Hi, Nick here. That’s short for Nicolai Nicolvoitch the 3^rd. When we last met, you left when I was sharing a chewy canine crunchie with a beautiful female client to the tunes of ‘Three-Dog Night’. However, nothing much happened after that. I’d forgotten that bitches are only amorous once or twice a year. Some humans say we’re lucky that way. Anyway, since then, I’ve been practicing writing limericks for the Detective Dog’s annual. How’s this?

I’m thinking of sending that in to the Husky Write-in Contest. The prize this month is a free year’s subscription to the Husky Inquirer. That’s a rag mag for Siberian Huskies. It’s a real howl! Just last month I read ‘Aliens Kidnap Husky and Take Her to Water Valley’, ‘Siberian Marries Human Owner For Peanuts’, ‘Siberian Born with Eight Legs, Runs Four Times Faster’, ‘Millionaire Siberian Buys Alaska’…..stuff like that! I like to keep up with the news. It keeps me four steps ahead of the pack.

Just then, I heard a knock at the door. Actually it was more like a scritch, clunk, scritch, clunk, screeeetch. Aha, another client I thought. This’ll be number two. Business is really picking up. I padded over to the door and remembering the last time, opened it and quickly danced out of the way.

In piled not one…not two…not three…not four…not five…but six Siberian Huskies, all in a heap. "Ah, a six-pack," I said. They were all wearing something I’d only seen on human puppies…harnesses. "Come right in," I yowled. "My name is Nick, who are you guys?"

"I’m Preston," woofed the big red Sibe, "I’m a wheel."

"I’m Honey," purred the light red one, "and I work the point."

"I’m Charmee," rumbled the gray one, "I’m the other point and I work harder that she does."

"My name’s Gizmo and I’m a wheel too," said the big black and white Sibe with the blue eyes.

From the bottom of the pile came…"I’m the lead dog." "No, I’m the lead dog." "I am." "No you’re not, I can outrun you any day." "That’s what you think, pip squeak." Before I knew what was happening there was a heated screeching argument emanating from under this pile of siberian fur from two dogs I couldn’t even see. Finally the others howled in unison, "Shut up you two." That calmed them down. Everyone untangled and separated. The two on the bottom came into view.

"Now," I said, "Who are you?"

"I’m Badger," said the bigger black and white, "and I’m the lead dog."

"No you’re not," screeched the pint sized black and white midget, "You couldn’t….."

"Enough!" I growled heatedly. This was getting out of paw.

"Ok," said the little one, "I’m Pepper and I’m the other lead dog."

"That’s better," they all sang.

"Now, what’s the problem?" I asked.

"We went to mush in the Bush," said Honey.

"We ran real fast so we wouldn’t be last," said Preston.

"We stopped at a tree to have a peek," roared Gizmo.

"We saw a squirrel and took a whirl," cried Charmee.

"We scaled a hill and took a spill," woofed Badger.

"To miss a bump, we had to jump," squeaked Pepper.

"When we looked back for our musher, there he was……gone," they all howled.

"We looked for him but had no luck," continued Badger.

"So, off we went, back to the truck," added Gizmo.

"But , he wasn’t there," said Charmee, his sister.

"We pooled our biscuits to hire a detective," said Honey.

"So here we are! Can you help us mister?" asked Pepper.

What a touching story, I thought. "Let’s go back to the scene of the crime," I said. "You’ll have to show me where all this happened." With that, I was led out of the office and down the stairs. Out on the street, they gave me a helmet to wear and strapped me on to some pieces of wood. "What’s this thing?" I woofed hesitantly. "A racing sled," they replied and away we went. Some time later we arrived at the trail. So this was what dog sledding was all about.

"This is where we were when we lost our musher," gruffed Preston hungrily, "he should be around here someplace."

I took out my magnifying glass and off we went looking for clues. We followed the trail with myself leading the six-pack and the sled. Heads down, noses at the ready we searched high and low, far and wide, behind rocks and under logs, behind bushes and inside snow banks. Mr. Musher was nowhere to be found. Not a sign of him anywhere. Not a clue. Just as if he’d disappeared off the face of the earth. He was definitely going to be late for dinner!

As we rounded a turn on the trail we encountered a deer. Being the consummate detective, I sauntered over to the deer and asked, "have you seen any strange goings on in these parts, dear?"

"No, I haven’t," she whispered and she wandered off.

We continued our search, following the trail further into the woods. Looking here and there, we happened onto a moose. Again, being the spokesdog, I sidled over to Mr. Moose and inquired as to the state of the meadow and how things were in Moosenee. Well, no luck there either. I was beginning to get a little worried. Maybe we wouldn’t find Mr. Musher. I could see from the looks on their faces and the angry growls from their stomachs, that the six little Sibes following me were getting very concerned too. Maybe aliens kidnapped their musher and took him to water Valley, I thought.

We continued along the trail. As we came over a rise, I heard a terrible noise. There sitting in the middle of a clearing was a squirrel mouthing off something awful. I ran up to him to see what his problem was. "What’s your problem?" I asked directly. I believe in getting right to the point.

"I was sitting at home watching television, enjoying a good nut show, ‘One flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest’, when crash! something hit my tree and broke my whole winter’s supply of nuts," said Mr. Squirrel. "I went outside to see what had happened and found a big ugly thing stuck around the front entrance to my tree. Can you help me get rid of it so I can watch my favorite TV show?"

"What’s that?" I inquired.

"The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show, of course," cackled Mr. Squirrel.

Mr. Squirrel led us down the garden path to where a large bump rose out of the ground. "Now, look up," chattered Mr. Squirrel.

There, about ten feet off the ground, wrapped around a branch, right in front of the entrance to Mr. Squirrel’s home was Mr. Musher. Everyone yelped and howled for joy. "Are we ever glad to see you," they all sang. A few minutes later we had him down and strapped onto the sled. "Time to take him home," they said, "It’s almost dinner time. Thanks for finding him for us Nick," and with a howl they took off, the six-pact, the sled and Mr. Musher leaving behind a big bag of biscuits.

Whoa!!! Wait a minute. How am I going to get home? Where am I anyway? Well, maybe that problem can wait. Right now, I’ll just curl up with this big bag of dog biscuits and enjoy myself. I’ll worry about getting home tomorrow.

THE END.