I crested a rise along the forest path and stopped pedaling to enjoy a speedy coast down the other side. At the bottom of the hill, where the honey locust and hawthorn trees are thicker and the trail is haphazard with the winter shed of their spiked branches, I saw a man off the trail chattering on a cellphone and looking up through a sparse canopy, which was just beginning to bud for springtime. I also noticed-as a dark blur on the opposite side of the trail-I believe a Doberman Pinscher-nosing around in the underbrush.
Then I saw the leash.
