going to be able to do that, no way.”
“No way,” Nora agreed grimly.
But in the blanket, cradled against Travis’s chest, Einstein trembled violently.
Travis remembered the lettered tiles on the pantry floor: FIDDLE
BROKE. . . AFRAID. . . AFRAID.
“Don’t be afraid,” he pleaded with the dog. “Don’t be afraid. There’s no reason
to be afraid.”
In spite of Travis’s heartfelt assurances, Einstein shivered and was afraid— and
Travis was afraid, too.
2
Stopping at an Arco service station on the outskirts of Carmel, Nora found the
vet’s address in a phone book and called him to be sure he was in. Dr. James
Keene’s office was on Dolores Avenue at the southern end of town. They pulled up
in front of the place at a few minutes before nine.
Nora had been expecting a typically sterile-looking veterinary clinic and was
surprised to find that Dr. Keene’s offices were in his home, a quaint two-story
Country English house of stone and plaster and exposed timbers with a roof that
curved over the eaves.
As they hurried up the stone walk with Einstein, Dr. Keene opened the door
before they reached it, as if he had been on the lookout for them. A
sign indicated that the entrance to the surgery was around the side of the
house, but the vet took them in at the front door. He was a tall,
sorrowful-faced man with sallow skin and sad brown eyes, but his smile was warm,
and his manner was gracious.
Closing the door, Dr. Keene said, “Bring him this way, please.”
He led them swiftly along a hallway with an oak parquet floor protected by a
long, narrow oriental carpet. On the left, through an archway, lay a pleasantly
furnished living room that actually looked lived-in, with footstools in front of
the chairs, reading lamps, laden bookshelves, and crocheted afghans folded
neatly and conveniently over the backs of some chairs for when the evenings were
chilly. A dog stood just inside the archway, a black Labrador. It watched them
solemnly, as if it understood the gravity of Einstein’s condition, and it did
not follow them.
At the rear of the large house, on the left side of the hail, the vet took them
through a door into a clean white surgery. Lined along the walls were
white-enameled and stainless-steel cabinets with glass fronts, which were filled
with bottles of drugs, serums, tablets, capsules, and the many powdered
ingredients needed to compound more exotic medicines.
Travis gently lowered Einstein onto an examination table and folded the blanket
back from him.
Nora realized that she and Travis looked every bit as distraught as they would
have if they’d been bringing a dying child to a doctor. Travis’s eyes were red,
and though he was not actively crying at the moment, he continually blew his
nose. The moment she had parked the pickup in front of the house and had pulled
on the hand brake, Nora had ceased to be able to repress her own tears. Now she
stood on the other side of the examination table from Dr. Keene, with one arm
around Travis, and she wept quietly.
The vet was apparently used to strong emotional reactions from pet owners, for
he never once glanced curiously at Nora or Travis, never once indicated by any
means that he found their anxiety and grief to be excessive.
Dr. Keene listened to the retriever’s heart and lungs with a stethoscope,
palpated his abdomen, examined his oozing eyes with an ophthalmoscope. Through
those and several other procedures, Einstein remained limp, as if paralyzed. The
only indications that the dog still clung to life were his faint whimpers and
ragged breathing.
It’s not as serious as it seems, Nora told herself as she blotted her eyes with
a Kleenex.
Looking up from the dog, Dr. Keene said, “What’s his name?”
“Einstein,” Travis said.
“How long have you owned him?”
“Only a few months.”
“Has he had his shots?”
“No,” Travis said. “Damn it, no.”
“Why not?”
“It’s . . . complicated,” Travis said. “But there’re reasons that shots couldn’t
be gotten for him.”
“No reason’s good enough,” Keene said disapprovingly. “He’s got no license, no