The Case of the Mixed-Up Mutts (2 page)

Connor and his mom live in the house behind Kayla’s. That means I can keep a nose on the place. I will be the first to know if my people come back.

Here are some bad things about going to live with Connor and his mom:

They are getting attached to me.

I am getting attached to them.

I don’t know what will happen when Kayla and her dad come back.

Will I go back to Kayla’s house or will I stay here with Connor and his mom?

While I am thinking about these things, the back door at my new house opens. Connor and Mom step outside, and Mom pats her legs. “Buddy, come!” she calls.

Buddy is the word that Connor and his mom call me. Buddy is another word for friend.

“It’s time to go to obedience school,” Mom says.

I LOVE obedience school. It’s my favorite thing! I zoom across the yard, my tail spinning ’round and ’round behind me. Mom snaps a leash to my collar.

“Let’s go to the car, Buddy,” Connor says.

I LOVE riding in the car. It’s my favorite thing!

No, wait. Obedience school is my favorite thing. If Mom and Connor pass obedience school, they will take me to a different kind of school. The kind Kayla went to. I wonder if it’s even the
exact same school
that Kayla went to. If it is, maybe I’ll see some of her friends there. Maybe they’ll talk about what happened to her.

At the very least, I’ll make new friends at that school. I LOVE new friends. They’re my favorite thing!

But solving crimes is my favorite thing, too.

I’m so confused!
No wonder I don’t know my own name.

Here’s a problem with humans: Sometimes it’s hard to tell what they really want you to do. They may say “sit” with their mouths, but the rest of their bodies say “jump on me.” Then they wonder why we jump on them.

I think this is why some humans go to obedience school.
Obedience
is a big word. It means humans learning to say what they mean.

Some humans are easier to train than others.

I don’t mean to brag, but Connor and his mom are the best-trained humans in the class. When Mom says “sit,” she says it with her mouth, her hands, and her whole entire body. When Connor says “down,” he says it with his mouth, his hands, and his whole entire body.

I do whatever Connor and his mom tell me to do at obedience school. Then something strange happens: I get a liver treat. I don’t know why I’m the one who gets the treat instead of Connor or Mom, but I’m not complaining. I LOVE liver treats. They’re my favorite food!

I feel bad for the pug who stands beside me in the circle. I don’t know the pug’s name, but her human’s name is Kathy. Kathy is not as smart as my humans are.

Kathy says, “Sit!” with her mouth, but the rest of her body says, “Go over there and say hello to that black Lab across the circle.”

The pug doesn’t know what to do. So she just stands there and looks at Kathy. She waits for Kathy to give her another signal.

“I said,
sit!
” Kathy says. Louder this time. But the rest of her body says, “Lie down.”

The pug drops to her belly. I would do the same thing. What a human says with her body is usually more important than what she says with her mouth.

Kathy smells frustrated. But I bet the pug is even more frustrated than Kathy is.

I sniff. No, the pug isn’t frustrated. She’s just sad.

The alpha human at obedience school says to Kathy, “You need to make sure you have your dog’s attention. Say your dog’s name when you give a command.”

“I can’t,” Kathy says with her hands on her hips. She turns away from her dog. “I don’t know what this dog’s real name is.”

The other dogs and I shift around uncomfortably. How does a human forget her own dog’s name?

I think the alpha human in this class is wondering the same thing. “What do you mean?” she asks.

Kathy looks down at the floor. “I don’t expect you to believe me,” she says softly. “The police didn’t.”

Police?
“Why would your human call the police?” I ask the pug.

The pug sniffs the floor. She doesn’t seem to want to talk about it.

“This isn’t my dog,” Kathy says. “She may look like Muffin from a distance, but she’s not. My Muffin has a darker nose and a wider face. And she doesn’t act anything like this dog.” She makes it sound as if this dog is acting really bad.

Kathy goes on. “I think Muffin was switched with another dog.”

“What?” Rosie, the Westie, sits up.

“I don’t believe it.” Shadow, the black Lab, shakes his head.

“Bad human,” Ike, the boxer, says. “Why would she make up such a story?”

I sniff Kathy’s feet. “I don’t know,” I tell the other dogs. “Sniff the human. She might be telling the truth.” Most dogs can tell when humans are lying and when they’re telling the truth.

The other dogs’ noses twitch.

“I can’t tell,” says Rosie. “She could be telling the truth. She could also be lying.”

The pug speaks up at last. “She’s telling the truth. Her dog Muffin and I left the dog park with the wrong humans.”

The pug’s name is Jazzy.

“What happened, Jazzy?” Ike asks while the humans are busy cleaning up after class. “How did you and Muffin end up with the wrong humans?”

Jazzy sits beside us. “Owen—that’s my human—saw Muffin doing a bunch of tricks at the dog park,” she says with a sniff. “Muffin can roll over and dance on her hind legs; she can even play pat-a-cake.” Jazzy looks at the floor. “I don’t do any of that stuff. I think Owen decided he’d rather have Muffin than me. So ... he took her.”

Shadow’s eyes grow dark. “What do you mean, he took her?”

“He picked her up and walked out of the dog park with her,” Jazzy says.

It’s hard to imagine a human doing such a thing. “Maybe he didn’t know he had the wrong dog,” I say. “Did you just get this human?”

“No, I’ve had him for a long time,” Jazzy says. “And Owen knew what he was doing. When no one was looking, he twisted Muffin’s tag off her collar and stuck it in his pocket.”

We all gasp.

“Then he took my tag off my collar and clipped it to Muffin’s collar,” Jazzy goes on. “And off they went. With Owen pretending Muffin was his dog.”

“But that’s dognapping!” Rosie cries. “Didn’t anyone try to stop him? Didn’t you? Didn’t Muffin?”

“How could we?” Jazzy asks. “Owen is bigger than we are. I tried to follow him, but he closed the gate on me. And Muffin yelled, ‘Help! Help! This isn’t my human!’ But no one helped.”

“You and Muffin should have bitten your human,” Rosie says. “That would have stopped him.”

“It’s not okay to bite humans,” I tell Rosie.

“It is if the human tries to dognap you,” Rosie argues.

“No,” I growl at her. “It’s
never
okay.”

Rosie backs away from me. “Well, what about Muffin’s human?” she asks Jazzy. “Why didn’t she stop Owen?”

“Kathy wasn’t at the dog park,” Jazzy says. “She was sick that day, so she paid a neighbor boy to take Muffin for a walk. She didn’t even know that the boy took Muffin to the dog park.”

“Why didn’t that boy stop Owen?” Ike asks.

Jazzy sadly shakes her head. “He didn’t see Owen. He was talking to a female human.”

Ah. We all know what happens when male and female humans start talking to each other. They don’t pay any attention to the dog.

“And you know humans,” Jazzy goes on. “Unless they actually know you, they think all pugs look the same. When it was time to go, the boy thought
I was Muffin
.”

“Well, Kathy must have known you weren’t her dog,” Shadow says.