Don't Explain: An Artie Deemer Mystery by Dallas Murphy

were both unacclimated to the absence of sirens, horns, alarms, explosions, salsa. Maybe in the silence, like in one of those sensory-deprivation tanks, we were hallucinating. My dog and I are very close, but not so close we share hallucinations. No, the sound was real, it existed. The hairs on the back of Jellyroll’s neck stood stiffly erect. The sound was moving fast, changing in pitch and quality…
    Dogs! Christ, that’s all—dogs. A pack of barking dogs, in Dog Cove, which was sheltered by the Dog Islands. Jellyroll began to bark his high-pitched, excited yap-yap bark.
    I saw the underbrush rustle and then, here and there, a flash of dog flesh. Ten dogs seemed to materialize from the undergrowth and gather in the clearing at the foot of the steps, where they swirled in excited circles. Jellyroll hesitated, watching the signals, then bolted down the steps to meet them.
    Dogs are not mere will-less servers of a master. Dogs are egotists. Everything they do around people and their fellows is rich with self-awareness and expression. The pack, a mix of mutts and purebreds, froze as Jellyroll neared the ground. He stopped on the bottom step. Tails down, they all waited for the ritual to resolve itself. A well-bred chocolate Lab, the biggest dog in the pack, dropped into the play posture, forelegs on the ground, rump in the air, and barked once, the cue for everybody to chill, we’re here for fun, aren’t we? Then they all moved at once.
    A springy Jack Russell bounced up on the steps to welcome Jellyroll, and he bounded into the play posture to accept. They swirled and sniffed and panted and leapt over each other’s backs. They had the look of a pack of hooligans feeding off each other’s energy. The Lab kissed Jellyroll, so did one of the two coyote types, then they all started running headlong back into the underbrush and up the hill the way they came. Jellyroll started with them—
    I gave that some quick consideration—a city dog running with the local pack—and I whistled for him to stop. He did. He always does, but this time he didn’t turn around to look at me. Acouple members of the pack stopped, looked over their shoulder at him. Then they ran off and left him standing there. Their wild barks faded to that keening sound, then to silence.
    I felt like a cruel bastard. Jellyroll still wouldn’t look at me. He didn’t return to the porch. He flopped on his side. No relationship can run smooth all the time. Even in a fantasy family.
    Then from along the shore in the opposite direction, we heard something else. Of course, Jellyroll heard it first. Someone coming on foot, walking along a shoreside path I hadn’t noticed yet. Jellyroll forgot his despair. He began to bark. This particular bark sounds like a dangerous dog’s bark, and sometimes I like that.
    Hands in his pockets, a gangly guy in his forties shuffled out of the woods into an open area at the side of the house, the only spare flat ground. He wore blue jean cutoffs, hiking boots, and heavy woolen socks. He had pale bird legs. His head bobbed forward and back with each step, like a great blue heron’s.
    “Christ,” he exclaimed, “I thought you were Clayton Kempshall for a minute there. I thought I’d seen a ghost.”
    “A ghost? Clayton’s not dead.”
    “He’s not?”
    “No.”
    “…Are you sure?”
    “I just saw him a week ago. He didn’t die since then, did he?”
    “Oh no, years ago.”
    “You must be thinking of someone else.”
    “Clayton Kempshall?”
    “Yes.”
    “Not dead?”
    “No.”
    “Oh, man, I feel relieved…Look, I’m Dickie.”
    “Artie,” I said.
    Jellyroll watched him suspiciously.
    “Wow, that’s really great about Clayton.”
    “Uh-huh.”
    “There hasn’t been anyone in the boathouse for years, of course.”
    “Why?”
    “Well, because of Clayton’s ghost, but now, of course, we know that’s bullshit, what with Clayton being alive. Yeah. I wonder whose ghost it was. You haven’t seen