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My dog isn�t lost, but �B.J.� doesn�t know that By Dani Dodge The ad began running in Thursday�s paper. "Reward!!!!! Beloved Red Female Doberman. Lost on July 25 near Ashland Dog Park. Slipped out of collar. Leave message for Maggie." My dog isn�t lost. My name isn�t Maggie. The ad is a ruse, an attempt to flush out a suspected con man scamming people who advertised their lost dogs. The call from Arizona comes at 9:14 p.m. Friday. "I�ve got a collect call," the operator says. "Caller, your name?" "Calling about the red Doberman," a man says. I accept the call. In a voice tinged with terror, a man asks: "Did Danny call you?" I tell him I didn�t know what he�s talking about. "Danny, from Phoenix (Ariz.); he was supposed to call you. Oh man, that�s really strange. He told me he called you." The man, who sounds about 25, goes on to spin a tale of woe. I�ve heard this story before � it�s the same tale Glenn Gaither and other dog owners tell about the calls they got from Arizona. The man says his boss, a nasty fellow, picked up my Doberman after drinking one night at the end of a job laying fiber-optic cable near the railroad tracks in Ashland. The man traced the work order back to the Medford area, he says, where someone figured out the dog was mine. "You did put up fliers, didn�t you?" "Well, no, not yet," I answer. "Oh," he says. "He knew somehow." In a breathless, I�m-really-taking-a-chance-here-voice, he describes the dog in cage where he works. Red. No collar. I ask if he remembers anything different about the dog, something unique. He gets panicky, saying he�d lose his job if his boss finds out he�s calling. "But I couldn�t sit still and do nothing," he whines. His wife just had a baby, a hard birth. She couldn�t work. He has to get off the phone. He pretends to have a conversation with his wife, Jan. I push for something special. He insists he has to go. There�s a pause, like he�s hanging up. Then, I blurt out: "Just check her back right paw. My dog is missing a toenail on her back right paw." He says he�ll get his wife to check. He�ll call me right back. At 11:56 p.m. Friday, a collect call from "B.J." "It�s her! It�s her!" he exclaims as if overjoyed. "My wife checked and it�s her." He says we have a bad connection. He can�t hear me. He hangs up. It�s 11:58 p.m. Another collect call: "She�s got a toenail pulled off on the right foot or something," he says. He�s trying to figure out how to get her to me. I offer to call the police. "Don�t call the police," he beseeches. "Don�t you understand what kind of chance I�m taking here?" I say I�ll fly there. He gets so panicky, he squeaks. He keeps saying he�ll lose his job. When I push, he acts as if he�ll hang up the phone. I volunteer that I have friends in Phoenix, Ariz., who could bust the dog out. He insists they�d get caught and squeal. Then he�d be fired. "Geez, my stomach hurts," he says. He�s checked bus schedules and airlines. They all require special crates for dogs that cost about $75. The flight will cost $246.74. He�ll get the dog and take her to a safe place. Wait by the phone, he tells me. Instead, I call the police. All the while, my real dog, a beautiful red dobie, is by my side. I pat her head, caress her soft ears. I�m glad she�s safe, but I�m sorry there are people out there being tortured with hopes of finding their lost animals by scam artists like "B.J." And I only hope that soon he�s the one behind bars in a cage. Obituaries | Sports | Business | Classifieds | Tempo | Prime Times | So Oregon Sites | Outdoor Journal | Subscribe | Contact | Movies | Advertise | Real Estate Showcase | Archive | Editorials | Letters to the editor | Religion | Wake-up Call | NIE | Cyber Chef | Job Network | So Oregon Weather | WSJ Northwest | Forums | AP Wire | AP Money | F.A.Q. | Awards Ottaway Newspapers, Inc. The Community Newspaper Subsidiary of Dow Jones & Co, Inc Copyright �The Mail Tribune 2000, Medford, Oregon USA