As he stepped onto the sidewalk, the illumination from the streetlights revealed a couple of streaks of red on the dog's fur. He hadn't noticed the blood before. He wondered if the dog had gotten into a fight, maybe with a squirrel. There hadn't been a shredded squirrel carcass lying under the bench, so it was kind of sad that the dog had been beaten by something so much smaller than it.
Well, okay, he had no evidence that it was a squirrel. It could've been a bigger dog. Or a human with a knife.
Either way, the dog didn't seem to have lost all that much blood, certainly not enough to account for its weakened state. Possibly a lack of food and water is what made it lose the fight. Much of Charlie's success at hunting came from seeking prey that was hungry and thirsty, so he understood the dog's plight.
The dog fell asleep in his arms as he carried it home.
- 3 -
Charlie smiled as he carried the dog downstairs to his basement. He'd lived in this house for five years, and the dog would be his first guest that wasn't going down into the basement to die. At least he hoped it wasn't--the dog didn't seem to be dying, but Charlie couldn't be certain. He'd never even
Actually, as embarrassing as it was to admit to himself, Charlie was a bit uncomfortable with the idea of the dog seeing the scene of his many crimes. Not that he thought the dog was going to run barking to the police, but still, dumb animal or not, it was another pair of eyes on the table where he'd killed almost twenty women. Maybe he was being less than meticulous about his secrecy.
However, that irrational feeling wasn't enough for him to let the dog bleed all over his upstairs furniture. He'd upholstered that couch himself.
He placed the dog on the metal table. It looked as if it wanted to jump to the floor but lacked the strength. He pressed down on its back to keep it from moving, and counted the wounds. Five different gashes: two long ones on its back, two smaller ones on its left side, and one on its back left leg. None of them were bleeding profusely.
Charlie had plenty of experience tending to wounds. No medical training, and nothing fancy--just bandages and antiseptic. He assumed this would work for a dog, too.
Normally his patient was strapped down. Unfortunately, though his ankle and wrist bracelets could adjust to accommodate various heights, they were still only designed for a human. He'd just have to hold the dog down while he applied the alcohol.
The dog yelped and thrashed and almost got free. 'You'll break your leg if you jump off,' he warned it as he pressed the dog more tightly against the metal surface. Instead of his usual precise touch, he settled for pouring the antiseptic over the wounds, and then held the dog against the table for several more minutes until it calmed down. The bandages didn't stick very well because of its fur, so Charlie wrapped tape around its legs and torso, which kept them affixed well enough.
The basement had a sink that Charlie primarily used to rinse blood off his tools. He found a small plastic bowl, emptied out the screws and nails that were inside, filled it with water, and placed it in front of the dog. The dog frantically lapped up the water, drinking so vigorously that Charlie had to hold the bowl steady to keep the dog from knocking it off the table. When the dog finished, he refilled the bowl and let it drink some more.
He lifted the dog off the table, causing it to yelp in pain, and set it down on the floor. 'Stay,' he told it in a firm voice, as he walked toward the staircase.
The dog followed him. Slowly and shakily, but it followed.
'I said, stay.' Charlie pointed to the dog. 'Stay.'
The dog barked.
'Don't bark at me,' he told it. 'Stay.' He decided to try something else: 'Sit.'
The dog did not sit. It barked again.
Charlie walked up the stairs and shut the basement door. He didn't want blood and dog hair upstairs. The only untidy part of his house was his basement, and then only when he had a victim down there. That dog was lucky it wasn't still freezing in the park; it would just have to deal with being kept downstairs until he returned it to its rightful owner.
He opened the cupboard and looked through the shelves. He didn't have any dog food. What was the next best thing?
Breakfast cereal? That sort of looked like dog food.
He filled a bowl with dry cereal, then reopened the door to the basement. The dog sat on the bottom step, looking up at him expectantly. Charlie walked down the stairs and placed the bowl on the floor next to the dog. It sniffed the cereal, looked back at up at him, and whined softly.
'Eat it,' Charlie said.
The dog continued to stare at him.
'Eat it,' Charlie repeated. 'They're Cocoa Puffs.'
The dog sneezed. Charlie wasn't sure if it was a derisive sneeze or just a regular sneeze. Either way, he didn't have a lot of sympathy for a starving creature that wouldn't eat the food that was right in front of it. If it wanted to die, he'd let it die. If it expired in his basement, his only regret would be that it had sneezed all over his perfectly good Cocoa Puffs.
Maybe he was being unfair. Charlie wouldn't eat a bowl of dog food, so perhaps it was unreasonable to expect this dog to eat a bowl of human cereal, especially without milk. It was only around eight o'clock, so the pet store was probably still open. He'd pick up some real dog food and then bill the cost to the owner.
'Stay,' he told the dog, then walked back upstairs and shut the door.
* * *
Before he went to the food aisle, Charlie stopped at the revolving metal book rack. He looked at the various covers, trying to figure out what kind of dog he had in his basement. It wasn't a schnauzer, dachshund, beagle (
He didn't take the book off the rack. He had no intention of learning how to care for the dog--he was just curious about what kind it was.
He wandered over to the food aisle and frowned. There were several dozen different varieties. Were they breed specific? Was it all the same garbage with different packaging? What was wrong with just having one bag and labeling it 'Dog Food?'
Charlie decided to make this into a much easier decision. He scanned the aisle, searching for the lowest price.
'Looking for something in particular?' asked an employee, a young cute brunette, maybe twenty-two or twenty-three.
'Just food.'
'How old is your dog?'
Charlie shrugged.
'Is it a puppy?'
'No.' Charlie picked up the closest bag of food, hoping that the employee would think he'd made his final decision and go away.
'If you're looking for anything else, toys, treats, or whatever, just let me know,' said the employee with a friendly smile.
'Okay.'
After she left, Charlie put the bag of food back on the shelf and traded it out for a cheaper one. Actually, for some reason he'd expected dog food to be a lot more expensive; still, no need to risk spending unnecessary money
