The Dog That Whispered by Jim Kraus Page A

say hello, Dr. Killeen. He won’t bite. At least he hasn’t so far.”
    Thurman was already at the top of the drive as Wilson finished, and he bounced around the wheelchair, growling happily, sniffing, and grinning.
    Dr. Killeen leaned forward as best he could and extended his right hand. Even from the street, Wilson could see the tremors. Thurman stopped and let the man put his hand on his head. He began to stroke the dog and Thurman growled his happy, contented growl.
    Wilson walked up and stopped a few feet away.
    “Thurman, right? That’s his name, right?” Dr. Killeen said.
    Wilson nodded.
    “You’ve got a good memory.”
    Dr. Killeen grinned.
    “It may be the only thing that still works. And I’m not so sure some days.”
    Wilson nodded.
    “You and me both.”
    “I saw your mother again a few days ago. Walking Thurman.”
    “She had him for all of two weeks and she still considers him to be her dog, I guess.”
    Thurman bounced and growled, That’s right .
    But Dr. Killeen did not appear to understand him.
    Must be like developing an ear for a foreign language , Wilson thought.
    Dr. Killeen drew his jacket closer around his chest, despite the fact that the temperature was in the mid-seventies. Wilson was not sure exactly what condition or disease or malady Dr. Killeen had. All he knew for certain was that he had been in a wheelchair for at least ten years, maybe more. He had retired from full-time pastoral work at the large Presbyterian church in Shadyside a few years before his…infirmity appeared. Wilson’s mother had attended his church for a long stretch following her husband’s death, and she had told Wilson that she liked the teaching and preaching, disliked the music. Gretna Steele did not suffer through many services where “something was off-kilter.”
    “The music sounds like medieval caterwauling,” she’d said.
    Wilson himself had never attended.
    “And Emily Gold was with her,” Dr. Killeen said. “That was nice to see.”
    Wilson did not show his surprise, but he was surprised.
    “You know Emily?”
    “I do. Not as well as I knew her husband. I mean, I knew them both. But more her husband.”
    Thurman paced down the driveway and then back again, sniffing virtually every square inch of the bushes that lined one side.
    “He was in the military, wasn’t he?”
    Dr. Killeen nodded.
    “Special Forces. An officer. I forget which rank. Served several tours of duty in the Middle East. Maybe in Afghanistan as well.”
    Wilson listened and remained silent. He simply did not know how much to probe, how much to let happen, how much people were willing or able to tell others. So as a matter of course, he seldom asked follow-up questions, questions his mother would have had no problem in asking and re-asking until she was satisfied. Wilson guessed that it was because he’d lived with the ambiguity and uncertainty of his past, he could accept both in his daily life now.
    “He’s dead, you know.”
    Wilson nodded as Thurman padded up to them, his tongue lolling out to one side, appearing like a deranged participant in some manner of frat-house bender during spring break. At least that was the image that flashed in Wilson’s thoughts.
    “I do. Well, my mother said she was a widow. I guess that means the same thing.”
    Dr. Killeen nodded.
    “It was one of the most painful experiences in my work as a pastor.”
    Wilson reached down and patted Thurman, having absolutely no idea if he should ask further questions or simply look like a sympathetic listener.
    “He came back to the States damaged. Not physically. But something broke. He couldn’t readjust. And I couldn’t help him. I tried. We tried. Emily. Me. And others.”
    Dr. Killeen raised his left hand to push an errant wisp of hair off his forehead. His hand trembled the entire time and it appeared to Wilson that it took a great effort just to raise it up.
    Then Dr. Killeen looked up at Wilson.
    “You know what that’s like, don’t