Free Flawed Dogs by Berkeley Breathed

both came to accept.
    And that was about it. Until one Friday.
    It was dark and almost ten o’clock, and the man hadn’t returned to the truck. Sam stood up and peered over the door into the work site. A few cars remained, and there was a light inside. People were still in there doing something, but Sam couldn’t imagine what it was. Maybe a game of some sort. He could hear voices. An occasional whoop or cheer. Or groan.
    Suddenly Sam saw the man running full speed out from the building, keys in hand. Several large men followed, chasing. Sam could hear the man screaming the same thing repeatedly: “I’LL PAY IT BACK! I’LL PAY IT BACK!” He dove into the cab of the truck, but one of his pursuers grabbed the door, keeping him from closing it. As the man frantically pulled, the other man tried to reach around the door to grab his neck. The Rough-Handed Man turned to Sam and screamed, “DON’T LET ’EM IN! DON’T LET ’EM IN!”
    Sam had no idea what was going on, but it seemed clear enough that life would be generally better without the other men getting into the truck, so he curled his lips halfway up to his skull and let loose a display of saliva-spewing, teeth-snapping dog fury of such fierce proportions, the sight of it stopped the approaching men like a wall of skunk stink.
    Even the Rough-Handed Man, still struggling with the door, couldn’t help but be shocked, and he let out a low “Wow” in admiration of the performance.

    The man got the door closed and, with the help of Sam’s rabid Tasmanian devil imitation, sped the truck away with squealing tires, leaving the very angry men behind screaming unfamiliar words.
    The Rough-Handed Man looked worried as he sped away and turned around to see if they were being followed. They weren’t. His pursuers receded from view, their shouts getting lost finally in the wind noise. The man looked at Sam sitting on the seat next to him, looking peaceful, and started to laugh . . . and then began singing an old sailors’ song: “Farewell and adieu to you, fair Spanish ladies . . .”
    Sam thought this was hilarious and joined in, his muzzle pointed high with matching howls.
    But after a while, the man looked ahead and thought very, very hard about the mess he was in. Sam had never seen such fear on a human being’s face before.
    That night they ate in silence while the man paced the small rooms, deep in disturbed thought. Then he placed Sam on a chair and sat opposite him. He clasped his hands, leaned close and spoke to Sam in the way that people speak at length to dogs when they’re frightened or excited or have been alone for too long and gone slightly crazy.
    “Hey, ol’ buddy. We’ve . . . You haven’t done too bad by me, have ya?”
    “I have a big spoon for a foot. Could be worse,” said Sam.
    “I . . . I’m in a bit of a jam. There’s some people I owe a lot of . . . stuff. I don’t have it. But there’s a way—a small chance, really—that I could get it. You could have some-thin’ to do with it.”
    “Me?” said Sam.
    “I’m askin’ a lot. Maybe everything.”
    “You want my half of the french fries.”
    The man’s face was twisted in the worst sort of painful grimace Sam had ever seen. He reached to pat Sam’s head but then pulled his hand back, almost embarrassed.
    “What I’m asking, little buddy,” he said, “is for you to forgive me.”
    Sam had no idea why he said that.
    By the next terrible night . . . the night where this book began, he would.

TWENTY-THREE

    LEAVE
    As the Rough-Handed Man carried Sam down into the dark depths of the building at the edge of the city, the sights and smells of human beings and money and cruelty couldn’t overwhelm an even larger sense that the three-legged dog was feeling:
    Fear.
    His own . . . and surprisingly, the man’s. It radiated up from his huge hands, cradling Sam’s bottom and chest as they moved toward the dog-fighting pit below the brilliant light. But there was something else Sam