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hadn’t had his shots. If those foolish people had seen that dog had had its shots, it never would have happened. But a coon or a skunk, you can vaccinate it twice a year and still it don’t always take. But that coon the Ryder boys had, that was what the oldtimers used to call a ‘sweet coon.’ It’d waddle right up to you—gorry, wa’n’t he fat!—and lick your face like a dog. Their dad even paid a vet to spay him and declaw him. That must have cost him a country fortune!
    â€œRyder, he worked for IBM in Bangor. They went out to Colorado five years ago . . . or maybe it was six. Funny to think of those two almost old enough to drive. Were they broken up over that coon? I guess they were. Matty Ryder cried so long his mom got scared and wanted to take him to the doctor. I spose he’s over it now, but they never forget. When a goodanimal gets run down in the road, a kid never forgets.”
    Louis’s mind turned to Ellie as he had last seen her tonight, fast asleep with Church purring rustily on the foot of the mattress.
    â€œMy daughter’s got a cat,” he said. “Winston Churchill. We call him Church for short.”
    â€œDo they climb when he walks?”
    â€œI beg your pardon?” Louis had no idea what he was talking about.
    â€œHe still got his balls or has he been fixed?”
    â€œNo,” Louis said. “No, he hasn’t been fixed.”
    In fact there had been some trouble over that back in Chicago. Rachel had wanted to get Church spayed, had even made the appointment with the vet. Louis canceled it. Even now he wasn’t really sure why. It wasn’t anything as simple or as stupid as equating his masculinity with that of his daughter’s tom, nor even his resentment at the idea that Church would have to be castrated so the fat housewife next door wouldn’t need to be troubled with twisting down the lids of her plastic garbage cans—those things had been part of it, but most of it had been a vague but strong feeling that it would destroy something in Church that he himself valued—that it would put out the go-to-hell look in the cat’s green eyes. Finally he had pointed out to Rachel that they were moving to the country, and it shouldn’t be a problem. Now here was Judson Crandall, pointing out that part of country living in Ludlow consisted of dealing with Route 15, and asked him if the cat was fixed. Try a little irony, Dr. Creed—it’s good for your blood.
    â€œI’d get him fixed,” Crandall said, crushing hissmoke between his thumb and forefinger. “A fixed cat don’t tend to wander as much. But if it’s all the time crossing back and forth, its luck will run out, and it’ll end up there with the Ryder kids’ coon and little Timmy Dessler’s cocker spaniel and Missus Bradleigh’s parakeet. Not that the parakeet got run over in the road, you understand. It just went feet up one day.”
    â€œI’ll take it under advisement,” Louis said.
    â€œYou do that,” Crandall said and stood up. “How’s that beer doing? I believe I’ll go in for a slice of old Mr. Rat after all.”
    â€œBeer’s gone,” Louis said, also standing, “and I ought to go, too. Big day tomorrow.”
    â€œStarting in at the university?”
    Louis nodded. “The kids don’t come back for two weeks, but by then I ought to know what I’m doing, don’t you think?”
    â€œYeah, if you don’t know where the pills are, I guess you’ll have trouble.” Crandall offered his hand and Louis shook it, mindful again of the fact that old bones pained easily. “Come on over any evening,” he said. “Want you to meet my Norma. Think she’d enjoy you.”
    â€œI’ll do that,” Louis said. “Nice to meet you, Jud.”
    â€œSame goes both ways. You’ll settle in. May even stay