Fear Nothing

immediately switched on the radio. Sasha was winding through the last half hour of her show, giving a weather report. We were still in the wet season, and a storm was coming in from the northwest. We would have rain shortly after nightfall.
        If she had predicted that we were due for a hundred-foot tidal wave and volcanic eruptions with major rivers of lava, I would have listened with pleasure. When I heard her smooth, slightly throaty radio voice, a big stupid smile came over my face, and even on this morning near the end of the world, I couldn't help but be simultaneously soothed and aroused.
        As the day brightened beyond the windows, Orson padded directly to the pair of hard-plastic bowls that stood on a rubber mat in one corner. His name is painted on each: Wherever he goes, whether to Bobby's cottage or to Sasha's, he is family.
        As a puppy, my dog was given a series of names, but he didn't care to respond to any of them on a regular basis. After noticing how intently the mutt focused on old Orson Welles movies when we ran them on video - and especially on the appearance of Welles himself in any scene - we jokingly renamed him after the actor-director. He has ever since answered to this moniker.
        When he found both bowls empty, Orson picked up one of them in his mouth and brought it to me. I filled it with water and returned it to the rubber mat, which prevented it from sliding on the white ceramic-tile floor.
        He snatched up the second bowl and looked beseechingly at me. As is true of virtually any dog, Orson's eyes and face are better designed for a beseeching look than are the expressive features of the most talented actor who ever trod the boards.
        Aboard the Nostromo , at the dining table with Roosevelt and Orson and Mungojerrie, I had recalled those well-executed but jokey paintings of dogs playing poker and it had occurred to me that my subconscious had been trying to tell me something important by so vividly resurrecting this image from my memory. Now I understood. Each of the dogs in those paintings represents a familiar human type, and each is obviously as smart as any human being. On the Nostromo , because of the game that Orson and the cat had played with each other, “mocking their stereotypes,” I had realized that some of these animals out of Wyvern might be far smarter than I had previously thought-so smart that I wasn't yet ready to face the awesome truth. If they could hold cards and talk, they might win their share of poker hands; they might even take me to the cleaners.
        “It's a little early,” I said, taking the food dish from Orson. “But you did have a very active night.”
        After shaking a serving of his favorite dry dog food from the box into his bowl, I circled the kitchen, closing the Levelor blinds against the growing threat of the day. As I was shutting the last of them, I thought I heard a door close softly elsewhere in the house.
        I froze, listening.
        “Something?” I whispered.
        Orson looked up from his bowl, sniffed the air, cocked his head, then chuffed and once more turned his attention to his food.
        The three-hundred-ring circus of my mind.
        At the sink I washed my hands and splashed some cold water on my face.
        Sasha keeps an immaculate kitchen, gleaming and sweet-smelling, but it's cluttered. She's a superb cook, and clusters of exotic appliances take up at least half the counter space. So many pots, pans, ladles, and utensils dangle from overhead racks that you feel as if you're spelunking through a cavern where every inch of the ceiling is hung with stalactites.
        I moved throughout her house, closing blinds, feeling the vibrant spirit of her in every corner. She is so alive that she leaves an aura behind her that lingers long after she has gone.
        Her home has no interior-design theme, no harmony in the flow of furniture and artwork. Rather, each room is a testament to one of her consuming passions. She is a woman of many passions.
        All meals are taken at a large kitchen table, because the dining room is dedicated to her music. Along one wall is an electronic keyboard, a full-scale synthesizer with which she could compose for an orchestra if she wished, and adjacent to this is her composition table with music stand and a stack of pages with blank musical staffs awaiting her pencil. In the center of the room is a drum set. In a corner stands