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THE DOG SNATCHER
I was staying with my Uncle Volodya at his country cottage. His next-door neighbor was Boris Ivanovich, a tall, thin, smiling man who had a cane. His dog's name was Chapa. Chapa was a shaggy, black Scotch terrier. We soon became good friends.
One day Boris Ivanovich decided to go swimming, but he didn't want to take Chapa along, because he'd taken him once before and it had all ended in a terrible uproar. Chapa had made straight for the water where a nervous lady was floating around on a big inner tube to keep from drowning.
"Go away! Take this horrid beast away!" she screeched and began splashing Chapa.
Chapa doesn't like to be splashed. He tried to snap at the lady, but since he couldn't reach her, he sunk his teeth into her rubber tube. He only did it once, but the tube began to hiss. All the air went out of it.
"Help! Save me!" The nervous lady screamed. She decided she was drowning.
There was great commotion on the beach. Boris Ivanovich rushed to the rescue. It was very shallow there, but the lady kept thrashing about. When she finally stood up the water only came to her waist. Boris Ivanovich saved her and then swished a twig at Chapa to make it look like he was punishing him. He never took Chapa bathing again.
Now Boris Ivanovich asked me to play with Chapa in the yard so he wouldn't chase after him. I went over to their yard and Chapa and I began to run and tumble, hop, jump and spin, bark and squeal, laugh and roll around.
Meanwhile, Boris Ivanovich went off to the river. Chapa and I fooled around till we got tired. That's when a boy I knew named Vanya came walking by the fence. He was carrying a fishing rod.
"Let's go fishing, Dennis!" he called.
"I can't, I'm minding Chapa."
"Lock him in the house. You can catch up with me," he said and walked off.
I got hold of Chapa's collar. He rolled over on his back, so I had to drag him carefully across the grass. I opened the door, pulled him into the hall, closed the door and went for my net.
By the time I reached the road Vanya was gone. He'd turned the corner and disappeared. I raced after him, but stopped dead in my tracks when I got to the small shop. Chapa was sitting in the middle of the road. His tongue was lolling out and he was looking at me innocently. That was a fine how-d'you-do! I probably hadn't shut the door tight enough. Or else he'd escaped through a window and taken a short cut across the back gardens. Here he was now, waiting for me. Chapa was one smart dog.
I'd have to hurry. Vanya was probably pulling in the fish, while here I was, stuck with Chapa. I'd've gladly taken him along, but if Boris Ivanovich got back and saw him gone he'd begin to worry and would go off hunting for him. Everybody'd be angry at me. I had no choice. I'd have to drag Chapa back to the house.
I got hold of his collar again and began pulling him but this time Chapa dug his paws into the ground, so I had to drag him along on his belly like a frog. I was all in by the time I got him back to the house.
I opened the door a crack, shoved him in and then pulled it shut. Chapa growled and barked, but I didn't stay to talk to him. I walked all around the house, closed all the windows and the gate.
Even though I was beat, I headed off for the river at a run. I was trotting along and had gotten as far as a wooden shed when - guess what? Chapa came running out from behind it! I was flabbergasted. I was sure I was seeing things. Chapa suddenly began to look like he was going to bite me for having locked him up again. He growled and barked at me. I tried to grab him by the collar, but he kept wriggling out of my grasp, backing away and barking all the time.
"Here, Chapa-Chapa! Here, boy!" I coaxed.
He kept right on teasing me. Besides, I was clutching my net and kept stumbling over it. So we pranced around. All of a sudden I remembered a movie I'd seen on TV. It was called "Jungle Trails" and was about hunters in China who used big nets to catch monkeys. That gave me an idea. I tossed my net over Chapa and caught him like a monkey. He barked and barked, but I rolled him up in the net, slung it over my shoulder and started off down the street with my catch like a real hunter.
Chapa was hanging over my shoulder, swinging in the net as if he were in hammock and yapping every now and then, but I paid no attention. When I reached the house I lifted him over the windowsill and shook him out onto the floor. Then I closed the window and leaned a pole against it.
Chapa barked and whined. For the third time I ran off down the road after Vanya. Actually, an awful lot of time had passed, because Vanya was coming back. He looked very pleased. He had two fishes, each one as big as a teaspoon, strung on a long stiff stem of grass.
"Boy! That's some catch!" I said.
"They kept biting all the time. I barely had time to pull them in. Come on. We'll take my catch to my mother for dinner and then we can go fishing again. You might catch something, too."
Before we knew it we'd reached Boris Ivanovich's cottage.
There was a small crowd outside the fence: a man in striped trousers with a stomach as big as a pillow, a lady in slacks and a halter, a boy wearing glasses, and some other people. They were all waving and making noise. The boy spotted me and yelled,
"There he is! That's him!"
Everyone turned.
"Which one? The one with the rod or the little one?" the man in striped trousers shouted.
"The little one! Don't let him get away!" They all raced towards me. I got a little scared and ran off. I dropped my net and climbed a high fence. I knew they couldn't get me now.
The lady in the halter ran up to the fence and began shrieking hysterically, "Give me back my dog! Where'd you put my dog, you horrible child?"
Meanwhile, the man was pounding his fists on the fence and shouting, "Where's my dog? Where'd you take her? Out with it!"
"Leave me alone," I said. "I don't know what you're talking about. I've never seen your dogs in my life! You tell them, Vanya!"
"Leave the child alone!" Vanya shouted. "I'll go tell my mother on you, and you'll be sorry!"
"Run for her, Vanya!"
"Hang on, Dennis! Stay where you are!" And he was off.
"The other boy's an accomplice," the man said. "Why, there's a whole gang of them! Hey, you! Where's Cookie?"
"How do I know where your daughter is?"
"Oh, so you're a smart aleck? You get down this minute! We're going to the militia station."
"I will not!"
"Wait! I'll get him!" The boy who wore glasses said and tried to climb the fence, but he couldn't, because he didn't know about the nail that gave you a toehold. I'd climbed that fence a hundred times before. Besides, I was kicking at him, to keep him down
"Wait, Pavel," the pillow-man said. "I'll give you a hand-up."
So the boy named Pavel climbed up on the man's back. I was getting worried again, because Pavel was so big. He must've been in the third or fourth grade. This was curtains for me. But then I spotted Boris Ivanovich jogging along and Vanya and his mother running from the opposite direction, shouting,
"Stop! What's going on here?"
"Nothing is!" the man in the striped trousers shouted back. "This kid's been stealing dogs! He stole mine."
Then the lady in slacks said, "And he stole mine, too!"
"I'll never believe that. Never," Vanya's mother said.
Then the boy named Pavel said, "I saw him. He had my dog rolled up in a net slung over his shoulder. I was up in the attic, looking down, and I saw him!"
"Quit lying! That was Chapa. He kept running away!"
"I know this boy to be a very honest child," Boris Ivanovich said. "I see no reason for him to have suddenly become a thief. A dog snatcher. Won't you all come inside? We'll discuss it calmly. You, too, Dennis."He came over to the fence and I crawled right onto his shoulders, because, as I said, he was very tall.
Everybody went into the yard. The pillow-man was snorting, the lady was wringing her hands and Pavel was trotting behind. I rode in on Boris Ivanovich's shoulders. We climbed the porch steps. When Boris Ivanovich opened the door three black dogs tumbled out. As alike as peas in a pod. I thought I was seeing things.
"Here, Cookie!" the man shouted.
And one Chapa jumped on him, landing on his stomach!
The lady and Pavel both shouted, "Bobo! Bobo!" They looked like they were going to pull the second Chapa apart, because she was tugging at the front paws and he was tugging at the hind paws. All this time the third Chapa was standing next to us and wagging his tail.
"So that's what you're like!" Boris Ivanovich said. "I never expected it of you. Why'd you cram the house full of other people's dogs?"
"I thought they were Chapa. Don't they all look alike? They've all got the same faces. They're just like triplets."
So I told them the story from the very beginning, and they all began to laugh. Finally, Boris Ivanovich said,
"I can see how you might've been mistaken. Scotch terriers are so alike it really is hard to tell them apart. Take what happened now, for instance. It was the dogs who recognized us, and not us who recognized our dogs. So you're not to blame. But I think that from now on I'll call you Dog Snatcher."
And that's what he's been calling me.