All Shots

African-American guy with light skin, hazel eyes, and the lean build of a long-distance runner. When we reached the graveled cutout, he leaned against the bright blue car and pulled out a notebook and pen. “Looking for a dog,” he said. “Yours?’
    “No. Just helping someone else.” It’s been pointed out to me that when I talk about dogs, I have a tendency to elaborate a bit. This time, I did not. Rather, I limited myself to giving my name, address, and phone number and saying that I had no idea who lived in the house. If I hadn’t been so concerned about Mellie’s reaction to the arrival of the police and, inevitably, to the news of a murder so close to home, I’d probably have mentioned Lt. Kevin Dennehy and said that he was my next-door neighbor. In fact, friendly person that I am, I’d have made some sort of contact with the young c op. Strangely enough, Rowdy took his cue from me. Instead of stacking himself in a show pose or demonstrating the full range of northern breed vocalizations or hurling himself to the ground to beg for a tummy rub, he made none of his usual bids for attention and admiration, but sat quietly and unobtrusively at my side.
    In almost no time, I was free to return to Mellie’s, as I promptly did. One glance told me that she was as frightened as I’d feared. In fact, she’d taken refuge inside her house. Still clutching the fabric lead, she was peering out through a front window. Catching sight of Rowdy and me, she opened the door, and before she had a chance to speak, I said, “Someone needed an ambulance. That’s why the police are here. It has nothing to do with you. You don’t need to worry. But I didn’t have any luck finding Strike.”
    Mellie shook her head back and forth. “Me neither.”
    “I have some ideas about what to do next.” Instead of explicitly inviting myself in, I asked, “Is there somewhere we can talk?”
    Mellie looked bewildered. From her point of view, I realized, we were already talking, weren’t we?
    “We could sit here on the porch,” I said. It had two folding aluminum lawn chairs, the uncomfortable kind that find their principal use around here after snowstorms, when people who shovel out their cars are careful to designate the snow-free spaces as personal property rather than as the open-to-anyone spots on city streets that they might otherwise appear to be. Traffic cones and trash barrels are also popular choices. As a dog person, I take a keen interest in this local custom, which is clearly a human version of territorial marking, which is to say, leg lifting.
    This time, Mellie got the point and invited me in. The first floor had only two rooms, a living room at the front, with a flight of stairs leading up to the second floor, and a kitchen and dining area at the back. The living room had brown carpeting, a brown couch, two brown chairs, a profusion of small pillows in bright colors, a large television set, and a great many small tables crammed with religious objects and framed photographs. On the wall hung two large reproductions of oil paintings, one of the Last Supper, the other of the Madonna and Child. The kitchen had dark brown cabinets and a floor of dark brown linoleum, but on the table in the dining area was a bright yellow tablecloth, and the refrigerator was plastered with photos of dogs held on by magnets. The little rooms were incredibly clean. The sink and appliances were white and unstained. Even the refrigerator magnets looked as if they’d been scrubbed. Fran-cie had described Mellie as a model for independent living. I’d begun to wonder about the accuracy of the claim, but the sight of the well-kept house relieved some of my concern, as did Mellie’s pleasant, ordinary offer of coffee and her obvious competence in using her coffee machine and in setting out mugs, spoons, a sugar bowl, and a pitcher of half-and-half.
    As the coffee dripped, she showed me the photos on the fridge. “My dogs,” she said with a giggle.
    “Dogs you take care of?”
    “Rusty, I walk him. He’s a Yorkie. Celeste. She stays with me sometimes.” Most of the dogs were small or medium size, hut there were a couple of Labs and a golden retriever. The highbrow names of some of the dogs gave Mellie trouble. The Pomeranian she called Kink and Guard was clearly Kierkegaard, but I was unable to translate a few of the others. To my amazement, she pointed to a picture of one of the Labs and said, “Milton has hip dysplasia.”
    Why