Everyone he loved was doomed to suffer and die young. Everyone he cared about
was torn from him.
That was all nonsense, of course, and Nora did not believe in it for a moment.
But she knew how hard it was to shake off the past, to face only toward the
future, and she sympathized with his inability to be optimistic just now. She
also knew there was nothing she could do for him to haul him out of that pit of
private anguish—nothing except kiss him, hold him for a moment, then send him
off to bed to get some sleep.
When Travis was gone, Nora sat on the floor beside Einstein and said, “There’re
some things I have to tell you, fur face. I guess you’re asleep and can’t hear
me, and maybe even if you were awake you wouldn’t understand what I’m saying.
Maybe you’ll never again understand, which is why I want to say these things
now, while there’s at least still hope that your mind’s intact.”
She paused and took a deep breath and looked around at the still surgery, where
the dim lights gleamed in the stainless-steel fixtures and in the glass of the
enameled cabinets. It was a lonely place at three-thirty in the morning.
Einstein’s breath came and went with a soft hiss, an occasional rattle. He
didn’t stir. Not even his tail moved.
“I thought of you as my guardian, Einstein. That’s what I called you once, when
you saved me from Arthur Streck. My guardian. You not only rescued me from that
awful man—you also saved me from loneliness and terrible despair. And you saved
Travis from the darkness within him, brought us together, and in a hundred other
ways you were as perfect as any guardian angel might hope to be. In that good,
pure heart of yours, you never asked for or wanted anything in return for all
you did. Some Milk-Bones once in a while, a bit of chocolate now and then. But
you’d have done it all even if you’d been fed nothing but Dog Chow. You did it
because you love, and being loved in return was reward enough. And by just being
what you are, fur face, you taught me a great lesson, a lesson I can’t easily
put into words . .
For a while, silent and unable to speak, she sat in the shadows beside her
friend, her child, her teacher, her guardian.
“But damn it,” she said at last, “I’ve got to find words because maybe this
is the last time I can even pretend you’re able to understand them. It’s like
this . . . you taught me that I’m your guardian, too, that I’m Travis’s
guardian, and that he is my guardian and yours. We have a responsibility to
stand watch over one another, we are watchers, all of us, watchers, guarding
against the darkness. You’ve taught me that we’re all needed, even those who
sometimes think we’re worthless, plain, and dull. If we love and allow ourselves
to be loved . . . well, a person who loves is the most precious thing in the
world, worth all the fortunes that ever were. That’s what you’ve taught me, fur
face, and because of you I’ll never be the same.”
The rest of the long night, Einstein lay motionless, lost in a deep sleep.
Saturday, Jim Keene kept hours only in the morning. At noon he locked the office
entrance at the side of his big, cozy house.
During the morning, Einstein had exhibited encouraging signs of recovery. He
drank more water and spent some time on his belly instead of lying limply on his
side. Head raised, he looked around with interest at the activity in the vet’s
surgery. He even slurped up a raw-egg-and-gravy mixture that Jim put in front of
him, downing half the contents of the dish, and he did not regurgitate what he
had eaten. He was now entirely off intravenous fluids.
But he still dozed a lot. And his responses to Travis and Nora were only those
of an ordinary dog.
After lunch, as they were sitting with Jim at the kitchen table, having a final