... the questions never end. “Maybe,” she suggested, “they’re looking for a Melrose Avenue type. You know ... Beautiful. Smart. Hip.”
“Hmmmmm.” Cassie mulled that over.
“Like a hottie!” added Pete.
“That’s it!” Cassie nodded with a smile.
Meg had learned that “hottie” was somehow a magical word.
Pete couldn’t hide a smirk, “Fill out the form,” he sad. “I know it’s going to be funny.”
Cassie took a long look at her brother. “Gee, are you gonna change your tune when I win this and you’re everywhere braggin’ how you’re my brother and all. I swear,” she continued, “I’m going to say that I never saw your little dork-face in my whole life!” Picking up the form, she added, “This will like, so totally not be understood by a clueless child such as yourself!”
“Read it, please, please.” That was part of the usual begging Pete had to do when Cassie felt like making him beg. He knew it, and she knew it. Like, how else would a big sister act?
“Oh, alright,” Cassie gave in.
Meg was pleased to see her children interact with each other. Even though it was often a tug-of-war, their squabbles took her mind off her growing concern that they weren’t on the right road to Idaho.
Cassie read the application’s instructions: “Write down why you think it would be the coolest thing ever to win the title of “Miss Melrose Avenue Teen.””
“What are you going to say?” asked Pete.
Cassie read aloud as she wrote. “Because my school and all my friends and all the outrageous things we do would make a terrific sitcom on TV. We are all so not dull.”
Pete jumped in, “Can I be on the sitcom? I help you do outrageous things, don’t I? Remember when we walked backward into the movie theater when everyone else was walking out so we didn’t have to pay for tickets?”
Meg glanced at Cassie with raised eyebrows.
Pete added excitedly, “And ... remember when you and Tiff put me in goofy disguises to get all those ‘one-per-customer’ cans of hairspray at fifty-cents apiece?”
Meg turned her face away to smile.
Pete reminded Cassie with a laugh, “My favorite was the little old man with the cane.”
From between clenched teeth, Cassie muttered, “That was a ‘confidant’ thing, remember?” After a killer stare, she turned over the application continuing to write on the back of the page. “And how cool is it, that the guy I really like at school is almost the hottest-looking guy in my grade?He writes for the school paper and has his own column called, ‘Hangin’ In The Halls,’ and he puts my name in every one. You could say, I’m already a celebrity.”
Pete made a sour face. “Albert Fainsbert is the hottest-looking guy in the eighth grade?”
Cassie shot back, “I said almost!”
Wanting to get the arguing over, Meg interrupted, “Let her finish, will you, Pete?”
“It was just a question, Mom,” Pete snickered.
Cassie’s enthusiasm began to return as she started a new section of the application. “This part is called, “Wish Fulfillment.” She continued reading aloud what she had written down.
“The dreamiest job I could possibly wish for would be something exciting and glamorous. I’d like to do movie reviews, or be a red-carpet interviewer, or be a personal trainer to the stars, or cure an incurable disease. Or,” she said proudly, “win the Miss Melrose Avenue Teen Contest.” She asked her mother, “What do you think? Is it too short?”
“More people will read it if it’s short. I like it.”
Cassie said, “Here I go. I’m going to sign it. Take a picture, Pete. It may be worth something someday.” Pete grabbed his camera and clicked away.
“Are you watching, Mom?” Meg shared the moment and a smile with her daughter. Cassie finished writing and slipped the application and one of her photos into a large manila envelope saying, “Keep your fingers crossed.”
Everybody was happy except Duchess. She used to hide in the bushes on Oleander Lane and watch a neighbor’s bird in a cage: It sang all day long. Now Duchess was in a cage and wondered what a caged bird had to sing about?
~~~
As the wagon continued on its journey, Meg pointed to nearby mountains. “See those mountains. They’re called the ‘Sierras.’ In Spanish, sierra means ‘saw.’ And that’s just what the mountaintops look like don’t they? The jagged edge of a saw.”
Cassie was impressed and asked, “Where’d you learn that? On Jeopardy?”
Meg said, “We’ve been living in Los Angeles, after all.”
That worm of a doubt wiggled in Cassie’s head again, wondering what her mother had meant by “been living” in Los Angeles. She thought that if someone asked her where she lived, she wouldn’t say, “I’ve been living in Los Angeles.”
Meg pulled the wagon across the highway to stop at a stand on the other side of the road.
“Haven’t we been here before?” Pete asked.
“All these stands look alike,” Meg answered, giving the kids money to buy fruit and snacks.
Pete photographed field workers, while some customers at the stand photographed Cassie. Her cowboy hat, orange hair, flaking snakeskin boots, faded Donny Osmond tee and a wrap-around skirt made of ruffled flea-market curtains, was way-more photogenic than a field of spinach.
Pete was proud of his sister: “Wow!” he thought. “I’ll bet they’d hire her to get people to stop here. All she’d need was one of those big hands with the pointing finger.”
Meg had opened her maps and was talking to a traveler at the stand. She traced a line on one of the maps. Shaking his head the man said, “No. No.” He took another map and traced a different line in a different direction. “You should be over here going the other way.”
Meg’s spirits sank. Sighing, she said, “Thank you.”
The man cheerfully replied, “Have a good one!”
Cassie and Pete were in the wagon eating fresh fruit from a nearby farm when Meg plopped herself into the driver’s seat and slammed the door. She turned on the key, and backed onto the highway.
“Whoaaa,” Cassie exclaimed, as the wagon left skid marks in some gravel.
Meg pulled the wagon into an open lane going back in the direction they’d come from. “Forget what I said before. We’ve been going the wrong way!”
Pete took a few seconds to “unlearn” Meg’s earlier lesson. “Does sierra still mean saw?"
******
Chapter 5
On the third day of the trip, the station wagon pulled away from a small motel onto an empty highway in pre-dawn darkness. In a matter of minutes the sun burst over the eastern horizon - its golden-red rays streaking across the sky promising all living things that a beautiful day was on its way.
Meg had called Grandpa’s attorney, Homer Hyde, from the motel phone because her cell phone didn’t work in the mountainous areas they’d entered. He told her to call back when they were closer to Dudley.
As the day continued, the trees got even taller and denser. They passed a large natural lake that was swarming with all kinds of boats - fishermen claiming the quieter spots casting their bait in small inlets. Along the shore, people were camping and having fun.
Frequently, Meg and the kids saw logging trucks heading for the mill. They honked and waved. The forests produced wood for the construction industry, furniture manufacturers, and paper mills all over the world.
Roadside billboards on a long stretch of the highway informed Meg and the kids that they were passing through an Indian reservation. NO FISHING and NO HUNTING warnings were prominently displayed. There were rest stops, usually on a bluff overlooking a valley where chiseled granite stones marked the locations of long-ago battles or other historic events.
Sparse communities popped up here and there along the highway. Some had turnoffs, which offered gas, snack machines, picnic benches and restroom facilities. Trucks and cars alike stopped so travelers could refresh themselves. Meg pulled the station wagon off the highway to park with several other vehicles at one of the stops.
Tired travelers were plunking coins into a row of vending machines pulling out snacks and canned drinks while families relaxed at picnic tables in an adjacent area.
Meg and the kids slowly got out of the wagon. After several hours of physical inaction they stretched their aching backs, Cassie complaining, “Why don’t we have a bigger wagon? I’m totally scrunched.”
“Duchess is scrunched too,” said Pete. “I’m going to let her out and leash her to the carrier.” He looked around. “We could put her under that shady tree over there.”
“I don’t know,” Meg said. It’s pretty busy here. Cats don’t like a lot going on, it makes them nervous. Duchess prefers quiet corners, even at home.”
Duchess knew they were talking about her and waited patiently for them to make up their minds.
Cassie checked out the tree. “This is quiet enough. And we could ask that family eating at the picnic table over there to watch her for a minute.” She waved at the group. “They’d do it. They’d keep an eye on her.”
The family at the picnic table was already keeping an eye on the Patterson’s especially Cassie. The adults were elbowing each other, never having seen anything like her “Queen of the Teens” appearance. Cassie was a vision in pink and an old rhinestone tiara was in her pink wig - probably the adornment from some long-ago “Prom Princess.” Pink stripes and pink patent-leather shoes completed her look. Among the wrinkled, hot and tired people at the rest stop, Cassie stood out like the Statue of Liberty in New York Harbor.
Meg had expected that kind of bug-eyed reaction to her daughter as soon as they’d gotten about ten miles from Hollywood. She’d worried about Cassie’s reaction to the reaction. What she didn’t expect was that people were short on disapproval and long on friendliness, even wanting their pictures taken with Cassie.
Meg had decided to let her daughter “sink or swim” by herself – sometimes it’s the only way to learn how to swim. And sometimes mothers worry about the wrong things to begin with.
Pete talked Meg into letting him leash Duchess to her plastic carrier under the tree. He’d spread a picnic blanket on a small patch of mowed weeds and an uneasy Duchess had settled down.
Children at the picnic table laughed and pointed, “Look, they’re parking the cat!”
Meg said, “Let’s get some food and have a picnic here with Duchess.”
Cassie called to the picnickers, “Watch her for a minute, okay?” They waved in response, and she joined Meg and Pete as they walked toward the facilities.
~~~
A short time later, munching on sandwiches and drinking canned sodas, Meg and the kids were walking back to the station wagon.
“What did you tell Mr. Hyde?” Cassie asked between bites.
“I told him we’d be getting in late because of a detour.”
As Pete sucked the juice off a pickle, he asked, “Was that when we got lost?”
“Getting ‘lost’ is a kind of a detour,” Meg said, feeling guilty about the fib. “Anyway, the important thing is Mr. Hyde said it doesn’t matter what time we get there ... the farmhouse will be open. He said it’s daylight until at least ten o’clock and the weather couldn’t be nicer.”
They walked toward the tree where Duchess had been “parked.”
“Mr. Hyde gave me directions from Dudley to the farm. It’s all by mileage. We go up this road for seven miles, and down that road for...” She stopped short. “Where’s Duchess?”
They’d come around the tree and the carrier was gone, and so was the cat! Only the picnic blanket remained. Meg and the kids were frantic. Where’s Duchess?” Where’s her carrier?” “What happened?” Meg looked at her watch, “We were only gone ten minutes!”
At the nearby picnic table, the family that had said they’d keep an eye on Duchess was cleaning up to leave. In a desperate state, Pete ran to them, Cassie and Meg following.
“Did you see what happened to my cat?” Pete pleaded. Meg and Cassie joined in, “She’s gone!” “She couldn’t have just left, she was tied to her carrier!” “We were only gone ten minutes!” “Did someone take her?”
The man in the group pointed down the highway. “The last time we saw the cat, it was running down there towards that big truck.” The man’s children shook their heads and laughed, remembering the scene. “The cat was pulling its house behind it!”
“But you said you’d watch her!” Cassie said with frustration.
“We did!” The man chuckled, “It was a sight, I tell ya.”
Meg and the kids started running toward the big-rig parked along the highway. “Come kitty, kitty,” they called.
They reached the truck just as the trucker inside the cab was preparing to leave. Pete threw himself on the ground to look under the truck, while Meg and Cassie pounded on the door to get the trucker’s attention, yelling, “Don’t go! Don’t go!”
Pete peered under the vastness of the truck. He saw engine things, brake things, heater things, and gear things, but no Duchess. “I don’t see her!” he called to Meg and Cassie, and they stooped down to look.
The burly trucker got out and joined the strangers looking under his truck. He was a huge man. As he got down on all fours, he asked, “What are we looking for?”
“My cat!” Pete said, near tears.
“She was seen coming down here,” Meg told him.
“Those people were supposed to watch her,” Cassie explained.
“A cat?” the trucker repeated as he stood up. “I don’t think it’s under my truck. What’s its name? Have you called it?”
Pete said, “Her name’s Duchess. But she’s a cat. She doesn’t usually come when you call her.”
“She’s a cat!” Cassie emphasized.
”My cat’s come when I call ‘em. Her name’s Duchess, you say?”
They answered, “That’s right, ‘Duchess’.” “She’s a Siamese.” “She’s very independent!”
The trucker cleared his throat. Raising the tone of his voice from a bullfrog to a songbird, he sang out. “Duchess! Duchess! Here puss, puss, puss. Here kitty, kitty, kitty.Here puss, puss, puss. Here kitty, kitty, kitty. Kit-teee. Kit-tee!”
Meg and the kids watched the man in amazement. A puny little meow snapped them to attention. “It came from over there,” Pete cried out, and they ran several yards to a large tree.
“What did I tell you?” the trucker called after them.
Duchess was crouching under the tree attached to her tangled leash which was attached to her banged-up carrier. She made small cat noises and her chin trembled as she looked at a preening bird on a limb above her. The bird glanced with unconcern at the cat who’d been disabled by some sort of cage-thing. Duchess had changed places with the bird on Oleander Lane, and it was the low point of her life.
******
Chapter 6
When the Pattersons drove into Dudley, a fierce rainstorm had hit northern Idaho and most of the lights in town were out. Meg had tried to call Homer Hyde before they got there but she couldn’t get through. He’d already given her the basic directions to Grandpa’s farm when she’d called him from the rest stop. That’s when he’d told her how nice the weather was.
Meg had an uneasy feeling as they headed out the lonely storm-swept road looking for the farm. It had been so long since she’d been there, she prayed she could find it.
She worried: “What if we get a flat tire? Could anything be worse on a night like this?”
Somehow they found the farm and all the dogs. But as they stood in a drenching rain in front of a darkened farmhouse, they were horrified to be confronted by a threatening stranger. Meg quickly prepared herself for something worse than a flat tire.
She and Cassie were panic-stricken as Pete shone his flashlight in the face of the hooded man who shielded his eyes from the piercing light, and pulled out something from under his jacket to aim at Pete.
“No, don’t!” Meg cried.
Something went click, and it turned out to be the man’s own flashlight! After pointing flashlights at each other like “bad guys” in a movie, the man laughed. “Don’t shoot!” he said, “I’m Shane, your next door neighbor! I’m sorry if I scared you.”