Free Shiloh by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor

looks at me, then at Dad. Dad still won’t say nothing, makes me do the talking. While the doc leans over Shiloh and slowly inserts the needle in his side, I get up my nerve.
    â€œIt’s Judd Travers’s,” I tell him. I got to start practicing the truth sometime.
    â€œJudd Travers’s ? This the dog he’s missing? How come you brought it in?”
    â€œI had him,” I say.
    Doc Murphy sucks in his breath, then lets it out a little at a time— huh, huh, huh . “Whew!” he says, and goes on about his work.
    Don’t know how long we’re there in Doc’s kitchen, Dad standing over against the wall, armsfolded, me with my hands cupped over Shiloh’s head while Doc Murphy washes the wounds, dresses them, and starts stitching the skin back up. Once or twice I feel Shiloh jerk, like it hurts him, but when he lays too still, I don’t know if it’s because he’s numb or if he’s dying.
    â€œThe next twenty-four hours, we’ll know if this dog’s going to live,” the doc says. “You check with me tomorrow evening; we’ll have some idea then. I can keep him here for a day or two, Ray. Then, if he makes it, you can take him on home.”
    I put my face down near Shiloh’s again, my mouth next to his ear. “ Live , Shiloh, live! ” I whisper.
    Hardest thing in the world is to leave Shiloh there at Doc Murphy’s, the way his eyes follow me over to the doorway, the way his muscles move, like he’s trying to get up when he sees me leaving. Second hardest thing is to crawl in the Jeep with Dad afterward.
    There isn’t a word passed between us till we get home. Once Dad turns the motor off, though, and I’m all set to get out, he says, “Marty, what else don’t I know?”
    â€œWhat?” I ask.
    â€œYou keeping Judd’s dog up there on our hill—got a place for him all built, never letting on. What else you keeping from me?”
    â€œ Nothing, Dad!”
    â€œHow do I know that’s not another lie?”
    â€œâ€™Cause it’s not.”
    â€œYou saying so don’t make it true.”
    I know then what Ma meant. But it’s not all so black and white as Dad makes it out to be, neither. And sometimes, when I get mad, it clears my head.
    â€œYou would have thought more of me if I’d let that dog wander around till Judd found it again, kick the daylights out of ’im?” I ask. “That what you want me to do, Dad?”
    â€œI want you to do what’s right.”
    â€œWhat’s right?”
    For once in my eleven years, I think I have my dad stumped. Leastways, it seems to be thirty . . . forty seconds before he answers:
    â€œYou’ve got to go by the law. The law says a man that pays money for a dog owns that dog. You don’t agree with the law, then you work to change it.”
    â€œWhat if there isn’t time, Dad? Shiloh could be dead by the time somebody looked into the way Judd treats his dogs.”
    Dad’s voice is sharp: “You think Judd Travers is the only one around here hard-hearted toward his animals? You think he’s the only one who starves ’em or kicks ’em or worse? Open up your eyes, Marty. Open your eyes! ” Now Dad half turns in his seat, back resting against the door, facingme: “How many times have you walked to the school bus and seen a chained-up dog in somebody’s yard? How many times you ever put your mind to whether or not it’s happy, its ribs sticking out like handles on the sides? Suddenly you’re face-to-face with a dog that pulls at your heart, and you all at once want to change things.”
    I swallow. “There’s got to be a first time,” I answer.
    Dad sighs. “You’re right about that,” he says.
    I’m pushing my luck, I know. “If Doc Murphy don’t tell Judd about Shiloh, can we bring him back here and keep him? I could build him a better