“He’s not rich!” Ben called after her.
Griffin held his head. “First she couldn’t stand me because Luthor was so hopeless. And now that he’s better, she can’t stand me even worse!”
Dmitri clucked sympathetically. “Excellence is a terrible burden. Oh, how Dmitri has suffered.”
It wasn’t until they headed for the parking lot that the full weight of Griffin’s exhaustion pressed down on him.
“Can you believe it’s been only twelve hours since we got on the train for Dmitri’s place this morning?” he said to Ben.
Ben nodded wearily. “It feels like months. I mean, Luthor started the day as a nobody; now he’s a champion.”
“The plan seemed like a one-in-a-million shot,” Griffin added. “Now it’s totally back on track. You have to figure Luthor is one of the favorites to win it all at Global.”
“And this morning you were toe jam to Emma. Now you’re still toe jam — but for a totally different reason.” Ben stopped in front of Dmitri’s 1971 Volkswagen Bus and plucked a piece of paper from under the windshield wiper. “Bummer. We got a ticket.”
Dmitri and the boys examined the crumpled page. The message was written in mismatched letters cut from newspaper headlines and taped in place.
tHE DobERmAn’S LifE iS in gRAVe DanGEr
dRoP OuT WhILe yOu stILL caN
nO dOgGoNe jOkE
Ben’s eyes scoured the deserted parking lot. “Who put this here?”
“I guess somebody who doesn’t want to face Luthor at Global,” Griffin reasoned.
The handler nodded slowly. “If you eliminate Luthor, you eliminate Dmitri.”
Ben was uneasy. “I don’t like this, Griffin. This guy sounds dangerous to me.”
“Why?” Griffin shot back. “Because he has scissors and Scotch tape? The whole thing is probably a joke.”
“It says no joke!”
“No doggone joke,” Griffin amended. “Don’t you know kennel humor when you hear it?”
“It is no joke,” Dmitri concluded in a somber tone. “You do not threaten the life of a dog unless you are deadly serious. The stakes, the money, the fame — it drives people to madness. It is not for me anymore. Despite my magnificence, Dmitri is a simple man.”
“Operation Doggie Rehab was supposed to be about helping Luthor,” Ben argued. “How does it help him to risk getting him killed?”
“How can we quit now, when the plan is finally coming together?” Griffin returned.
“Enough!” Dmitri held up his pinkie. Luthor snapped to attention, and Griffin and Ben fell silent. The boys had not understood the power of the simple gesture until that very moment. “Dmitri did not ask to return to the dog show. But now that I am back, there will be no quitting.”
“But the author of the note could be a deranged psycho!” Ben protested.
“Possibly,” the big Russian agreed. “But Luthor does not know the meaning of threats. And Dmitri does not know the meaning of fear.”
21
* * *
MID-ATLANTIC CHAMP LINKED TO TOP DOG’S ACCIDENT
METUCHUN, NJ — The dog world is buzzing about Lex Luthor Savannah Spritz-o-matic, an oversized Doberman who took top honors at the prestigious Mid-Atlantic Kennel Society show this past weekend. The previously unknown dog was presented by none other than Dmitri Trebezhov, the fabled handler — now a virtual hermit — who suddenly returned to competition just for this animal.
That story would be newsworthy enough, but the Times has learned that Luthor, the newly minted Best in Show, is the unruly animal responsible for the mall accident that sidelined the previous number-one dog, Electra Mourning Becomes Eugene. The beagle — originally trained by Trebezhov himself — had been on the verge of an unprecedented fourth-straight Global Kennel Society victory. Her owners declined to comment due to a pending lawsuit.
Dog lovers have much to think about in this new champion, who poses more questions than he answers: How could such a newbie come out of nowhere, and attract the greatest trainer in the history of the sport? How could a dog that goes berserk at a mall be capable of the kind of poise and discipline required of a Best in Show? And most important of all, can he win the big one — the 136th annual Global Kennel Society show in New York City next week?
If Lex Luthor Savannah Spritz-o-matic can accomplish that, all the other questions will blow away like the dust of a well-used dog run….
* * *
“I don’t like it.” Ben crumpled up the article and tossed it in a trash bin. “This reporter is practically saying that Dmitri trained his new dog to knock out his old dog so he could get back in the spotlight.”
The two were headed over to Griffin’s house to take in the Bings’ mail.
Griffin had a different worry. “Good thing my parents are in Prague. The last thing we need is my dad seeing that article.”
“What are you talking about? It doesn’t mention us.”
“It doesn’t have to,” Griffin replied grimly. “It says Spritz-o-matic. A new invention is supposed to be a secret. You don’t name a championship dog after it. I should have told that lady his name was Fred.”
“You can’t plan for everything,” Ben offered comfortingly.
It earned him a sharp look from Griffin. “Of course you can. I just didn’t.”
Griffin climbed the front steps, opened the door, and scooped up the small pile of mail that lay scattered on the mat. He opened the envelope that bore the logo of the Global Kennel Society, and pulled out a printed notice. “Luthor’s confirmation for the big show,” he announced. “All nice and official.”
Ben tried to match his friend’s smile. He was blown away that Operation Doggie Rehab had brought them to the point where Luthor had a chance to win at Global. It was always like that with Griffin’s plans. They seemed like million-to-one shots. Yet suddenly, impossibly, the finish line beckoned, not too far out of reach.
But the Doberman was attracting more and more attention. They’d all be under a microscope at Global. If the word somehow trickled down to Ben’s parents —
Frowning, he plucked a single piece of mail from Griffin’s armload and held it so his friend could read the address:
LEX LUTHOR SAVANNAH SPRITZ-O-MATIC
“For Luthor?” Griffin mused.
Ben tore open the envelope and unfolded the contents.
qUit gLoBal wHilE tAilS aRe sTiLL WAggiNG
LuThoR wiLL LiVe tO tHanK yOU
tHis iS yOuR lASt WaRninG
“It’s him again!” Ben was terrified. “The guy who put that note on Dmitri’s car!”
“Or her,” Griffin added, none too steady himself. “It could just as easily be a lady.”
“Whoever it is, how did they find us in Cedarville?”
Griffin held up the confirmation form. “This is Luthor’s address of record for the show. Anybody could get it from the Global Kennel Society.”
“I’ll bet it’s Mr. Mustache,” Ben accused. “Schroeder owned the Doberman breed until Luthor came along.”
Griffin was thoughtful. “It could just as easily be that Nigel guy. He and Dmitri used to be archenemies back in the day.”
“And Luthor beat him twice,” Ben added breathlessly. “At group with one dog, and Show with another.”
Griffin sighed. “The truth is, it could be anybody — even that sour-faced old bag who owns Xerxes. Getting rid of Luthor opens things up for every dog at Global.”
“Wouldn’t it be a kicker if it turned out to be your girlfriend, Emma?”
Griffin reddened. “She would never do something like that.”
“I think she’d do anything for her precious Jazzy.”
“You’re wrong,” said Griffin, tight-lipped.
“Maybe we should take the letter to the police,” Ben suggested.
“No police!” Griffin exclaimed. “The first thing they’d do is ask to talk to our parents.”
“We can’t just do nothing,” Ben argued. “Someone’s se
nding us threatening letters!”
“We’ll tell Dmitri. He’ll know how to handle it.”
Luthor stood covered in suds in the claw-footed antique bathtub in his handler’s second-floor apartment above the old Shaolin Palate. The Doberman maintained perfect stacking position as Dmitri scrubbed him down with a huge, longhandled push mop.
Since Dmitri’s pinkie was not free to maintain the dog’s attention, he substituted his voice, soothing yet in command: “Focus, Luthor … your mind is a laser beam … a concentrated point of pure light….”
When the dog was fully lathered, Dmitri stripped down to a Speedo bathing suit, climbed into the tub beside his star pupil, and began to run the mop over himself.
The sound was distant, but unmistakable: Crash!
Breaking glass.
It disturbed Luthor’s stance and galvanized the soaped-up Dmitri into sudden action. He was out of the tub and into the hallway in two strides of his long legs. Luthor was right behind him, paws skittering on the hardwood floor. To the Doberman’s guard-dog instincts, a crash meant an intruder. And that was his business.
Dmitri started down the steps to the abandoned restaurant, but he was no match for Luthor’s speed. The Doberman brushed past him and raced to the bottom. Powerful canine legs propelled the dog through the overturned chairs and rickety tables to the door that had once been the entrance to the Shaolin Palate. A fist-sized hole had been punched through the window, just below the CONDEMNED sticker. On the floor in front of it lay a piece of raw steak.
Luthor started toward it.
“No-o-o!!”
Dmitri’s commands were always quiet and calm, but this was practically a scream. Luthor stopped in his tracks long enough for the handler to hurl himself past the dog, shielding him from the door.
A jet of white foam that looked like shaving cream blasted through the hole in the glass. It caught Dmitri in midair, splattering over his face and bare chest. His size-fourteen foot came down on the meat, which slid out from under him. He hit the floor with a foundation-shaking thud.
On the other side of the door, partially hidden by the CONDEMNED sign, a black-clad figure turned and ran down the street.
Dmitri tried to scramble up to give chase. A stab of fire in his left knee told him that he would not be running anytime soon.
Slumping back in defeat, he took a whiff of the white foam that covered his face and upper body. “Hair remover,” he diagnosed in a thready voice, and passed out cold.
22
By the time Griffin and Ben made it to the hospital, Dmitri was being wheeled out of Emergency by a young orderly in scrubs. Luthor trotted obediently behind the stretcher, following the raised pinkie, which protruded from the pale blue sheet covering the handler’s long body.
“Dmitri!” Griffin called as they rushed over.
The big Russian’s face was pale, but his eyes were even wilder than usual. Two-thirds of his beard and mustache had been burned away, revealing large patches of raw, irritated skin. Huge clumps of hair were gone, giving him the look of someone who had been attacked by a deranged barber.
“What happened?” Ben asked in awe.
“Dmitri has thwarted an attempt to remove Luthor from competition!” the patient declared in outrage.
“Somebody tried to kill him?” Horrified, Griffin thought back to the latest threatening message: This is your last warning, it had said. So the author had decided to back up those words with action.
“Far worse than that,” the handler replied in disgust. “The coward attacked with hair remover — Nair, I believe.”
Griffin’s eyes traveled from the handler’s patchy, uneven hair and red, inflamed skin to Luthor’s shiny, perfect coat. If the depilatory foam had reached Luthor instead of the Russian, the Doberman would be in no condition to compete in a dog show — not with great patches of fur missing. He would have been knocked out as surely as Electra had been with her broken tail.
The orderly handed Griffin the leash. “You have to take the dog, kid. No animals in the operating room.”
“Operating room?” Ben echoed. “He needs beard surgery?”
“Not his beard; his knee,” the orderly informed them. “The patient tore his ACL tripping on a steak.”
The handler was tight-lipped. “Dmitri did not trip. Dmitri acted heroically as a human shield.”
“It has to be repaired arthroscopically,” the young man persisted. “And the dog isn’t invited.”
“I vouch for this dog’s behavior with my very life!” the handler declared emotionally.
“The ambulance attendant said he was barking the neighborhood down.”
“He had to alert the authorities to my predicament,” Dmitri insisted. “With only a small hole in the door, he understood that great volume was required. If you do not see the genius in this, you are a fool.”
The orderly was unimpressed. “Tell that to the doctor.”
“Dmitri will tell it to the surgeon general himself!”
“Don’t worry,” Griffin soothed. “We’ll look after Luthor.”
“You will do more than that,” the big Russian ordered. “You must take him home with you. Dmitri charges you with my brother’s safety.”
Ben emitted a cry that elicited a shhh! from every nurse up and down the hall. “But he’s good with you! What if he goes back to his old self? He won’t win Best in Show if he mauls all the judges!”
“Luthor is under attack,” Dmitri reasoned. “Just as Electra was under attack when a dart was used to turn Luthor into a weapon against her. He is not safe in my home. Our enemy has already damaged one Best in Show.”
“He’s not safe at my house, either,” Griffin exclaimed, worried. “The last note went to my address.” He turned to Ben. “We’ll keep him with us at your place.”
“Are you nuts?” Ben blurted. “What about my parents? Luthor’s not a turtle you can hide in a shoe box! My folks aren’t blind, you know.”
The orderly was growing impatient. “Somebody had better step up, because Mr. Trebezhov is going to be off his feet for the next six weeks.”
“Six weeks?” squeaked Griffin. “But he’s okay to handle Luthor in the dog show, right?”
“Absolutely — so long as he can do it sitting down.”
Both boys pictured the job of a handler: walking with the dog; running with the dog; standing by the dog. There was no sitting.
Dmitri addressed Griffin. “You will handle Luthor at Global.”
Griffin turned chalk white. “But it only works when you do it!”
“True, no one can replace Dmitri. But I will be there to oversee everything. Luthor will be fine. Make sure that you are also fine.” With those words hanging in the antiseptic-smelling air, he was wheeled into surgery. As the doors swung shut, they heard him informing the doctor: “Dmitri is an organ donor. I have willed my pinkie to the Smithsonian.”
Ben rounded on Griffin. “All right, Mr. Man-With-The-Plan. What has your precious plan got in mind for this?”
“It’s not good,” Griffin admitted.
“That’s an understatement,” Ben growled. “My mother notices when the ice maker gurgles in our fridge. You think she’s going to miss Lex Luthor Savannah Spritz-o-matic?”
“We hid forty-two fugitive zoo animals,” Griffin reminded him. “Surely we can hide one dog.”
“We hid forty-two small zoo animals,” Ben amended. “If there’s a single word that doesn’t apply to Luthor, it’s small.”
“It’s a long train ride back to Cedarville. That’ll give us time to do some planning.”
Ben bit his lip. Another plan.
* * *
He did his best to tiptoe, but Mom heard him anyway.
“Benjamin — can I see you for a minute?”
Benjamin — never a good sign when she called him that.
He found her in the living room. “What’s up, Mom?”
“I ran into Michelle, your swim coach. She tells me that you and Griffin hav
en’t been showing up for class much lately.”
“Really?” Ben bought himself a few precious seconds by pretending to be astounded. The boys had been pretty good about attending an early lesson before heading into Flushing every day during Luthor’s training. Or so they’d thought. Apparently, their “occasional” absences had been piling up.
“I really don’t mind if you miss a class or two,” she went on pleasantly. “But it raises the question of what you’d been doing with all that time — Ben, are you listening to me?”
In fact, he was peering over her shoulder out the sheer curtains, where Griffin was sneaking across the lawn with Luthor on a leash. Ben followed their progress toward the basement window that they had chosen as an entry point. He lost them there. But a moment later, he heard a faint thud of boy and dog jumping to the concrete floor.
To cover up the commotion, he raced to the TV, switched it on, and cranked the volume up to 93. “You’ve got to see this, Mom. It’s amazing!”
An Ex-Lax commercial blasted through the room.
“Turn that down!” Mrs. Slovak ordered.
“Wait! We’re just getting to the good part!” What they were getting to, Ben knew, was where Griffin brought the dog out of the basement and up to the attic.
Ferret Face didn’t appreciate the noise any more than Mom did. He burrowed in search of peace and quiet, pressing his head into Ben’s armpit.
Mrs. Slovak hurried over and switched off the television. “I’m not watching a musical number about constipation. Now, look, if you don’t want to swim, that’s fine. Just let us know so we can stop paying for the lessons.”
A soft wump from above told him that Griffin and Luthor had reached their destination, closing the trap door behind them.