Saving Gracie by Carol Bradley Page B

She was worn out.
    Still, the death of the puppies inspired Bair anew to demonstrate, over and over, that she was there for these dogs. Whenever she had a few minutes to spare, she stepped inside a kennel, lay down next to its inhabitants, stroked their coats, and cooed to them nonstop. The shower of attention conveyed a powerful message: You’re a good dog. You’re special. Somebody loves you. The payoff would come, she knew.
    Change did come, gradually. By early March, the dogs looked healthier. Their coats were growing back in, albeit slowly. Their bodies had begun to fill out. Their eyes were starting to lose that awful dullness and take on a little shine.
    The dogs also appeared to appreciate their clean kennels, even if they kept soiling them. Once nighttime temperatures crept above fifty-five degrees, workers left the guillotine doors open day and night, and a couple of the dogs took advantage of the arrangement to go potty outside. They seemed to like having clean kennels. They were housetraining themselves.
    Over time, the puppy mill survivors lost their fear of water. For the first weeks at the shelter the dogs were shampooed weekly, then monthly after that. They loosened up in the tub and learned to turn around for Engler with just a little prodding. Back in their kennels, they cuddled up with their blankets. Toys, stuffed or squeaky, were less of a hit. The puppies adored them, but the older dogs couldn’t grasp the purpose of lavishing attention on an inanimate object. The blankets, though, were something else entirely. After years of living on wire mesh, the dogs grew to cherish the soft layers of warmth. They had no idea Bair was color-coordinating the blankets with the color of the dogs’ coats, but the tenderness she brought to the task was evident.
    The dogs needed as much socializing as they could get. Bair and her co-workers made it a practice to greet their wards as they passed back and forth during the course of a day. Frequently a tech would kneel down, reach some fingers through a chain-link door and stroke a face or squeeze a paw. The staff addressed the dogs by their newly given names, and in a matter of weeks some of the dogs began to answer back. Instead of retreating to the rear of their kennels, they trotted forward at the sound of someone’s approach, stood up on their hind legs and wagged their tails. To Lambert, watching their personalities emerge was like watching a flower bloom—something you would expect to see in a puppy, but rarely an adult dog.
    Dog 132 hung back. She still soiled her kennel and still stepped in her own feces. Emotionally, she remained maddeningly out of reach. She paced back and forth, seldom responding when staffers greeted her by name. The techs knew from experience that dogs were capable of a wide range of emotion: anticipation, gratitude, anger, fear, jealousy, exuberance, love. But Dog 132 seemed too closed off to feel anything but numb. She was so tiny, so devoid of personality. Some of the dogs came around nicely, Hill noticed. Some didn’t. Number 132 didn’t.
    Veltri later estimated Dog 132 to be 6 years old. She’d been born in a crate, reared in a crate, and forever after confined to one. At last she’d been liberated. Finally she was in a safe place, a place where she was getting plenty of food and, even more special, human compassion. Yet she seemed incapable of deriving pleasure from any of it.
    For centuries, scientists and philosophers debated the capacity of animals to suffer fear and pain. The staff at the Rescue League didn’t need to be told what modern-day studies have concluded: that neglected and mistreated animals do feel pain, and not just physical pain but emotional deprivation, too. The techs saw the effects of abuse firsthand. And they knew that while many dogs were able to get over the past, some never would recover. Which camp would Dog 132, Wilma, fall into? They were starting to wonder.

Chapter 8: The Case Goes to