The Truth of the Matter by Robb Forman Dew

jumper, a sleek thoroughbred. Agnes had been efficiently chopping chunks of celery and onions but suddenly she laid the knife flat down, opening her hands and bracing herself against the low chopping block as she leaned forward in surprised embarrassment at her own wandering thoughts.
    She straightened and instinctively covered her face as she felt herself blush, but her hands were moist from the onions and celery. “Ah! Oh, oh,” she said and made a small hissing sound of dismay. Finally she ran upstairs for the eyecup and flushed her eyes as best she could. She had always been sensitive to onions, and it was hours before her eyes stopped tearing. But she was helpless against her imagination, and if an image of Will came to mind at some odd time or other, she found that she literally salivated, and it became her greatest pleasure—in a tangle of bedclothes—to abandon, finally, every other thought of anything at all.
    In late February, Ernie Mullins came to school with a note from his mother asking if Mrs. Scofield would tell the class that the family was moving and had a good dog that needed a home. Agnes explained that she had to check with the principal before she could announce it to the class. That evening, however, after putting together a quick supper of sardines on crackers, which she ate standing over the sink, she put on her coat and went out herself to the Mullinses’ house in a run-down neighborhood near the school, which looked all the more bleak with the last of the snow melted and windblown into yellowing patches that scabbed the stingy little yards like the end bits of soap floating in brackish bath water.
    Mrs. Mullins didn’t invite Agnes in, and Ernie walked her around back, where the dog was tied. It let out a single, declaratory bark of greeting and came forward to meet them. Agnes took one look at the animal standing alert at the end of his chain and was taken aback by an immediate welling-up of admiration.
    The dog was a reddish-brown, medium-size shepherd mix, with his ears cocked forward at their approach, his strength leaning into his shoulders as he stood absolutely still except for a quiver of the silky fringe of his sweepingly curved tail. He approached them almost as far as his chain would allow, but that slight though definite arc of the chain’s slackness—the dog’s dignified refusal to pull it taut—was a bit of restraint that won Agnes over in less than a minute. This was too good a dog, anyway, she thought, to be subjected to the whims of Ernie Mullins or anyone of his family.
    “Why don’t I take him home with me, Ernie?” He merely shrugged his shoulders. Ernie was unnerved to have his teacher standing in his own yard.
    Ernie’s mother wanted the collar for some other dog her family would eventually have when they had moved away from Washburn, Ohio, and settled in Illinois. She stood leaning against the door frame, making it clear from her stance that she had other things to do. “Unless you want to buy it. It’s good leather, and it might be hard to find one now. I just don’t have the heart to ask you to pay for King, even though my husband says he nearly ate us out of house and home. Well, King never went hungry. I’ll tell you that. Anyway, I said we should find him a home, though I don’t know if he’ll make a good watchdog for you or not.”
    Agnes looked at the dog, who stood calmly between her and Ernie, and she stooped down to unfasten his collar. “I’m sure he’ll be just fine,” she said. “And especially grateful, since he’s going to cost me so much in groceries.”
    Mrs. Mullins put her hand on her hip and relaxed even her pretense of goodwill. She looked tired and hostile. “My husband said we should just leave him behind. That he’d make do for himself. But it seemed to me we could try to find a place for him.”
    Agnes searched through her purse, fishing out two dollars, which she handed over to Mrs. Mullins along with the collar. “I’d