As darkness closed in I found a flat area heavily imbued with human scents. A few wooden tables were scattered about, and near a few of them were metal poles atop which were buckets of ash and the tantalizing promise of burned meat, though when I stood on my back legs to investigate I was only able to lick a trace of food from the bars atop the ashes.
Much more promising was a round barrel similar to the one Female had climbed into, though this one was metal. I attempted to duplicate her feat, but where she was able to climb in by leaping up, hooking her front paws on the lip, and then scrabbling with her rear legs, my own leap and grab only succeeded in pulling the entire thing over. Guiltily, I remembered Lucas telling me bad dog when I did something similar at home in the kitchen, but that did not stop me from locating chicken pieces and a thick piece of sugary treat and some dry biscuits that were not very good. The chicken crunched as I chewed through the bones and I licked delicious juices from the plastic container I pulled from the barrel. I was as full as I had been in several days, and contentedly curled up under the table for the night. Having a satisfied tummy made me feel safe.
The next day the trail took me steeply uphill, and I was tired. Before long I realized I was already hungry again. I regretted ever disliking Good Exercise, the game where Mom or Lucas would toss dog snacks down the stairs for me to run after them, gobble them up, and then climb back to the kitchen. Now I would happily play that game all day, if they wanted.
When I heard a flat, loud noise I instantly turned in the direction from which it came and ran toward it. I knew what that boom meant—Dude and Warren were using their pipe. Though I would not get in their car, I would gladly accept more meaty morsels.
Soon I heard voices. They were men and they sounded excited. “She’s got to weigh a hundred fifty pounds!” someone shouted.
I emerged cautiously from the trees. Up ahead there was a ridge. I now could smell the humans and they were not Dude and Warren. I padded up to the ridge and looked down.
I was on a small hill, and down the slope below me a stream trickled through the rocks. Across a narrow canyon was a far taller hill, sparsely covered with thin plants. I glanced up and saw two men stumbling and running down the higher hill. They were on steep terrain and did not look over, or they would easily see me. Both of them carried pipes, and the air was filled with the stink I associated with the loud bang these pipes could make.
“Told you we’d get something today!” one of them gasped at the other.
Panting and tripping, the men were hurrying down toward the small stream. I crept along the ridge, curious, watching the men’s progress, and that’s when a delicate shift in the wind brought me the strong smell of an animal and something else.
Blood.
I turned toward the blood scent, the men forgotten. “At least five hundred dollars!” one of them said, but I was tracking with my nose. I did not have far to go—just a few steps and I saw a creature lying motionless in the rocks. I cautiously approached, though the stillness in its body told me it was not living. It was like the squirrel Lucas showed me by the side of the road on one of our walks—warm and limp and dead.
I sniffed at the blood on its chest. This animal smelled similar to a cat, though it wasn’t like any cat I had ever seen—it was enormous, larger than I was. It was a female, and a milky odor from her teats reminded me of Mother Cat. Infused into her blood was a stark, smoky stench, the kind that came from the pipes that men like Dude and the two on the hill carried.
I did not understand what I was seeing.
Behind me, I could hear the men breathing loudly. The change in sound told me they had reached the bottom of the canyon and were now coming up the near side.
“I need a break!” one of them panted to the other.
“We got to grab it and get the hell out of here,” the other said tensely, but I could hear that they had stopped climbing.
“No one around. We’re fine.”
“Dammit, we’re not fine. You know what happens we get caught poaching a cougar?”
“I know we might get as much as a grand for her, that’s what I know.”
I decided I did not want to meet the men and felt sure they would not give me any treats if I did.
Then a movement from the bushes caught my eye and I turned my head. There was something there, an animal, but the wind was blowing the wrong way for me to smell it. I stared, seeing eyes, pointed ears. Then, though it was nearly hidden, I recognized what I was looking at: an immense cat, bigger than many dogs, the largest I had ever seen. It eyes were locked on mine, and when it realized I saw it, it ducked its head a little, as if to hide. But now that I knew it was there, I could separate its smell from the huge animal lying motionless in the rocks. A female.
The way she held herself reminded me of the cats in the den when there were humans coming in through the hole: the same rigid body, the same wide-eyed stare, lips drawn back slightly. She was terrified.
There was a loud shout from one of the men: “Dammit!” and she cringed and backed into the bushes and darted away. I recognized the motion, the skittering way she ran, and realized that despite her size she wasn’t a cat, she was a kitten, a kitten as big as a medium-sized dog.
She only retreated a little way before halting. I did not know what had happened, but I could tell by her tense movements that she wanted to flee. Yet she didn’t—was it because of the dead feline at my feet? Was that her mother?
The sounds and smells told me that the men with pipes were nearly at the top of the ridge, so I, too, needed to go. I turned away and padded stealthily into the brush.
The big kitten followed.
*
The route I took roughly tracked the comingled scents of Big Kitten and the huge dead mother cat, retracing their steps. The going was not easy, but the trail went in a fairly straight line away from the angry men. I could smell them and the blood now, the breeze cooler under my tail than on my nose.
I was disturbed by what I had just witnessed. I did not understand the connection between the death of Big Kitten’s mother and the humans with the stinking pipes, but I did believe there was one. I was reminded of the time Mom invited a friend inside the house and then he became furious and she hit him and he fell down. The scary conclusion was that there were bad people in the world. I knew there were those who would prevent me from being with Lucas, but this was something else entirely.
If a dog couldn’t trust humans, how was life even possible?
Big Kitten was silent behind me; I could smell her, smell the terror and the anxious despair. When I stopped to look at her, she moved swiftly to hide, her bouncy gait exactly like any normal-sized kitten.