Last Dog on the Hill

Last Dog On The Hill



Highway 101 sweeps north into the small Mendocino County town of Willits, California, gateway to redwood country, home to vineyards and fast rivers, and to the resting place of Seabiscuit, the great race horse. And it is where I found Lou, the greatest dog I have ever known.

In 1986, teaching degree in hand, I packed my Civic and left the grit of Queens for the glitz of Los Angeles. Upon arriving, I renewed an old fascination with dogs, one I’d first nurtured in childhood. Living in a one- bedroom New York tenement with my parents and brother, I’d asked for a dog but had gotten only a pale blue parakeet named Chipper, a bitter bird who’d bend apart the bars of his cage and escape, to strafe our heads and scream his discontent.

In Los Angeles I read scores of books about breeding, training manuals, and pet magazines until I fancied myself a bookish “authority.” I thought I was ready for a dog of my choosing. Then chance changed the course of my life, and the lives of so many others.

My girlfriend Nancy and I took a few December days off, packed the car, and drove up Highway 101 toward Northern California. The entire West Coast had fine weather; we took our time, often detouring over to the coast in places to enjoy the scenery.

North of Ukiah, in Mendocino County, the highway snaked through the countryside. Halfway through a long, right sweeper, we spotted furry shapes porpoising up a steep grassy hill, toward the tree line above.

“Puppies!” said Nancy. We pulled over onto the wide shoulder and got out.

On the crest of the hill a half- dozen dogs scampered for the cover of trees; midsized, dark-coated mutts with shepherd looks, tongues flagging, teeth bright in the sun.

“Five, six months old,” I said, suddenly aware of a much larger creature lying by the shoulder ahead, half hidden in the grass. An enormous Rottweiler, he basked in the sun like a Dakota buffalo, his black- and- tan coat dusted with dirt. And in his mouth rested the tawny snout of limp, road- killed deer.

“Don’t go near him,” I said, the deer’s snout crunching like a carrot stick in his jaws.

“Not a chance,” Nancy said, more interested in the puppies, who had a lithe, black, shepherd mix with them, perhaps their mother.

The Rottweiler gnawed away thoughtfully and watched us. Following their skittish mother up into the tree line, the pups were nearly out of sight. I gave a quick whistle just to see what would happen; all but one scampered off. But the last dog on the hill stopped, gazed down at the road, then made a mad downhill dash toward us, as if recognizing someone.

Black and tan, it looked more like a diminutive Rottweiler than did the others. Like a Looney Tunes character, the quick little mutt skidded to a stop right in front of us, dropped into a perfect soldier- sit, then stared up at me like I was Simon Cowell. It was Lou.

From: LAST DOG ON THE HILL by Steve Duno, copyright © 2010 by the author and reprinted by permission of St. Martin’s Press, LLC.