That was how we adopted Jefferson, or how he adopted us. He was of an indeterminate breed, what my parents called a Heinz, as in Heinz 57 varieties. He was short haired, a brown and white mix that had elements of a small hound and something larger. He was young, and mostly housebroken. Our initial thought was that he was a runaway or lost, and that we would find some flyers up or hear something or see it in the paper. At least that was what we told ourselves, which became a big, big problem. ‘We’ll take care of him for a week and try to find his owners.’ Nobody tried to find them. Jefferson, named that by Ricky Holloway (a Texan and the only other southerner in the house besides me) for both Jefferson Starship, the band, and Jefferson Davis, the President of the Confederacy, was a very nice little dog, and we quickly fell in love with the little mutt.
Unfortunately, he was not universally beloved. Jerry Modanowicz in particular took exception to dog crap in the back yard. By the end of the week, Jerry took Jefferson down to the pound, basing his decision to do this on the statement that we were only going to keep him for a week until we found his owners. No owners, the week was up, and so was Jefferson’s time with us. Jerry never told anybody about this either. By the time we figured all this out, enough days had passed that the pup was put to sleep.
Maybe not everybody wanted a dog, but nobody wanted him killed, and Jerry was thrown out. It was not considered a grave loss. He had proved a real pain in the tail, lived in a single on the first floor of the main house (the Underground Railroad room), and thought his fecal matter was not possessed of an aroma.
That was all on the first time through. Now I could do something about it. That Friday afternoon, when I noticed Jefferson was missing, I looked around for him. Nobody had seen him all day, and Ricky got worried and stared asking around also. “Where in the world did he get to?” he asked.
“Where’s Modanowicz?” I asked.
“Why?”
Marty had joined us by now, along with Leo, and listened in as I said, “Wasn’t he complaining about Jefferson, and how we should get rid of him at the end of the week? Do you think he might have done something?”
“You’re kidding me! No way!” said Leo.
Marty was silent, but Ricky asked, “Like what?”
I shrugged. “The pound?”
Ricky’s eyes widened at the thought, and he went into the hallway to the house pay phone and leafed through it until he found the phone number for the dog pound. He fished out a quarter, and as we watched, he called and asked if a small brown and white male dog had been brought in. His eyes lit up when the answer was positive, and he asked them to hold onto him until we got there.
“I can’t believe that son of a bitch did this!” he exclaimed. “I swear, I’m going to kill him!”
“Hold your horses,” cautioned Marty. “We don’t know he did it, not for sure. What do you want to do?” Marty was a senior like Ricky, and highly respected among the brothers.
“I want to go rescue him, that’s what!” said Ricky. I nodded in agreement.
“That means you are adopting him into the house? What if the house doesn’t vote to let him in?”
I looked over at Leo, not figuring that answer. “I vote yes,” said Leo.
“Me, too,” I added.
“Listen, I’m a senior. We don’t have time to take a formal vote. If the house has a problem, I’ll take him when I leave,” answered Ricky.
Marty nodded. “Okay, listen, you two go grab Jefferson. I’m going to figure this out and talk to Bill and figure out what we’re doing. Get going!” Marty grabbed Leo and told him to start asking around over in Grogans’, while he did the same in the main house.
Ricky and I got into the Galaxie and headed into town. Curiously, Ricky had grabbed the fraternity portrait off the wall of the formal room. Once we got down to the pound, we went inside and told them we had called about the brown and white dog. We were taken back to a line of kennels, which was a truly piteous sight, and there we found Jefferson. He immediately went crazy when he saw us, jumping up and trying to lick us through the chain link kennel side. I went to open the kennel, but I was stopped. “Hold on there, we have to do some paperwork first!”
We told Jefferson we would be back for him, and went back out front. First we had to buy a dog license, and then we had to have him neutered. Bitches got spayed. He needed rabies shots and other vet stuff done. And we had to cough up some cash to pay for all of this. Fortunately, they had a vet on tap to handle all these things, so if we wanted, they would arrange everything, but we wouldn’t be able to take Jefferson home for another couple of days. Ricky agreed and I grabbed my wallet.
Then Ricky went outside and came back in with the fraternity portrait, and asked if Jerry had been the one to bring in Jefferson. The fellow squinted, but said he thought so. Ricky and I looked at each other and rolled our eyes. Jerry had really fucked up this time. We went back and said goodbye to Jefferson, promising to come back at the beginning of the week.
We got back to the house just before dinner, and Marty latched onto us in the kitchen. “Was he there?”
“We got there in time. He was there.”
“And was it Modanowicz?”
I looked at Ricky and then nodded, saying, “It wouldn’t be good enough to take to court, but the guy was pretty sure it was Jerry. We showed him the pictures from the formal room, and the only one that seemed familiar was Modanowicz’.”
“Shit!” swore Marty quietly.
“Is he here?” asked Ricky. “Let’s ask him!”
Marty shook his head. “He’s visiting some girl over at Union. Won’t be back until Sunday.”
I shrugged. “What was the consensus around the house?”
“I think they’d all rather have the dog than Jerry.”
“We’ll announce it at dinner,” agreed Ricky.
It was the main topic of dinner that night, with about half the guys talking about the dog and the other half in disbelief over what Modanowicz had done. Ricky and I shared a table with Marty and Leo, and a few other guys, and at the end, Ricky motioned for me to stand up with him, and called for attention.
“Okay, here’s what we figured out. We found Jefferson down at the pound. Buckman and I went down there and laid claim to him, and registered him in the name of Kappa Gamma Sigma. We’ll do a formal vote at the next meeting. If there’s a problem, I’ll take him when I leave.”
“How’d he get down there?” asked Joe Bradley, from a table on the other side of the room.
I took this one. “He didn’t run away, if that’s the question. The dog warden didn’t pick him up. He was brought in by somebody, a college kid, a guy, at least according to the guy at the desk down there.”
“Was it Modanowicz?” asked somebody in the back.
I shrugged. “Absolutely positively? Can’t say. I will say that the guy picked his face off the portraits in the formal room, and nobody else’s face. We’ll have to ask him when he gets back.”
That caused quite an uproar. Ricky motioned for silence and then said, “In order to rescue Jefferson, we had to get him a dog license, and he has to get his shots and get neutered.”