I like stories with happy endings. Unfortunately, sometimes they start with pretty awful villains, so awful even Disney wouldn’t cast them as villains in their movies.

One such account occurred apparently last weekend. When I first received emails about it, I couldn’t handle it. I couldn’t even think about it, much less write about it.

A person that the original email sender (a witness to the brutality) called a “coward” shot his dog at a lime kiln near South Fork and left it to die in the cold and blowing snow. I’m guessing the owner intended to kill the dog because he or she didn’t want it anymore, but the bullet was not well aimed, and the dog did not die. The owner did not finish the job but left the dog to suffer and presumably to die.

There was an angel watching, though, that day. There are always angels watching, and how often I think they must cry over the brutality of humans (and often, too, at the kindness of other humans responding to that brutality.)

This time there was a human angel there, too. She saw the dog and human get out of the car, the dog wagging its tail thinking it was going for a hike. She then heard the shot and saw the coward take off. She heard the dog scream.

She picked him up and took him to the wonderful folks at Alpine Veterinary Clinic who began to care for him.

She began spreading the word about this sweet heeler or Australian shepherd dog who had such a will to live.

Folks with caring hearts began to respond, so much so that when I finally was able to write about this story and called the veterinary clinic, the lovely lady answering the phone said they had received so many donations, they didn’t need any more. His vet bills were paid.

She said the dog was walking and doing well.

And, she added, he has a wonderful home to go to when he is able!

I don’t know if the culprit who shot him will be caught, prosecuted or punished, at least in this life. I think hell is not hot enough for folks who hurt innocent creatures like dogs and children. I always want to punish the people who commit these atrocities in the same manner as their crimes, shooting them and leaving them to suffer in the cold. Of course that’s not a very Christian attitude, but it’s the way I feel towards these blankety-blank cowards.

I know some of these folks might have also been victims of abuse as children, but they are no longer children. They are adults who can choose now to be better than their upbringing.

Fortunately, this story does have a happy ending for a sweet dog who will now receive all the love he always deserved.

I don’t know what his final name will be with his adoptive family, but the last email update I received on him called him “Milagro” — miracle.