Sallys in the Alley | Page 9

for the glorious privilege of being one of its citizens."
"Then what?"
"He stopped the car and told me to get out. He said he wanted to vomit, and he always vomited in private if he could manage it. He literally pushed me out! Right on this deserted road in the middle of the desert! And then drove off and left me!"
"You said you didn't know his name," Doan remarked. "Haven't got any idea where he hangs out, have you?"
"No. Are you going to try to find him and teach him to respect patriotic American womanhood?"
"Well, not exactly," Doan said. "I think maybe I could use a slacker like he is in my business--"
"What is it--your business?"
"It's rather confidential."
"Oh!" said Harriet Hathaway, thrilled. "It's government work, isn't it?"
"Not unless you're thinking of a different government than I think you are."
"Oh, I know you can't say anything about it," said Harriet understandingly. "I'll just bet you're an agent of some kind or other."
"Of some kind or other," Doan agreed. "Other, to be strictly accurate."
"You can trust my discretion, Mr. Doan. I know just What's that queer noise?" She turned around. "There's a dog in your back seat!"
"I noticed that," Doan told her.
"He's awfully big."
"Yes," said Doan.
"He's snoring--"
Doan sighed. "Yes."
"He's a Great Dane--"
"So his pedigree says."
"I don't like Great Danes. They're stupid, and they're a nuisance."
"You're telling me."
"Then why did you buy this one?"
"I didn't. I won him in a crap game."
"I don't believe in gambling. You might lose."
"I did," said Doan. "The only trouble was that I didn't know it at the time. I thought I'd won something pretty fancy until I got him home and he started sneering at me and snubbing me because I didn't have a ten-room suite in the penthouse of the Park-Plaza Hotel."
"I know. Then, later, you grew so fond of him and he of you that you couldn't part with him."
"What?" said Doan. "Fond? I detest him, and he despises me."
"Oh, no," said Harriet confidently. "Dogs always love their masters."
"Explain that to Carstairs sometime when you're not busy. It would be an interesting new theory to him."
"Does he always sleep like this?"
"Turn around again," Doan said.
Harriet turned around. Carstairs' broad, blunt muzzle was just a half inch from the end of her nose, and his eyes were fiery greenish slits staring unblinkingly into hers.
"Oh!" she gasped.
"Relax, stupid," said Doan.
The rear seat springs bonged as Carstairs hurled himself back into the cushions again.
"Oh," said Harriet, swallowing. "Oh."
"He gets resentful when people make disparaging remarks about him," Doan explained.
"Oh, I'm sorry! I didn't know he could understand... Why, he can't understand! Dogs can't understand what people are saying!"
Doan shrugged. "Okay."
"You signaled him some way. I know! You mentioned his name!"
"Have it your way..."
"Well, I don't like him--"
"He'd feel insulted if you did. What did this horrible person who picked you up in Masterville look like?"
"Well, he was tall and skinny and unhealthy looking, and he had a beard that grew in patches in a disgustingly unkempt manner. He was really most unpleasant, and I didn't bother to pay much attention to him. I always say we should ignore the lower elements of the population and concentrate our attention on people of culture and breeding."
"I'll bet."
"Bet what?"
"That you always say that."
After that they rode in silence for awhile. Doan turned on the headlights, and the car moved smoothly and silently through the white tunnel they dug in the night. A few stars came out. In the Mojave the stars aren't coy. They don't twinkle and wink at you. They just stare. Sometimes, when you've been alone too long, you begin to think they're taking an altogether too personal interest in you and your affairs, and then you get sand-silly and start running in circles and screaming.
Carstairs licked Doan on the back of the neck. Carstairs' tongue, spread out flat, was as wide as a four-inch paint brush and had much the same effect when used judicially. It never failed to make Doan jump. Now the car swooped across to the wrong side of the road and back again.
"Damn you!" Doan said emphatically.
"What?" Harriet asked, startled.
"Carstairs," Doan explained. "He has an urgent personal errand to attend to."
He stopped the car and shut off the motor, palming the ignition key as he did so. He got out and opened the rear door.
"Come on. And don't step on a rattlesnake, like I hope you will."
Carstairs looked up the road and down the road and snorted twice disapprovingly and then ambled off into the shadows. Doan walked around to the back of the car and stared up at the stars without much enthusiasm. He looked down after a moment, his eyes caught by the gleam of the chrome handle on the trunk compartment.
It was still turned sideways. Doan attempted to turn it back to