The breeze gently moved the sheets, showing off their pristine whiteness, as Kathy hung the laundry to dry on the clothesline stretched across the back yard. The sun shone warmly enough to let her remove the light jacket she'd worn against the morning's chill. The sensation of heat on her arms was welcome.
She gazed with pleasure around the neatly kept yard, its newly-planted garden just showing signs of the coming crop of vegetables to be harvested at the end of summer. She looked forward to the canning chore. She took pride in filling the winter cabinet with the products of her labor.
Jocko snoozed beside the steps, his 'fetch it' ball never far from his grey muzzle. He had long since forsaken all puppy pleasures, except that of leaping to chase the ball thrown by his indulgent family.
Her basket finally empty, Kathy put it on the porch steps and went around to the back of the toolshed, to help Jim restack the woodpile. Ax flashing in the sunlight, Jim stood in shirt sleeves, rhythmically splitting strips of kindling from a piece of aged hickory.
"How's it going?" she asked.
"I'm about finished." He threw her a quick smile. "This should be all the wood we'll need before the nights warm up as well." He threw the ax down and wiped the perspiration from his brow. "Didn't you make a batch of iced tea this morning? I could sure go for a big glass of it."
"Sure, I'll go..." she stopped, turning her head as a sound reached her. "Did you hear that?"
"What? I didn't hear anything," he said. "Not much out here
to
listen to, unless you're partial to the sound of corn growing."
"No, it was something else," Kathy insisted, then was silent as a high, thin wail sounded again. "There! It sounds like a baby crying!"
"Don't start that, Kathy."
"Listen to it, Jim. It must be right around here somewhere."
"Kathy, stop this! You know it can't be a baby. It's probably some animal caught in a trap." Jim started toward the sound, calling over his shoulder as he hurried, "I'll try to free it, and then call Boone. I've told him before not to set any of his traps around here."
Kathy went after him, half-convinced that they'd find some poor creature torn and bloody from jaws of steel. What they found was a baby. It was wrapped in a light blanket and lay under a low shrub at the side of their driveway.
Jim stood as if rooted when he saw the small bundle. He looked out over the split-rail fence of their yard, trying to spot some dust cloud along the gravel roads that would indicate a vehicle had passed recently enough to have just left the child. There was nothing to mar the idyllic landscape.
Kathy bent quickly to pick up the infant, holding it to her bosom and gently soothing it as she walked toward the two-story house. As she mounted the steps, Jocko woke from his sleep with a start, and growled, hackles raised.
The sound of the screen door chattering as its long spring slammed it loosely against the frame brought Jim's attention back to his wife and the child she had carried into their home. He hurried after Kathy, instinctively holding the door open long enough to allow Jocko to enter, as well.
"Look, Jim," Kathy invited, her face radiant. "It's a boy, and he's beautiful! Every fingernail is perfect, and he has ten chubby little toes and everything!"
She had placed the baby in the center of the kitchen table to loosen the blanket around him and examine her find.
Jocko slowly approached the table, head low, a steady growl still rumbling from deep in his throat.
"Now, stop that, Jocko," Kathy gently chided. "You mustn't scare the baby. You make friends with him."
"No need for that," Jim said, reaching for his phone. "I'm calling Ezra."
"What for?" Kathy's face already set in a stubborn line. "I can take care of the baby."
"That's not the point." Jim's gaze locked with his wife's equally determined one. "When you find an abandoned child, you have to contact the sheriff. It's the law."
"But, it's Sunday. He and Harley are probably still out on the river, fishing for bass. You know they are; they asked you to go along."
Kathy made a face at her husband as he left a message. Law enforcement coverage for their town over the weekend happened only after leaving a message for the sheriff, to collect and answer whenever he got around to it. Everybody was good with that. There was never bad trouble around here.
Kathy's face brightened when Jim finished the call without mentioning the baby. "See, Jocko," she said to the dog, who had moved to stand with his front paws on the table's edge, staring intently at the baby lying beyond his reach, "if you're quiet, you don't scare the baby. Look at him watching you with his big blue eyes."
The dog gave his mistress a quick lick on the hand which had just stroked his head, then looked back at the intruder. Jocko strained to get nearer to the pink flesh, his lips lifting nervously from his canine incisors. The baby lay watching the animal with an unblinking stare before waving his pudgy fist nearer to the bared teeth. Jocko snapped, lunging as close to the fingers as the table's edge would allow.
"No, Jocko! Bad dog!" Kathy cried, snatching the baby from the tabletop. "Jim, put him outside."
Once out the door, Jocko scratched against it a few times, whining for re-admittance before going down the steps to his usual resting place. He turned around and around before settling against the corner formed between the wall of the house and the latticework which protected the area below the steps. He lay with his head on his paws, but didn't close his eyes. Instead, he watched the grassy expanse before him, as if to see what was causing the faint slithering, scratching sound which approached.
Jocko raised his head when the hatchet blade appeared at the edge of the area where his use had worn away all growth. As the weapon moved even closer the dog sat up, pressing his back tightly against the house. He nervously lifted first one foot, then the other, as the hatchet came into full view and slowly rose until it was balanced on the bottom of its wooden handle.
It struck before Jocko made any outcry, burying itself deep within his neck. Jocko's blood fountained out, staining the earth, as his legs spasmed briefly before he slumped in death, eyes wide in fear.
From the moment Jocko was expelled from the kitchen, the baby stared after him intently. He braced backward against Kathy's supporting arm, head wobblingly erect, his right arm gesturing toward his departed adversary.
"Did that bad doggie frighten you? He'll just have to stay outside until he learns not to scare a little boy. You are so brave! Yes, you are," Kathy cooed.
The baby seemed to mimic her with an atonal chant of his own. He continued to stare at the doorway, waving his arm in increasing arcs, until suddenly seeming to tire of the exercise. He looked again at the woman holding him and chortled, as if pleased with himself.
"Oh, you are a charmer," Kathy said. "Are you telling Jocko he can come back inside if he'll behave like a good dog?"
"Kathy, for Pete's sake!"
"Don't be a spoil sport, Jim." She walked away from her husband, nestling the baby closer to her bosom. "We'll just ignore him, won't we, Pumpkin? He's just an old meany spoil sport. Why, I'll bet he was never as cute as you are... He's just jealous!"
Kathy leaned her head against the infant's, expecting to smell that scent of young skin so near her. She nuzzled against the small neck and shoulder and started to take a deep breath. She abruptly straightened, wrinkling her nose in disgust. The baby smelled like meat left out to rot.
"You need a bath, young man," she said with mock severity, "because
