He nonchalantly scratched his left ear...and strolled over to pee on the hydrangeas. "Mom, meet Wally."

He had ridden shot gun all the way cross town, his long legs folded into the coupe's little seat, and when he awkwardly stepped out onto the gravel driveway, he stumbled. He scratched his left ear nonchalantly with his long hind foot and strolled over to pee on the hydrangeas that lined the driveway as if to say, "I didn't really stumble.  I meant to do that all along."

"Mom, meet Wally," my daughter said.  A half an hour earlier, she called on her cell to tell me that she was bring a "temporary guest" home whom she had found running on a busy road in the heat, obviously in need of assistance.

"Wally?" I asked. "Is that his name?"

"Probably not. No tags, of course. I went by the vet to see if he was chipped. No luck. But doesn't he look like a Wally?"

When she called  and told me she was headed home with a friend in tow, Where's Waldo immediately popped into my mind, red striped shirt and all. Wally was wearing a collar with red striped tape wound around it.

"I kinda thought he was a Waldo," I said, "but Wally's good." I come from a long line of animal whisperers, and more than once have rescued a nameless, tagless dog whose owners have claimed it and called it by the same name I had assigned to it, or something very close. And not run of the mill dog names like Fido or Spot, either, but Margaret, or one time,  Larry.

"I'll advertise for his owner tomorrow. It's too late today," my daughter said. Wally sat. He climbed the front steps, went straight into the den and lay before the fireplace. He politely ate the food he was offered, although he was obviously hungry, drank water like  he was dying of thirst, and took a nap. Later, he picked up a Croc garden clog and when offered a chicken dog toy, made an effort to stuff the chicken into the shoe, presenting the shoe and chicken gift package to my husband when he came to check on the visitor.

We have a long history in my family of having sad, lost canine visitors become permanent residents when they were unclaimed, and inevitably they turned into treasures we could not imagine life without. Wally looks a lot like Greta, snatched off a dangerous road in a snowstorm. Wet, starved, freezing and unable to walk, that leggy black dog was wrapped in blankets and carried into our warm kitchen to breathe her last. A couple of years later, a very elderly Greta did indeed breathe her last, but not until she had gained enough life and breath to dance like a circus stiltwalker when she saw one of us come down the steps in the morning.

So tomorrow we will see if the signs with Wally's photo yield any results, but anyone who calls will face some stern questioning. Wally will not go to anyone who can't identify his odd little markings, his distinctive collar and other attributes.  He may have dropped in on us at a woefully inconvenient time, but he didn't plan it that way. And the blessings of fate are seldom conveniently timed to fit into our plans.