Another Life by Andrew Vachss Page B

perfect, beautiful girl she was, when Gateman yelled out: “Rosie, sit!”

And she did.

“Yeah!” Gateman cheered. “Come and get it, girl!”

She gave me a look, then trotted over and took whatever Gateman slipped her, swallowed it in one gulp.

“I never had a dog,” the wheelchair-bound shooter said. “I know she ain’t mine”—catching a look from me—“but I’m part of her family, right?”

“True blood,” I notarized. Then I glanced behind the counter, saw the trailer-hitch eye-bolt screwed into the floor, attached to a length of heavy chain.

“Got to have it, boss,” he explained. “This little girl sees anybody coming through that door, she just goes. No yap-yap bullshit for her; she’s a natural.”

He didn’t have to add “killer.”

“I know it, Gate. But, look, that means, if any of our crew shows up and she’s up there with me—”

“I call up and warn you, bro. She’s gonna be one of us, but we go step by step, am I right?”

I tapped fists with him. When I said, “Home,” Rosie charged up the stairs like a Great White who just heard a surfer convention was in town.
    * * *
    “R ose is such a beautiful name,” Michelle said, stroking my dog’s triangular head. “Why do you have to call her Rosie? That’s a washerwoman’s name. Not fit for a princess, is it?” she asked the pit.

“When you train a dog, you need a two-syllable name,” I told Michelle. “It’s all about getting them to focus, lock in on whatever you’re saying, pay attention.”

“Oh, for the love of—”

“I know what I’m doing, honey.”

“Yes, you are quite the expert when it comes to females.”

“Give it up,” I told my sister. “You’re not winning this one.”

“Men are like that,” she said to my dog. “Aren’t they, Rose ?”
    * * *

O nly a certified imbecile licenses a pit bull these days. They’ve got that “born bad” tag on them so deep that lawmakers all over are trying to make them illegal. They’re even a “banned breed” in some countries, and the disease is spreading. Pits can’t hire lobbyists, so nobody’s running around screaming about their right to own one, even if they can be dangerous in the wrong hands. I mean, it’s not as if they were something sacred…like guns.

You know how those gangsta-boy punks “train” their dogs to fight? They feed them gunpowder. Ulcerates the lining of their stomachs until they’re in so much pain all the time that it turns them vicious. I guess that doesn’t qualify as irony—not cute enough for the bloggers, and too nasty for the poets.

I couldn’t wait for Michael Vick to find Jesus, snatch himself some forgiveness, and go back to pro football. I could watch every game, hoping he’d get his spine snapped. Then they could just push his wheelchair into a swimming pool, and throw in a plugged-in space heater. Hey, if he can’t breed, what good is he, right?

Still, I wasn’t going to let Rosie walk around without tags and give some cop an excuse, so I did the good-citizen thing. The clerk didn’t even blink when I put down “Taurus Uniqua” as her breed. I wrote “Rose” for her name.

You pay the money, you get a dog license, no questions asked. But if you want AKC credentials, you have to paper the provenance. Otherwise, you can’t enter one of their oh-so-special shows.

The Nazis would have loved the spectacles those “dog lovers” put on: the winner is the one who comes closest to the physical-perfection template. Blue blood, blue ribbon, big bucks. That’s why some breeders “cull” their litters. Can’t have below-standard pups running around; those defective genes could pollute the perfection pool. A German shepherd with a spotted coat—now, that’s a sin against nature.

I had Rosie microchipped, too. Things happen. If she was running loose, a Good Samaritan might get her to a shelter. The phone would ring at Mama’s, and one of us would go get her.

Plus, I didn’t want some Animal Control idiot stopping Gateman’s wheelchair for walking Rosie without tags.