I drive up to the rusting chain link gate surrounding the barren desert property, a 100-foot-square parcel of gritty sand and scrub brush. A single ramshackle trailer at the far end looks one strong desert gust from falling over.
I’m here to see if the owner will allow us to park trucks on his property for a film shoot down the road. There is no one else around for miles.
I honk several times. I wait.
After a long while, a man steps out of the trailer. Indeterminate age. Skin leathery from working in the sun. Face worn and etched with lines. Wiry and thin. He motions for me to approach. I slowly drive onto the property.
Suddenly, six large dogs bolt out from behind the trailer toward me, barking their heads off. They leap against the doors of my car, smear slobber on the windows, paw the hood.
I can tell they’re not vicious. They’re desert dogs, allowed to run freely across the vast expanse they call home, and this is more a game than it is protection. Still, I don’t doubt that a bite will follow if I get out of the car.
I slow to a crawl, doing everything I can to not run one over. They dart back and forth in front of my car, challenging it as if it’s a fellow canine. I took to the man for help. He shows no sign of concern.
I finally arrive at his trailer. The man snaps his fingers for the dogs to desist. They race off to another part of the yard.
The man only speaks Spanish. I do my best to convey the request, and after a few minutes, he understands and accepts the offer. I tell him I’ll return with an agreement and his payment.
I start to drive out. Within seconds, the pack of dogs are crawling all over my car again, snarling and drooling.
I call to the man and ask if he’ll hold back his dogs. I tell him I’m afraid I’m afraid I’ll accidentally run one over.
“They fine,” he says gruffly, with little concern. “Don’t worry. They fine.” He disappears back into his trailer.
Frustrated, I slow the car to idle speed, ride the brake, literally inch toward the gate as the dogs show no sign of relenting. I finally lurch through onto the empty desert road, and for a moment, I think I’m free.
I’m not. The dogs bolt through the gate after me, racing beside and in front of my car.
There’s simply no way I can accelerate without possibly killing one or several of them. So I come to a complete stop on the vacant desert road. I wait. I wait some more.
The dogs wander around their unexpectedly dormant foe, confused. Suddenly, movement. Some unfortunate desert critter scurries by, and they’re after it at lightning speed, chasing it back onto the property.
Then, all is quiet. I wait to be sure they’re gone. I slowly inch forward. No dogs appear.
I slowly accelerate faster, 10 mph, 15 –
It happens in a microsecond. A black dog, what looks like a lab mix, gallops at the front left front corner of my car. Without any warning, he veers to the right, not in front of my car, but under.
I both hear and feel a massive THUNK at my feet as something – presumably the dog, possibly its head – slams into the underside directly below the pedals.
Horrified, I whip to look in the rearview mirror. I see the black dog race out from under my car at bat-out-of-hell speed, barking its head off. I search for any sign of injury. No limp. No trail of blood. I drive a Subaru with a decent amount of ground clearance, so maybe, just maybe it’s OK. But that thunk…
I watch dog hook a left abruptly off the road and disappear into the desert amongst the scrub.
I slam on the brakes, pull over. I climb on the roof of my car, search desperately for the animal. It’s gone.
I return to my car. I sit in the driver’s seat, deeply shaken. I sit there for a while. Then I realize with a sinking feeling I have to go tell the man what happened to his pet.
I slowly pull back into his property. For some reason, the dogs seem less interested in my car this time, engrossed in digging a hole at one corner of the yard.
I pull up to the trailer. Knock on the door. The man steps out, waits for me to speak.
“I’m so sorry,” I say, near tears. “Your dog… It followed me out. I didn’t see it. He ran under my car. I think I hit it. I don’t know if it’s OK.”
The man squints hard at his dogs. “My dogs fine,” he says.
“No,” I say. There’s one not here. That’s the one I hit.”
“All my dogs here,” he says. Measurable annoyance has grown in his voice. “They fine.”
I look at him with confusion. “No, there’s one missing,” I say. “The black one. I’m talking about the black one.”
A look of cold fury suddenly passes over his face. It’s so sudden and intense that I take a step back.
“Black dog not my dog,” he says in a low, angry tone.
“What?” I ask.
“Black dog not my dog,” he says again, each word dripping with hatred.
“But it was in your yard,” I say.
“Black dog very bad,” he says, in the haunting, austere tone one might use in a horror movie when telling the history of the monster that has been viciously killing people for centuries. “Very bad. Black dog not my dog.”
“I’m sorry. I don’t understand,” I say. “A black dog followed me out of your property with your dogs. I think I hit it with my car. I’m afraid it’s injured – ”
“My dogs fine!” he yells at me. “Black dog not my dog!”
He stares daggers into my eyes, states each word with finality: “Black dog very bad.”
The conversation is over. He walks back into his trailer, slams the door.
I sit for a long while in a daze.
I slowly, carefully maneuver back to the gate. His dogs ignore me, still distracted by their hole digging.
Once on the road, I pull over a short distance further and search one last time for the black dog, but he’s gone. I sit there for a while longer, lost in thought.
This happened five years ago. To this day, I still think back and wonder if the black dog survived. And then I wonder what it could have possibly done to make that man speak of it as you would the devil.