David glanced at the rack of equipment on the left side of the bed against the wall. “A heart monitor,” he said. “And... some kind of a respirator?”
“That’s right. I have ALS, Lou Gehrig’s disease. I had an auto accident nearly three years ago, shattered my right shoulder and hip. And while I was in the hospital, in traction, they diagnosed the ALS. They gave me eighteen months to live, or less. That was three years ago. I need a wheelchair to get around now, and the respirator breathes for me much of the time, but I’m still here. Maybe that’s why life seems very precious to me these days. If I care for this pup properly, will he have a chance to live?”
“That depends. He won’t be a pup for long, you know. He’ll only drink milk for a few weeks, then he’ll need solid food and it’ll have to bypass his mouth. Are you up to feeding him through a tube? Several times a day?”
“If that’s what it takes to save his life, then I’ll either do it myself or see that it’s done. I’m not alone here, my mother can help, and my niece. And you? Are you willing to help?”
“I don’t know,” David said. “What you’re suggesting would be difficult for anyone, let alone someone in your condition. No offense, ma’am, but you seem to have troubles enough of your own.”
“Trust me, a few puppy-sized troubles will make a pleasant change from the rest,” she said, smiling. It was a wan, but fine, smile.
“Then I guess we’ll all have to do the best that we can,” David said, handing her the pup.
“Good,” Inga Crane said. She cradled the pup to her breast. “Can you sit a minute? I don’t have much company. You’re the newcomer Yvonne LeClair married, aren’t you?”
“Not such a newcomer,” David said, easing into the chair beside her bed. “I’ve been practicing in Algoma for about four years.”
“In northern Michigan, unless you’re born here you’re a flat-lander forever. Ted, my husband, moved here... My God. Is it five years now? It seems like so much longer. We hadn’t been married long when... this happened.” She indicated her wasted form with a wave of her free hand. “He tries, but he’s such an active man, he has a little trouble dealing with illness, I think.”
“On the other hand, you seem to be handling it well enough,” David said.
“But I have no choice, have I?” she countered. “Oh! Is something wrong? The puppy’s twitching.”
David peered at it intently, then relaxed. “No, nothing to worry about,” he said. “He’s just dreaming, that’s all.”
“Dreaming? About what?”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, he was just born last night. He hasn’t been anyplace or done anything yet. His eyes aren’t even open,” Inga said. “So what can he possibly be dreaming about?”
“I don’t know. I guess I never thought of it that way.”
“Maybe he’s dreaming about Puppyland,” she said.
“About what?”
“Puppyland. My family has always had dogs, so my mother never told us the stork story. She said that baby dogs came from Puppyland, kind of a hound heaven, where they can run and play all day. When I was a girl, this house was my Puppyland. My grandparents built it and I grew up here. Ted thinks we should sell it now. I know it’s expensive to maintain, but I doubt my mother’d be happy anywhere else, and I love it too. God, I used to run like a deer in the hills out back when I was a kid. I still dream about it sometimes. I’m running flat-out with the wind in my face, and I can breathe easily again. I almost hate to wake up. I hope this little guy won’t be too disappointed when his eyes open and he finds out he’s not in Puppyland anymore. He’s stuck in our world now.” She smothered a cough with her hand. She was clearly tiring.
“At least he’ll have a friend,” David said, rising to leave. “What are you going to call him?”
“I don’t think I’ll name him yet,” she said, thoughtfully tracing his silken ears with her fingertip. “It will be harder to lose him if he has a name. I’ll wait a few weeks. See how he does. Thanks for coming by, Dr. Westbrook.”
“Call me David,” he said. “Would you mind if I stopped by now and again? No charge.”
“I’d like that,” she said. “Maybe you can help me choose a name. If he... needs one.”
“He’s going to need one,” David said.
She named the pup Hector, after the old phrase “since Hector was a pup.” Neither of them could remember who the original Hector the pup was, but it didn’t matter. Inga’s Hector soon developed a quirky personality of his own. Despite his defect, he cheerfully adapted to his circumstances, learning to feed and drink in Inga’s arms, first liquids, then solid food through a tube. Over the next several months, as spring warmed into summer, David stopped by once or twice each week to check on the pup and to chat with Inga Crane. The visits often stretched into an hour or more, talking about dogs, or mutual friends, or just life in general. David rarely saw Ted on these visits, but he did meet Inga’s mother, Clare, a charming, drifty old soul who seemed to wander through the house like a ghost. She’d obviously been a beauty once, but her mind was as cloudy now as Inga’s was clear.
Most of the scutwork and heavy lifting involved in caring for an invalid fell to Inga’s niece, Cindy, a stolid, pudgy girl of twenty or so. She wore her dun-colored hair in an MTV-style shambles and her ears were pierced with three studs each. She never complained, but David sensed that she resented his visits a little, so he generally took her arrival as his signal to leave.
The truth was, his visits had become more personal than professional anyway. Hector was healthy and growing like the national debt, and David really couldn’t afford the time away from his practice, but there are some things you have to do for yourself. For your soul.
In any case, he knew that the visits wouldn’t continue for long. He was a vet, not an M.D., but it was clear that even as Hector was flourishing under Inga’s devoted care, Inga herself was wasting away, as though the fire of her spirit was consuming her shrunken body. It should have been depressing, but he found her struggle an inspiration instead. He’d read Dylan Thomas in college, but he’d never truly understood the line “Rage, rage, against the dying of the light,” until he met Inga. Her thirst to savor every last drop of her life, however bitter, personified the indomitability of the human spirit more than anyone he’d ever known. And in the end, she did not “go gentle into that good night...” Not gentle at all.
The phone dragged David up from the depths of a dark dream. He glanced at the nightstand as he fumbled for the receiver. Four-thirty. What the hell?
“Hello.”
“Dr. Westbrook? This is Sheriff Wolinski. I’m sorry to bother you this time of the morning, Doc, but I’ve got a special problem. Are you awake?”
“I am now. What is it, Stan?”
“I’m at the Crane place on Stillmeadow Road. Do you know it?”
Damn. “Yes, I know it,” David said. “Is it Inga?”
“Yeah, she’s gone all right. Thing is, it looks like her dog may have killed her.”
“What?”
“Look, Doc, I can show you a helluva lot faster than I can explain it over the phone. Can you get out here, please? Now?”
“Right,” David said, fully awake now. “I’m on my way.”
The emergency flashers of the Algoma County Sheriff’s patrol car and the EMT van were already being washed out by the first light of dawn when David pulled into the red brick drive of the Crane estate. Sheriff Stan Wolinski was waiting for him on the porch, pacing impatiently. Stan’s concrete-block build and gray uniform were both in perfect order and his eyes were clear. A grayish stubble of beard was his only concession to the early hour. David wondered if he ever actually slept, or just caught catnaps at his desk at the county jail.