Waggit Forever Read Online Free PDF

clutches of Uprights. We help them escape, hide them in safe dens, and place them in suitable living arrangements. We usually do it one dog at a time, but I suppose we could move a whole team if necessary. It would certainly be better than having our food stolen.”
    Waggit sat down and sighed. This was a lot for a young dog to take in. He’d come here only to look for food, and now he was faced with a tough-talking stranger who planned to move the Tazarians out of thepark that had always been their home.
    â€œHow would we know,” he eventually asked, “if the new park was any better than where we are now?”
    â€œThat,” replied Beidel, “is a gamble you’ll have to take. And in the end, what alternative do you have? You either starve where you are or fight us or another street team for a piece of their domain. A fight you’d be unlikely to win.”
    â€œIt doesn’t seem fair,” Waggit complained.
    â€œIt’s not,” Beidel assured him. “It never is. Go back to your leader and tell him what I just told you. I will allow you to use this feeder for as many risings as there are claws on one paw, but after that, we will defend it.”
    Waggit made his way back to the park with a heavy heart. He felt that he’d messed up, but wasn’t sure how. Maybe if he’d been more alert, he would have heard Beidel coming and escaped before he got there, not that it would have made any difference. If the big dog hadn’t cornered him today, he would have got him the next time. It was inevitable. Waggit’s only consolation was that he was returning to the team with a large slab of spare ribs held firmlyin his jaws. Even this was hard to enjoy, for he knew that when it was divided up, there would be very little for each team member.
    The situation was serious.
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    When he got back to the team and they had finished off the spare ribs, he nervously told Tazar about his conversation with Beidel.
    â€œNo! No! No! We will never leave the park!” Tazar was in a rage. “I don’t care what some full-of-himself street hound says. We stay here, and we’ll survive. If I’d have been there, I’d have shown him a thing or two.”
    â€œBut…,” Waggit tried to interrupt.
    â€œNo buts, Waggit,” Tazar snarled. “I’m not blaming you. I’m just angry that a mangy, conniving, no-good mutt would try to take advantage of a naïve young dog who doesn’t know better. I tell you, as soon as they moved us out, those—what’re they called, Ductors?—would move in here and take over our realm, sure as fleas bite.”
    Silence fell on the group, and for several minutes the only sound to be heard was Tazar’s snorting, for he was still fired up. As usual, Lowdown was the onlyone brave enough to speak. He cleared his throat.
    â€œWhile what you say is true, boss,” he said, “whether or not these Ductors is villains don’t change our predicament. I mean to say, we just finished our meal, and I don’t know about you, but I feel as hungry now as before I ate it, and there ain’t much of me. Gordo must be thinking someone slit his throat when he wasn’t looking.”
    â€œOh no, Lowdown,” said Gordo, “I’m sure I’d’ve noticed if they did that. I am pretty hungry, though.”
    â€œI know, I know,” Tazar assured them. “It’s a bad time. But we’ve been through bad times before and survived them all. Things will get better. They always do.”
    But they didn’t. Over the next two days there was still no prey to be hunted in the woods, and even with Cal and Raz helping, the amount of food that they could carry from the Chinese restaurant was scarcely enough to live on. And it was getting more and more dangerous. Cal was almost hit by a taxi, and twice a very angry Chinese man chased them off waving a meat cleaver. There wasn’t much