The Dogs of Babel

THIRTY-ONE

I stare at Remo. “Dog J?” I say. “He’s here?” Remo smiles something close to a smirk. “You got it,” he says. “So what do you say we put your dog away in the kennels and show you around?”

I look down at Lorelei, still cowering behind me. Should I just take her home and forget I’ve ever seen this place? I imagine the evening ahead of me, sitting quietly at home with Lorelei, knowing that only a few blocks away, a group of men are gathered to hear a dog speak. I don’t think I could bear it. Lately, I have to admit it, I’ve begun to lose faith in my project. I’ve begun to wonder if I’m wasting my time. It would be a great boost to my morale to see the living proof that all my efforts have not been in vain. To see that it is possible, after all. What hope it would give me! I look up at Remo’s house, ordinary and unprepossessing as it is. Somewhere in that house, the world’s only known talking dog is waiting, waiting to tell us what he has to say. How can I not stay for that?

“I’ll tell you what,” I say to Remo. “I’ll just run her home. It won’t take me a minute.”

“You sure?” he says. “The kennels are just around back. I’m sure she’d be perfectly comfy.”

I look down at my frightened dog and feel a surge of protectiveness. “No,” I say. “She’ll be better off at home.” I kneel down to comfort her. “Shh, girl,” I say. I can feel her trembling. “It’s going to be all right. What a good girl.” Remo’s looking at me strangely.

“You talk to her like that, do you?” he says. “Well, I guess we’ve all got our methods.”

“Come on, girl,” I say, leading Lorelei to the sidewalk. She bounds ahead of me, panting with relief. She pulls me all the way to the car. I open the back door, and Lorelei leaps in. “Don’t worry, girl,” I say to her softly as I crack the window open. “I’ll take you home.” She settles herself on the seat and rests her head on her paws.

I drive home quickly and deposit Lorelei in the backyard. I give her a quick pat and dump a small pile of biscuits at her feet to apologize for the evening’s ordeal, then I head back to Remo’s. The street is packed with cars by the time I return. I end up parking two blocks away. As I walk toward the house, I can see that Remo is sitting on his porch, waiting for me.

“You get her all settled in?” he asks as I head up the front walk.

“Yeah,” I say. “She’s fine.”

“All right, then,” he says. “Let’s show you around.”

He leads me to the rear of the house. “We don’t get too many newcomers,” he says to me as we walk. “And we have to be pretty careful about outsiders. You never know when somebody might get skittish and call the police. But like I said in my note, we checked you out a little. And you come recommended by Wendell Hollis—can’t do much better than that.”

I try to return his smile. “Right,” I say.

We’re standing in front of a large outbuilding in the yard. I can hear barking and yelping coming from inside. It’s a terrible noise.

“This would be the kennel,” he says.

“Don’t the neighbors ever complain?” I ask.

“Well, they used to,” he says. “But I made things pretty unpleasant for them, until they all either just shut up or moved.” He laughs. “Yep, I made things pretty unpleasant. The houses on either side of this one are owned by Society members now, so we don’t get too many complaints.”

He swings open the door to the building and ushers me inside. I see that we’re in a long, narrow corridor with rows of cages on either side. The cages are filled with dogs of various breeds, most of them two to a cage. There must be thirty dogs in here. Most of them are pathetically skinny, and some of them have bandages on different parts of their bodies. The cages haven’t been cleaned anytime recently, and the smell is overwhelming. I’m very glad I didn’t agree to leave Lorelei here.

“These are the dogs we’re currently working with,” he says. Dogs on either side of us fling themselves against the bars of their cages, yowling at us as we walk past.

“They don’t seem very happy,” I say.

“Oh, they’re fine. They’re just looking for their dinner.”

We walk back out into the yard, and Remo closes the kennel door behind us. “The meeting’s going to be upstairs in the main part of the house,” he says, “but we’ve still got a little time. Why don’t I take you down to the lab and show you around?”

I take a deep breath. “Sure,” I say. “Sounds good.”

There’s a cellar door that opens into the yard, the slanty kind of door that opens outward to reveal stairs leading down to the basement. I remember suddenly that my grandmother’s house had a cellar door like this and that I used to like to slide down it when I was very small. Remo opens the door and gestures to the stairs inside. “After you,” he says.

I walk down the stairs cautiously. It’s dark until Remo flicks the light switch. I’m prepared for any number of horrible things, but it looks pretty much like a regular basement. There’s a large table in the middle of the room, a sink in the corner, and a row of cupboards along one of the walls. I flinch slightly when I notice a display of knives and surgical equipment laid out on the counter next to the sink.

“This is where it all happens,” Remo says. “Now, once you’ve joined the Society and paid your dues, you’ll have access to all this. I assume you’re working out of your house now?”

I nod.

“Well, you’ll probably find this a little easier. The room’s soundproofed, and we’ve got a good supply of tools and ether, suture materials, just about everything you need.”

I nod again. “Great,” I say, in a hollow voice.

Remo continues. “Now, it didn’t look to me like your bitch has been altered in any way. Am I right about that? You haven’t started operating on her yet?”

“Uh, no. See, my background is in linguistics, and I thought I’d try a nonsurgical approach first.”

Remo looks skeptical. “What have you been doing with her, then?”

“Well, lately I’ve been working with flash cards, trying to get her to associate certain words with a set of pictorial symbols I’ve devised,” I begin. “I’ve had a special typewriter made up with these symbols, and I’m trying to get her to the point where she can type a sentence with her nose.” I stop talking. It sounds ridiculous, even to me.

Remo’s smirking. “Yeah, and how’s that working out for you?” he asks.

“Well, I admit it’s going a bit slower than I’d like.”

Remo laughs. “Yeah, I thought so. Listen, you’re not the first one to try going at it from that angle, but here at the Cerberus Society we pretty much believe that there’s no progress without surgery. If you decide to join, you’ll also have access to our library”—here he points to a corner of the basement that has a couple of bookshelves lined with three-ring notebooks and veterinary textbooks—“and I think after you do some reading, you’ll probably come to the same conclusion for yourself.”

Remo walks over to a filing cabinet that’s next to the “library.” He opens a drawer and pulls out some papers. He hands them to me.

“Here’s our membership packet. You can look it over and let me know after the meeting whether or not you’ll be joining us. Dues are three hundred dollars a year, which may sound a little steep, but it goes toward covering the cost of our medical supplies, feeding the dogs, and paying for whatever guest speakers we have.” He smiles. “Of course, we didn’t have to pay tonight’s speaker anything. We’ll give him his honorarium in kibble.”

I force a smile. “Okay,” I say. “I’ll look these over.”

Remo checks his watch. “Well, we’d better be getting upstairs,” he says. He walks toward the staircase, then stops and turns around. “I forgot to ask you,” he says. “Are you married?”

“No,” I say. “I’m a widower.”

“Well, I’m sorry to hear that, but it’s probably for the best. We’ve found that most women don’t seem to understand the work we’re doing here. We have a little saying around here: ‘The only bitches we allow are the ones that bark.’” He laughs deeply.

I look away. Remo sees I’m not laughing.

“Well,” he says. “Meaning no disrespect to your late wife.”

“No,” I say. “Of course not.”

Remo leads me up the cellar stairs and back out into the yard. I listen to the noise coming from the kennels, and I feel a little bit sick.

Remo and I walk around to the front of the house and up the steps. Remo opens the front door, and we walk into a little entrance hall. To the right is the living room, and I can see that there are several rows of chairs set up, facing a podium. Funny to think they’ve provided Dog J with a podium. There are about twenty men standing in groups, talking.

“Come on,” Remo says. “I’ll introduce you.”

He leads me over to a group of three men. He claps one of them on the back, a big, bulky man with thinning hair, holding a clipboard.

“Lucas,” he says, “I want you to meet Paul. He’s thinking about joining our little society. Paul, Lucas here is our treasurer. He’s the one you’ll be giving your check to.”

“No, give it to me,” says another man, with red hair and very white skin. “I’ll take your money.” The men all laugh.

“That’s Aaron,” Remo says. “Don’t pay any attention to him.”

“And don’t give him your money, whatever you do,” adds the third man, a short, mousy guy with big eyes. More laughter. “I’m Tom,” he adds.

I shake the men’s hands. “Paul here’s got himself a Ridgeback bitch,” Remo says. “Turns out she used to be one of ours.”

“A runner?” Tom asks.

“Yup,” Remo says. “But they all end up back here sooner or later, don’t they?” He turns to Lucas. “You were working with that litter of Ridgebacks seven or eight years ago, weren’t you?”

“That’s right, I was. I guess this must be my prodigal daughter. She out in the kennel?”

“Nope,” Remo says. “Paul took her back home. She seemed a mite upset to be here.” The men laugh. “Paul here was real concerned for her feelings.” Remo and Lucas exchange a look I can’t read. “Maybe he’ll let you take a gander at her sometime, if you ask real nice.”

“I’d enjoy that,” Lucas says. “Perhaps I’ll come by sometime. Let’s see, you’re on”—he consults his clipboard—“you’re on Turner Street, is that right?”

“Yes, that’s right,” I say. I don’t like these men knowing where I live.

Remo sees the expression on my face and smiles. “I told you, we can’t be too careful,” he says.

“Of course,” I say.

“So Paul,” Lucas says. “Have you done any throat work on her yet?”

“No,” I say. “Um, not yet.”

“Paul’s kind of new to all this,” Remo tells them. “He’s been trying a ‘nonsurgical approach.’” The other three men burst into laughter.

“Oh, you’re one of those, are you?” Lucas says to me.

I stand there uncomfortably, not sure what to say. Remo claps me on the arm. “Don’t take offense, buddy,” he says. “We’re just joshing you.”

“We’ve all been there,” says Tom, the mousy man. “I started out that way, too. Spent three years trying to get my beagle to say ‘Mary Had a Little Lamb.’ Finally occurred to me that he was designed wrong, and I wasn’t going to get a word out of him unless I fixed him.”

“And how did that work?” I ask uneasily.

“Well, that one didn’t make it through. But I’ve got one I’m working on now that’s able to make a k sound.”

“We’re all making good progress,” Remo tells me. “But none of us has had the kind of success Wendell had. That man is a genius.” The other men murmur assent.

“That’s why we’re all so excited about our guest of honor tonight,” Lucas says. “Speaking of which”—he glances at his watch—“I think it’s about time to get this show on the road.”

“Take a seat,” Remo says to me. “I’m gonna go see if his canine highness is ready.”

“I’ll excuse myself, too,” Lucas says. “I’ve got a few things I want to take care of before the festivities.” He and Remo walk off into the next room, and Tom goes to tell the other men that the meeting’s about to start. Aaron and I find seats next to each another.

“So how’d you get into this?” Aaron asks me.

I hesitate, unsure if I want to tell him the truth. But what other story would be plausible? “My wife passed away last fall,” I say. “And our dog Lorelei was the only one there when it happened. I guess… I guess I just wanted to find out what she saw.”

I feel myself blushing at the ludicrousness of it, but Aaron just nods.

“That’s not too far off from my story,” he says. “I had some suspicions that my wife—my ex-wife, I should say—was cheating on me. I figured that the only one I could trust to tell me the truth was her poodle, Fluffer.” He smiles ruefully. “Always hated that name.”

“And did… Fluffer tell you?”

“She didn’t have to. I came home one day and found my wife in bed with the other guy. She left and took Fluffer with her. But by that time, I’d already met up with these guys”—he waves his hand to include everyone in the room—“and it was too late. I was hooked on the idea.”

I nod. This is a very strange group I’ve wandered into. But, in a way, I’m one of them.

The meeting begins with a brief greeting from a man named Jeff who seems to be the secretary. He reads a few announcements, then goes through the minutes of the last meeting. It feels just as ordinary and routine as any meeting I’ve ever been to, except for the vaguely sinister details that keep popping up: Jeff announces that a veterinary textbook has gone missing from the library and asks that it be returned as soon as possible; he reminds us that proper cleaning of surgical instruments is one of the conditions of membership. A man in the audience raises his hand and announces that he’s found a place that sells cheap dog food in bulk; another member announces that one of his dogs is pregnant, if anyone’s looking for puppies. I’m feeling more and more uncomfortable being here. I look at my watch. We’ve been sitting here almost twenty minutes.

Just then a hush falls over the room as Remo and Lucas return. They’re carrying a large dog crate between them, covered with a dark cloth. They set the crate down carefully, and Remo walks up to the podium. Jeff steps away and takes a seat in the front row.

“Good evening, gentlemen,” Remo says into the microphone. “And thank you, Jeff. This is a proud night for the Cerberus Society. It was about eleven years ago that I first made the acquaintance of a man named Wendell Hollis. I was nothing but an amateur then, trying the odd experiment here and there with a stray mutt I’d picked up at the pound. But meeting Wendell Hollis changed my life. Never had I met a man with such clarity of purpose, such unflinching devotion to a cause. He was a visionary in this new field, a true visionary, and everything I know I’ve learned from him. Unfortunately, as we all know, Wendell can’t be here tonight, due to the ignorance and shortsightedness of the United States penal system. But we have something even better. We have Wendell Hollis’s crowning achievement. Some people call him Hero, but I choose to call him by his true name. Gentlemen, I present to you… Dog J.”

Applause thunders through the room. Next to me, Aaron stands up and whistles through his teeth. Remo walks over to the crate, lifts the cloth, and opens the front grate. I crane my neck to see over the crowd, but as soon as the dog walks out of the cage, I have to look away. He has almost no face left. From the shoulders back, he looks like a normal yellow Lab, full grown but still young enough to walk with a puppy’s lope. But his head has been completely reconstructed. His snout has been shortened so much that his face looks almost caved in. His jaw has been squared and broadened to resemble the shape of a human jaw. Even from four rows away, I can see the scar tissue on his neck where, I know from the newspaper reports, Hollis opened him up to operate on his larynx.

Aaron leans over to me. “Beautiful work, isn’t it?” he whispers.

Remo picks the big creature up in his arms and sets him down on a wide stool in front of the podium. He adjusts the microphone so it’s level with Dog J’s poor scarred mouth. The room falls silent, and Dog J opens his mouth to speak.

The sound that comes out is unearthly. A cross between a howl and a yelp, the noise shapes itself into a string of random vowels and consonants. I’ve never heard a living creature make a noise like this before. It’s the saddest thing I’ve ever heard. But it isn’t speech.

“Ayayay,” the dog says. “Kafofwayo.”

I look around the room. The men are smiling and staring raptly.

“Woganowoo,” enunciates Dog J. “Jukaluk.”

“Amazing,” Aaron whispers. “J’s and k’s are very hard.”

I sit there, listening to the unholy noise and waiting for someone to react. But they all seem satisfied. Next to the podium, Remo is smiling beatifically. There’s a new light in his eyes, one that I see reflected in every face around me.

I wonder if it’s me. “What’s he saying?” I whisper to Aaron, but he waves me away.

“Just listen,” he says. “It couldn’t be clearer.”

Suddenly, there’s a pounding on the door. It’s loud enough to drown out the sad yowling, and I’m grateful.

“Police,” someone yells from the other side of the door. “Open up.”

Panic fills the room as the people around me jump up and run for the back door. Up at the podium, Remo grabs Dog J and heaves him back into his crate. I see him say something to Lucas, and they both turn to look at me for an instant. Then the two of them pick up the unwieldy crate and carry it out the back door. I stand still for a moment in the chaos, with people pushing past me on all sides. Chairs are overturned as everyone struggles to get out.

I’m glad the police are here. I want these people arrested, and I want those dogs freed. I’m on the verge of going to open the door for them, when something occurs to me: the police will think I’m one of them. How will I explain my presence here, interacting with criminals? The best thing is for me to go, to get in the car and drive home as fast as I can. I reach the back door just as the police break through the front. With all the chaos in the backyard, it looks like I can still get away. I run a convoluted path through neighbors’ yards until I get to the block I’m parked on. I jump in my car and drive home at top speed.

I pull into the driveway, drunk with adrenaline, and turn off the engine. I sit in the car for a moment, my heart beating wildly in the sudden quiet. I’ve just fled from the police. Am I in trouble? I remind myself that, apart from the actual running, all I did was attend a meeting. I try to think whether the police will find my name anywhere among Remo’s belongings. I never signed up, I never paid a membership fee, so I wouldn’t be listed anywhere on the club’s rosters. But of course—and here I feel a pang of fear—Wendell Hollis sent Remo my name and address. Certainly the police will want to examine all correspondence from Hollis, given the Dog J connection. And Lucas had my name and address on his clipboard. Calm down, I tell myself. Surely it will be clear that I’m no more than a bit player in this drama. I had nothing to do with the kidnapping of Dog J, and I’ve never taken part in the mutilation of a dog. I’ve done nothing wrong.

But right away I know it’s not true. I should never have been there. What the hell was I thinking, going to a place like that? I feel as if I’m going to spend the rest of my life trying to forget the things I saw this evening. All I can think of, the only thing that will help, is to go get my dog and wrap my arms around the great furry mass of her. I step out of the car and fairly run across the front lawn.

But once I get to the back gate, I stop short and my skin turns cold. Because the yard is empty.