Each day as Jack Buffmeir took his carrot-fueled excursions, Oyster waited on the back porch. I tempted the dog with succulent cuts of beef from the meat locker, and while he would eat them, he refused to give in and play with me. He would not fetch. He would not wrestle. He tolerated my hugging him, and once when I got into a screaming and cussing rock fight with Carl Smith, Oyster leapt from the porch and chased Smith out of the yard and clear over to Bowditch Avenue to the Smith hovel. Shortly thereafter Carl Smith came back with reinforcements, the Tinsley and Calhoun brothers: big, tough, and mean-all. I was caught flat, but the dog sensed their sinister intentions immediately and soon had the entire pack racing for Bowditch Avenue. A few days later I saw Carl Smith at the playground and shoved him to the ground, pulling his arm up behind his back for the goose egg that one of his rocks had inflicted on my forehead a few days before. The playground supervisor quickly broke up the fight and not only sent me home for the afternoon, but kicked me off the junior softball squad. Dejected, I returned to the store. I parked my bike along the side of the garage, and when Oyster came off the back porch to greet me, I was mildly astonished. I sat near a pile of leaves that had blown alongside Pug and Vera’s place and hugged the dog, who let me cuddle next to him for warmth. A burst of sunlight broke through the clouds and warmed us and almost instantly I fell into a deep and wonderful slumber. It was cold and nearly dark when I awoke. Oyster had abandoned me for his position on the porch. I dusted off my clothes and went inside.

Oyster would not fetch or wrestle, but he liked to play tug-of-war with a rope. It was virtually impossible to beat him at this game and Jack exploited the dog’s power in these demonstrations to help sell his canned produce. Oyster was eighty pounds of pure muscle. Another thing he liked to do at Jack Buffmeir’s behest was jump at inflated balloons, a comical sight that caused the customers to stop and watch in wonder. Oyster possessed incredible vertical leaping ability. It looked as if he were playing basketball. He timed his jumps so that each time his snout hit the balloon, he seemed to hang in the air a moment. Jack could sell several cartons of fertilized eggs whenever he put his wonder dog into action. But this seldom happened once the black moods befell him.

The long, introspective, carrot-nibbling walks continued. The heels of Jack’s two-toned shoes were worn down. He stuffed them with cardboard, though the cheapest shoemaker in town had a shop just across the street.