Tommy was a boy. He lived on the Martin Farm. Not that they grew martins on the farm (for the fur trade), but that was the name of the family that ran the farm. And Tommy Martin was their boy. He had Adventures.
Bonnie is Tommy’s dog. Bonnie really should have been named “Bill” or something like that. But Tommy really didn’t pay attention to details, so his dog is named “Bonnie”. Bonnie had Adventures too, but he didn’t like them much.
Bonnie is the kind of dog you look at and think “Hey! Some crazy person heard that any dog can breed with any other dog and decided to test that saying out.” Bonnie had some Airedale in him. (Or as Tommy would say “in her”.) And some Wiener Dog. There was a scrap of Greyhound and a little Spinone (a real dog) and a bit of Great Pyranees and a sliver of Chihuahua and a poke of Norwegian Elkhound. Luckily there was no Cocker Spaniel or Dandie Dinmont because throwing either of those in the mix would have made of One Ugly Dog. Bonnie was a good dog, a generally dogly dog. Any boy would have been lucky to have a dog like Bonnie. Bonnie was Tommy’s dog. They went everywhere together.
Tommy would wake up early on the Martin farm and go have Adventures. Bonnie always went along because, well, he (or as Tommy would say “she”) knew how things were going to shake out. There was always some shaking going on, on one of Tommy’s Adventures.
Say they went over to Mr. Cleveland’s apple orchard. You know, just to “look around”. Sure as anything Tommy would have to climb the tallest tree and up near the top he’d slip and be dangling by his shoelace and Bonnie would have to run home to get help.
“June! June!” Bonnie would bark. (Only he’d just bark bark. In Bonnie’s head it would be “June!”, only in real life it would be “bark!”.) And June (Who was Tommy’s mother. Only people mysteriously called her “Cloris” for two years. No one knows why.) would come a-running (That’s how you did things on the farm. You didn’t just “come running”, you came a-running. Actually mostly people "came a-runnin’ ", but June was classy and kept the “g”.) just in time to save Tommy from falling out of the tree onto his head on top of a rattlesnake or something.
Or Tommy would be minding his own business down by the creek (crick). And wouldn’t you know it? Old man Howdy’s bull would get loose and chase Tommy up the windmill and Bonnie would have to chase off the bull and then run back to the farmhouse to get June. And then June would have to run back and save Tommy from certain doom. (All that running gave June some swell gams though, let me tell you.)
One time Tommy was down at the old pasture and dropped his lucky hat (Tommy had all sorts of “lucky” stuff: his lucky hat, his lucky clover, his lucky rusty nail, his lucky fifteen pound rock, his lucky railroad spike…) down the old well and tied himself off to the old tractor so he could shimmy down the wet, dank hole (probably full of snakes, and with Tommy’s luck, an alligator) to get it back. Only the parking brake wasn’t set on the tractor and it started rolling down the hill and smashed into the well, dropping Tommy way down into it and then knocked a bunch of the rocks that were stacked around the well loose which fell down onto Tommy’s head and then onto the alligator, really cheesing it off and then the alligator tried to jump up and eat the unconscious Tommy’s legs off as he danged down in the old well while snakes were crawling out of the sides of the well trying to get into Tommy’s ears and the knot he tied the rope onto the tractor was coming undone! Well Bonnie had to do something!
So he walked home. When he got there, he strolled into the kitchen.
“What’s wrong Bonnie?” June yelled! “Is there something wrong with Tommy!” (Well, duh! There’s all sorts of things wrong with Tommy.)
But instead of running around barking, Bonnie just shrugged. (Or he would have if dogs had shoulders.) Using Doggy Mime, Bonnie let June know Tommy left home to join the circus. (It took about three hours all told.) Then he went into Tommy’s room, jumped up on his bed, and went to sleep.
Suppertime rolled around and Tommy still hadn’t come home. June let Bonnie have Tommy’s to “cheer him up”. And Tommy’s dessert too. It was chocolate pudding.
Later that year the circus came to town. June and Paul (Mr. Martin) went to see it, just to make sure Tommy was doing OK. But Tommy wasn’t with that circus. No one had even heard of a “Tommy Martin”. It was all a big mystery.
But not to Bonnie. He knew what happened. But he wasn’t saying. He just kept eating Tommy’s dinners. And then eating Tommy’s desserts. And sleeping in Tommy’s bed.
Every once in a while Bonnie would go down to the old pasture and look down the wreck of the old well with the old tractor crashed half down the hole. And Bonnie would just laugh and laugh!
Bonnie was really an evil dog.
-Rue.
