Bloodlines

voice was young, clear, and educated, with a hint of a British accent, and not Har va rd educated, pseudo-British, either, but real British, in other words, genuinely foreign. But just a trace.
    “You owe me thirty-five dollars,” I repeated. “For trail mix. After you let go of his leash, he went to a concession stand that sells trail mix and candy and stuff. It has open bins.” I assume that I sounded cheerful. I was. In fact, I was having fun. I’d wanted to get one these people alone for a long time. “He didn’t actually eat thirty-five dollars’ worth, thank God, but he grabbed a lot of mouthfuls and threw them on the floor, which is what he does when he steals food. You wouldn’t know that, of course, because you don’t know anything about dogs, never mind malamutes, but he does. His name is Rowdy, by the way. He’s an Alaskan malamute. Anyway, what Rowdy didn’t eat or toss on the floor he probably drooled on or whatever, and the guy was nice about it, and we settled for thirty-five dollars.”
    The Bronco was very warm by now. The wipers made a cozy swish back and forth across the windshield. And the car smelled homey, too, of course.
    The indignant young voice broke the near silence. “You’re kidnapping me! Stop this car and let me out this instant!”
    “Actually, I’m rescuing you. You’d’ve got into any car that stopped, so I’ve probably rescued you from rape and murder, and those dog people back there would hang you from the nearest grooming loop. I’ve practically plucked you off the scaffold. Actually, one of them was going to strangle you. I think I’ve got that right. And someone else definitely wanted to shoot you. Actually, what she said was that you ought to be shot on sight. But I didn’t shoot you, did I? I’m not even taking you back there.”
    “You’re holding me in this car against my will! And that’s kidnapping. You could get in a lot of trouble for this.” Childish? That’s how she sounded.
    “You were hitching. I picked you up. You’re lucky. I happen to be a nice, peaceful person. Let me introduce myself. My name is Holly Winter. I live at two fifty-six Concord Avenue in Cambridge, Massachusetts, which is where we’re going, in case you wondered. I’d offer you my hand, but I need it on the steering wheel right now, so why don’t you just tell me your name, and we’ll save—”
    She interrupted with a self-righteous announcement: “I am not going anywhere with the kind of person who keeps an animal locked in a cage.”
    “Actually, you are,” I said. “Right now, that’s what you’re doing, but the word is crate. Question: Why is Rowdy in a crate? Why isn’t he free ?” I answered for her. “So if I slam on the brakes, he won’t be thrown against the windshield. That’s why the wagon barrier’s there, too. Double protection.”
    “You couldn’t let anything happen to your valuable property, could you?” she snapped.
    “He is valuable,” I said. “He is one of the most important people in my life, and, in case you wondered, I am not joking. So is Kimi, my other dog. Hey, while you’re at this, have you ever considered releasing children?”
    She didn’t answer.
    “Really,” I said. “I mean it. I’m serious. A lot of people would be less pained and, uh, jeopardized, in a way, if you went around liberating their children instead of doing stupid things like this. I mean, for a start, children can at least talk. Not babies, of course. You’d go for preschoolers, I guess. On the other hand, there are these old statistics....” I paused and explained. “I write about dogs. That’s what I do. I’m a dog writer. That’s why I know this stuff. Anyway, in 1982, Americans spent one point thirty-two billion dollars on pet accessories, and in the same year they spent only two hundred and twenty-two million dollars on toys for children under the age of eighteen months. Okay? So which would people rather lose?”
    “Oh, for Christ’s sake,” she said.
    Finally. I felt delighted. “The point is,” I said, my voice suddenly cold, “that the quality of the bond, if you want to call it that, is not very different. Love is love. It sounds corny, but that’s what this entire dog thing is about: absolute, unconditional love. And if Rowdy had been killed because you ‘liberated’ him, I would have been absolutely and unconditionally glad to see you dead. I might not actually have murdered you, but I’d sure have wanted to. I might