Hank didn’t answer. He stepped across some partly burnt mattresses and picked up a blackened bucket. He carried it to a pile of trash down in a gullylike place and set it on a dead washing machine. “Big target. You won’t miss.”
“What if somebody comes along?”
“No law against shooting buckets.”
“The dump road’s back there.”
We walked over and looked behind the line of junk at the plowed out road twisting between dump piles. There was an incredible number of dead cars. They were everywhere. It was like an end-of-the-world movie.
“Any misses’ll go over a pickup,” Hank said.
“What about a dump truck?”
“No dumps on Christmas.”
Hank showed me how to pop out the magazine thing and load cartridges. “Butt first, see. Hard to get it wrong.”
“Can these kill elk and moose?”
He shook his head. “Squirrels, chiselers, beaver if you’re sixty-seventy feet in. People. Kill people dead.”
“But not elk.”
“Lung shot might do it, but they’d run a ways and be in pain. The harmonious man kills the animal without hurting it.”
“Like with the rifles in your gun rack?”
He nodded and snapped in the magazine. He pulled back the bolt, down, up, shoved it forward. “Safety here, red line means it’s off.”
“It won’t fire with the safety on?”
“That is why you call it a safety.”
He handed me the rifle. I felt kind of like I did following Maurey into the bedroom the first time. Sort of. I’d fantasized women’s breasts often, but I’d never fantasized firearms. Most of my violent daydream short stories involved hand-to-hand battles, although if the other guy deserved it sometimes I’d pick up a baseball bat and pound his head. Only real fights I’d been in were nothing like movies or books—more wrestling, less pounding.
“Shoot the bucket,” Hank said. I raised the rifle to my shoulder. The barrel end wouldn’t be still.
“Sight down the bottom of the V.”
I sighted and pulled the trigger. Nothing happened.
“Safety’s on,” Hank said. “Remember I told you about the safety.”
I lowered the rifle and pushed the safety button.
“Don’t point at me,” Hank said.
“Sorry.”
I raised the rifle again and waited for the bucket to come into the V.
“Squeeze the trigger instead of pulling.”
I squeezed, the gun jumped and powed in my ear.
A bad yelp came from behind the gully line.
“Shit,” Hank said.
I threw down the rifle and ran forward. Soapley’s dog, Otis, was on the road, scream-yelping and dragging himself after the truck. Soapley hit the brakes and jumped out. “He never fell off before.”
Hank was at my side. “We shot him off.”
“You shot my dog?”
“I didn’t do it on purpose.”
Everything kind of froze up on me. Hank was suddenly at the dog, bending over with his bandana out. Soapley looked at me, then he was there too. I didn’t know what to do. I wanted to go back and start the day again. They worked over Otis’s back end. Soapley said “Aw, hell” once.
After a few seconds Otis quit yelping and lay there helpless, which was even worse than the noise. I got down and held his head so he wouldn’t flounder around. His eyes couldn’t understand. They were scared and hurt and trusting and it was my fault.
“Think he’s gone?” Soapley asked.
Hank’s hand held fur under the right hind armpit. There was a lot of blood. “Vet might save him. Worth a try. It’ll cost a lot and you might lose him anyway.”
Soapley looked at the head under my hand. “I’m real attached to the old guy.”
“My grandfather’ll pay any bills it takes to save him,” I said, hating myself for saying it. “I’m real sorry.”
Soapley’s face held what I took as disgust. I don’t know, I’d be disgusted if I was a grown-up and some snot-nosed kid shot my dog and said his grandfather would pay to fix it. I was no better than Pud doing it on purpose.
“Let’s load him in the truck,” Soapley said.
They held arms under Otis and lifted him careful as they could, but he was in pain, you could tell. His tongue was way out and he trembled bad. I ran ahead to open the truck door and help get him in.
I hate it when things happen to me that really matter. I mean, it’s so easy to roll through the days, enjoying the irony of a weird mom or a school full of half-wits, exploring growing up with Maurey. The Kennedy-death thing had mattered, but from afar. This thing with Otis was right up close and my fault. I couldn’t be cool and slightly above the situation, which was awful.
Otis lay across my lap with his head on my left thigh and his wounded hip on Hank all the way to the vet’s. Hank had made a tourniquet out of his bandana, but there was still so much blood. I could see the white bone in the hole and the back side where the bullet came out was ripped and jagged.
But looking at the mess was better than looking at his face. His eyes hurt me. Pain without understanding is torture. Soon his eyes dulled up some and the quivering got worse. Soapley didn’t say anything. I wanted him to cuss me, or talk to Otis or something, but he just drove with his eyes forward and his right hand on Otis’s neck.
The vet was eating Christmas dinner and I doubt if he was happy to see us. His name was Dr. Brogan, he had a widow’s peak hairline and forearms of a wrestler. He was real severe and scared the wadding out of me.
“Who shot him?” Dr. Brogan asked as he bent over Otis in the truck.
“I did,” I said. “I didn’t mean to.”
“It was my fault,” Hank said.
“No, it wasn’t.”
“You two girls can argue over who did it later. Let’s get him inside.”
Dr. Brogan went to the house and brought back a stiff stretcherlike thing. Hank and Soapley carried Otis into the animal clinic next to the house. That left me to walk in with the vet.
“You do this often,” he said.
“Today’s the first time I ever fired a gun.”
Brogan grunted. I know he hated my guts. I usually don’t mind people hating me, it’s their choice, but this guy had just cause so it felt really bad.
They lay Otis on the table and raised his right hind leg with a line-and-pulley deal attached to the ceiling. Brogan gave him an injection in the front leg to reduce the pain, then he studied the place where I shot him.
“What a mess. You did this with a twenty-two?”
“Yes, sir.” Hank and Soapley were at the end of the table, holding Otis’s head and shoulders. His eyes were closed now so at least I didn’t have to face that look anymore.
The doctor cleaned and probed and messed around a long time. He clamped off the exposed artery to stop the bleeding. It looked like a thin worm. The muscles were pink and way down in there the shoulder bone glistened white.
Brogan turned to Soapley. “He’s lost the leg.”
Soapley swallowed but didn’t say anything.
Brogan went on. “See here, the bullet took out all the blood vessels and shattered the bone. I can’t believe a twenty-two could cause this much damage.”
It all looked like gore to me. I’d never seen any real gore before, unless you count the dead kittens, which count I guess. I felt sick and wanted to go out to the truck and lie down. Christmas was wrecked.
“Do it,” Soapley said.
Brogan pulled out an electric razor and started shaving Otis’s leg above and below the wound. “Dogs don’t get near as traumatized losing limbs as people do. They only know what is, so there’s no dwelling on what might have been. He’ll be up chasing meter readers in three days.”
Hank spoke. “Can the boy wait outside while we do it?”
Brogan’s eyes were lightning harsh. “He’s going to shoot things, he needs to see the consequences.”