in "The Blue Ridge Mountain Adventure!"

Because Luke is still too rambunctious to respond reliably to a recall, he is never allowed outside the house off the leash, and since he has become quite adept at slipping out of his collar, we thought the best solution was to put him in a harness instead -- until he chewed two of them to pieces. So, he was back to wearing a collar on the early Sunday morning that I took him and Bonnie for their customary walk around the house. I had barely stepped off the front porch when Luke dashed around the corner, with Bonnie in tow. Suddenly his flexi-leash went slack in my hand and by the time I turned the corner myself, both dogs were gone. They had vanished into thin air.

We live on the edge of the Blue Ridge Mountains, not far from Skyline National Park, so chances are they had startled a grazing deer and chased it into the woods. Unfortunately, even if I had seen which direction the dogs had taken, the terrain was much too rough for us to hike after them. Kate and I called and whistled and shouted over and over again, but without any response. We consoled ourselves with the knowledge that Luke and Bonnie had taken off before breakfast and surely hunger would tempt them back home before too long. Trying not to worry, we returned to our chores, but we had a hard time concentrating.

By noon we were driving up and down the highway and winding our way through all the nearby farm roads, half afraid of what we might find. By nightfall we'd begun to despair. Luke was crazy enough to go romping merrily through the woods, but surely gentle, obedient Bonnie would have come home if she could. Or would she? If Luke felt the call of the wild, she would probably stay by his side. The bond between them was very strong, perhaps stronger than her affection for us. Fearing the worst, but determined to keep searching, we printed out a dozen copies of a Reward poster and made a list of all the places we could post it.

A little while after I took off for work Monday morning, just as Kate was on the verge of leaving for the nearest vet's office, the phone rang. A woman called with the news that two bedraggled dogs had been hiding under her porch since Sunday noon. She had thought they were strays at first, but then noticed that one of them was a collie, surely someone's pet. Despite her best efforts, it had taken until Monday morning before she could coax Bonnie out far enough to read her tag.

Kate sped off in her truck, following directions that led her four or five miles down a rutted back country road. There, taking refuge under a farmhouse with dogs and cats and ducks, were our two extremely miserable, woebegone runaways. Evidently their grand adventure had lasted only a few hours before it turned into a nightmare. They were tired, frightened, hungry and muddy, and Bonnie's pads were so sore that she practically crawled to the truck. And although they were pathetically eager to go home, Kate swears they seemed to look at her reproachfully for taking so long to come get them.

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