Free The Small Adventure of Popeye and Elvis by Barbara O'Connor Page B

dogs,” Starletta said. “They hunt raccoons.” She pointed to a tall stone monument surrounded by a rickety wooden fence in the middle of the cemetery. “That’s where Troop is buried.”
    A sign at the base of the monument read:
    Â 
    TROOP
FIRST DOG LAID TO REST HERE
SEPTEMBER 4, 1937
    Â 
    Popeye walked around the cemetery, studying each of the graves, reading about the dogs who were buried there.
    Â 
    BIG ROY
FAITHFUL FRIEND
DIED 1976
AGE 14

BEAR
BORN AUG. 1, 1965
DIED OCT. 9, 1971
BELOVED COMPANION OF
HARLEY T. JANSON

KATE
GONE BUT NOT FORGOTTEN
1978–1990
OLD BLUE
HE WAS AS GOOD AS THE BEST
AND BETTER THAN THE REST
1953–1965
    Â 
    Most of the graves had vases or soda bottles holding colorful plastic flowers. One grave had a little plastic raccoon sitting on top of a crumbling stone etched with the name Loud.
    Some of the graves had been carefully tended. Others were overgrown and long forgotten.
    Popeye studied the photos sealed in plastic and taped on the stone markers or nailed to pieces of wood.
    A man in a hunting cap kneeling in a field with his arm around a black and tan dog.
    A long-eared brown and white dog panting in the back of a pickup truck, one paw resting in the lap of a bearded man in overalls.
    Much-loved dogs.
    Like Boo.
    Elvis darted from one grave to another saying, “Cool!” and “Look at this one!”
    Starletta skipped around the cemetery, reciting the dog names on all the graves she passed. “Bubba Dog, Old Blue, Tater . . .” The sequined edges of her butterfly wings glittered in the sun.
    Popeye was still dumbstruck.
    He had lived on the gravel road in Fayette, South Carolina, his whole life and had never dreamed that on the other side of the woods behind his house, just beyond the creek where he had played a million times, was a cemetery full of dead dogs. A placewhere grown men left flowers in soda bottles and called their dogs
beloved
.
    Popeye took a deep breath, the sweet scent of honeysuckle tickling his nose.
    He wanted to savor this moment.
savor:
verb
; to enjoy or appreciate completely
    So while Elvis darted and Starletta skipped, Popeye savored.
    Until Velma stepped out of the woods.

25
    VELMA’S APPEARANCE at the edge of the cemetery, arms crossed, face red, was definitely not serendipity. It was much closer to vicissitude. Her livid wrath was like sparks, shooting from grave to grave, from tree to shrub, from Popeye to Elvis.
    Popeye wished he hadn’t connived and cajoled. He should have listened to his qualms. Then maybe he wouldn’t have been standing here all shamefaced in the middle of a coonhound cemetery beside a girl with butterfly wings and Elvis with his so-what? face.
    Velma stomped over to Popeye and gave him a little whack on the arm when she asked him what inthe world had gotten into him. Then another whack when she asked him if he had plumb lost his mind. And another whack when she told him she’d been traipsing through the woods for an hour looking for him. And one last whack when she asked him if he was trying to worry her right into the grave.
    Then she spun around and glared at Elvis. “And you!” she hollered, jabbing her finger at him.
    She lit into Elvis while he peered up at her from under his shaggy hair. As she hollered on and on about how he oughta be over there helping with that motor home and nobody even knew where he was and did he want to grow up to be like Dooley and Shifty and all those other no-accounts, his so-what? face began to change. By the time she was done with him, he was wearing a pretty good I’m-sorry face.
    Then the quiet drifted down and hovered over them until Starletta shattered it like glass.
    â€œThese are all dead dogs,” she said, throwing her arms out. “And they live here.” She pointed to each grave, reading off the dog names like she was taking roll. “Jasper, Connie, Big Tick, Rollo . . .”
    â€œWho are