At the shelter, good comes with the bad in an almost bearable balance.

Tripod's 3-legged status and winning disposition gave her the run of the clinic until she was adopted. Her leg was cleanly, surgically amputated, healing nicely when she was brought in by a citizen. No one knows her story. WALLY NELSON/ DAYTON DAILY NEWS

As Ace lingers, his tricks become less dependable.

`Sit up, Ace!' commands Penny Davis, the gentle animal-care provider who has taken a bit of a shine to this dog. He knows it; he paws at her knee and wags his tail. `When he came in,' she says, `he was great at this stuff. He knew all sorts of tricks.'

He's getting rusty from disuse.

Ace is wearing plenty of identification. He has numbered tags from Illinois in addition to a custom-made tag with his name on it. His owners have been contacted, and they said a relative would be in to pick him up.

The staff knows bits and pieces of his story, for it's rare that a dog comes into the Montgomery County Animal Shelter with tags. It's almost unheard of for a dog to come in with tricks.

Day after day, nobody comes for Ace. So he waits.

No. 7896: Mixed breed; brown, white and red. Stray, picked up in Dayton, Oct. 7. Female, not spayed.

Adopted Oct. 17.

The dogs' stories begin in the middle, the beginnings all mysteries with few clues. The end is often brutal and swift: Death.

But often - just often enough, perhaps - the end is a fairy tale's happily ever after.

For every person who comes to the Montgomery County Animal Shelter to look, in vain, for their lost pet, there's a reunion that has the whole staff smiling. For every dog dropped off by an owner tired of its shedding, there's a new family formed. Or so it seems.

The balance may be made only in the heads of the shelter workers, who've seen it all and then some, but who live for the ugly mutt finally found by his lady, who never gave up; for the big, black chow who lingered in the adoption ward for almost three months before being taken home by a shelter volunteer; for the puppies who find boys. For the reunions.

Among the statistics of dogs arriving and dying, there are happy stories. In a perfect world, every story would be a happy story. But at the shelter, the staff will settle for the few that come their way - very relatively few, in the grand scheme of things, but just enough, perhaps, to keep them reporting for work.

No. 8013: Poodle mix; gray and black. Stray, picked up in West Carrollton, Oct. 11. Male, neutered.

Owner claimed Oct. 13

Where am I?

Frank and Debbie Rogers drove for miles, looking. Searching.

Where are they? Best guess is that he chased something out of their big yard and just got lost, being relatively new to the community.

Hmmmm.

Smokey was given to the Rogers by a family member who couldn't keep him any longer. They'd had him for just a few months. Debbie was already deeply in love, and now the big dog was gone.

`We drove for two days looking and looking,' she says, sitting in her wheelchair outside the shelter on a Monday morning at 10:15. Debbie knew: in 15 minutes they'd let her in to look for her dog. `He has to be in there,' she said. `He just has to be.'

It's 10:30 a.m., and the shelter doors open to the public. There's a line of people waiting to get inside, all there for one reason: To find a dog. Their dog, be it the dog they know well or a dog they've yet to meet.

He thumps his tail when Penny comes to his cage. She's talking to him, soothing him with words he's heard before. Good dog. Good boy. There you go, boy. She hooks him to a rope fastened to a wall, where he stands and watches while Penny cleans his cage. Then he's led back inside the cage. He's still wagging his tail. There's fresh water. It's 10:30 a.m. and the doors are just opening, but truth is, the shelter never sleeps. The building is staffed 24 hours a day, seven days a week. There are dogs and cats to feed, cages to clean and clean again. There is paperwork. There are phones to answer, emergencies to attend. Injured animal - the shelter responds. Police need assistance - the shelter responds. Dog bites man - the shelter responds.

When you call about the strange shepherd loping down your street, the shelter will respond. But you'll have to get in line.

Nobody knows his name. He sits, lies down, gets back up, barks a little. He wags his tail when people walk by, looking at them with curiosity. With hope? He's been there since Saturday. It's Monday morning, and he waits.

No. 6582: Poodle; black and gray. Stray, picked up in Trotwood, Aug. 22. Male, not neutered. Note on file: Dog cowers in cage when approached, timid.

Euthanized Aug. 26.

But this Monday the vet was unable to make it. This Monday, the dogs will wait a little longer in their cages, being fed and cared for to the best of the stretched staff's ability. Maybe a vet will come Wednesday - the next scheduled vet-check day.

Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, for an hour or two, contracted vets come and evaluate the dogs' health. The public knows that these are the best days to come for a new pet. People know that by 10:30 a.m. on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, the stock is replenished with dogs who are ready to go home. But not to the home they knew; that home, if there was one, is lost to these dogs.

These dogs need a new home. With someone, with anyone.

He's in the back, in the general population with the others who've been captured or released to the shelter by their rightful owners who don't want, or can't keep, or got tired of them. He got lost and he was caught, brought to this place that's smelly and loud. He sits and he waits.

The shelter is a nondescript, dark-brown building that squats in a row of industrial complexes on Webster Street, just inside the Vandalia city line. It's one of the three main Montgomery County agencies that deal with the welfare of stray animals, but it's the only one that has to. It's a law-enforcement agency, created to enforce Section 955 of the Ohio Revised Code, the law that requires dogs to be confined, licensed, and controlled. Its territory stretches from Englewood to Farmersville and all points in between.

In 1997, 9,013 dogs were `processed' by the shelter. The largest percentage - 5,688 - are dogs caught, though the preferred term is `rescued,' by animal-control officers driving radio-equipped vans. But into the mix add dogs captured in municipalities with their own officers - Kettering, Miamisburg, West Carrollton, Trotwood, Moraine - and the dogs brought to the shelter by their owners - 940 in 1997 - for reasons both understandable and unconscionable.

No. 8012: Mixed breed; tan, black and white. Stray, picked up in Dayton, Oct. 11. Female, not spayed.

Adopted Oct. 16.

Last year, 720 dogs were adopted into new homes. Last year, 5,547 dogs were killed, then frozen, then burned into ash.

He sits in his cage. There's nothing else to do.

His name is Smokey, but nobody here knows it.

And he waits. It's 10:30 a.m. and the Rogers are led inside the kennel by Penny Davis. They maneuver down the narrow aisles between the dog runs and the dog cages. Debbie Rogers strains to see each dog.

`There he is, there he is,' she says, finally, relief flooding her. `I knew he had to be in here. There was no where else he could be.'

There she is. There he is. There they are. Good!

`Smokey, Smokey. How are you, boy?' Debbie Rogers looks up at her husband. There are tears on her cheeks.

`He looks a little thinner, don't you think?' says Frank, scratching his dog's head through the bars of the cage. Behind him, Davis gives her eyes a slight roll. The shelter workers hear that a lot: `You didn't feed my dog. His cage isn't clean. He's all dirty.' They hear these things, but they also hear a lot of `Thank yous,' through the tears of grateful owners reclaiming loved ones.

Frank and Debbie Rogers are sent to the lobby to pay their fine and buy Smokey a license, which they happily do. They're all reunited in front of the shelter, and it's hard to tell who's more eager to leave the place - the people or their dog.

No. 6788: German shepherd; black and tan. Released by owner to shelter because of behavior, Aug. 29. Male, not neutered. Note on file: Aggressive.

Euthanized Aug. 31

She's a striking animal, typical of huskies who look at you with one brown eye, one blue. She was running along the highway near Lyons Road in Miami Twp., and the traffic down there didn't leave her much of a chance. But she made it into the minivan of the Armstrong family who, says the mom, `fell in love on the ride over' to the shelter.

The Armstrongs put a Finders Request memo on `their' dog, this young husky, meaning that if the dog isn't claimed, they would get first chance to adopt her.

Three days later, they got a call. No one had come during the dog's sanctioned holding period. She'd made it through vet check. She was about to be put into the general adoption population, unless.... Were they serious about adopting her themselves?

The Armstrongs, mother Annette, father Bill, with sons Tyler, 5, and baby Jack, piled in the van for the trip back to the shelter.

The husky was waiting, happy to see them, happy to see anybody. She was a young, vigorous and gangly puppy. She was beautiful, and she was going to be a handful.

Annette listened carefully as David Vollette explained the basics of house training, obedience, food. He stressed the importance of spaying their new pet, just as soon as they could. She listened, as Sadie, or Magic (the name was a matter of debate) bounced around the boys.

Tyler loved her. From a distance.

As they got back in the van and headed for home, Annette smiled ruefully and said, `We always said we'd never have a dog.'

Nobody counted on the husky pup with one brown and one blue eye saved from the Lyons Road traffic.

No. 6997: Shepherd mix; brown and black. Stray, picked up in Dayton Sept. 4. Male, not neutered. Injured, left rear leg.

Euthanized Sept. 9

Stephanie Smith's huge laugh echoes through the offices; her throaty voice resonates over the phone. She minces no words, she plays no games. She comes on strong and she doesn't let up. Sit and listen, she'll do most of the talking.

Smith is the director of the shelter. She runs a staff, constantly short, of about 30 people. She runs it well, so well that she spends a great deal of time out in the community speaking to any group that wants her.

She's assisted by two senior managers: Donna Wilson, who oversees the workers who stay inside the Shelter building; and Bob Sexton, who's in charge of the animal-control officers working the streets.

She loves to talk to schools, where she used to be accompanied by her dog, Buddy, until someone told her that if that dog bit anybody she'd be in big, big trouble.

`For a while, I didn't take a dog at all,' she says. `But people kept bugging me about it.... Here all this time, I thought it was me they were inviting.'

So she chose a nice-looking shepherd mix from one day's take at the shelter. She named the dog Shiloh, and had her licensed to the county commissioners.

`But I don't know if they know that,' she grins, punctuating with her trademark wink. `Her full name's Shiloh Montgomery.'

It's almost laughable, the idea of any dog of Stephanie's being a biter. She abides neither growl nor sneer, and takes every curled lip for what it is: A warning.

She will budge not at all on the shelter's one hard and fast rule: Any dog that shows any sign of aggression is dead. Period. No debate.

`People are always saying, `Look at their circumstances. Give them a chance.' And sure, of course! These dogs are stressed - majorly stressed. Who knows what's happened to them? Who knows where they came from? If people treated me the way some of these dogs have been treated, I'd be biting people. You'd better believe I'd be biting.'

Smith turns, looks around at the dogs under her care.

`But look at all these dogs, in the same circumstances, that are still wagging their tails, happy to see everybody.' That day at the shelter, there are dozens such dogs, smiling and wagging all over the place.

There is no shortage of temperamentally sound animals, and Smith has to be sure that any dog she places in a person's home will not be a danger to them.

Shelters have been sued over adopted dogs who bite, she says. `By the time a dog leaves here, it's been exposed to every possible kind of person. Black people, white people, men, women.... We are as sure as we can be that the dog is temperamentally sound.'

Take Tripod, the three-legged rottweiler hopping around the clinic. The missing leg is a mystery, and so it shall remain. Abuse? Accident? Animal trap? No one knows but Tripod, and she's not talking.

But she's wagging her tail, or what the tail-cropper left of it, and she's smiling. Scratch her ears, she smiles some more. (She was adopted soon after.)

Stephanie saunters through the kennel. She stops at the cage of a young, brown mutt. She bends over, talking baby talk and scratching him under his chin. He wiggles in ecstasy; Stephanie drops a biscuit in his cage. Shelter workers are full of biscuits.

`There is no way under any circumstance this dog is going to bite someone. Just look at him,' she offers her cheek for a kiss, which comes immediately in the form of a short little lick. `He's a little sweetheart.'

No. 7894: Shepherd mix; black, tan and white. Male, not neutered. Released to shelter Oct. 7 by resident who found dog four months ago, can't keep dog any longer. Dog has behavior problems. Note on file: Fear biter, very scared. Red dot.

Euthanized Oct. 8.

He was a messy old mop of a dog, dirty and matted befitting one who came from the streets. That's all they knew, that he came from the street. A street in Montgomery County.

The day he passed vet check, the very day he went into the adoption ward, a family with two little girls gave him the once-over. The twice-over. But the magic wasn't there, the connection wasn't made and he went back in his cage. He didn't mind, especially when the woman came and took him out again - this time for a shave and a haircut in a big, warm tub.

No. 7017: Poodle; black. Stray, picked up in Dayton,Sept. 5. Male, not neutered. Note on file: Did not pass vet check.

Euthanized Sept. 11.

Newly shorn and looking good, he was put back in the cage for public appraisal.

And the Benningtons came along. They knew what they were doing, having adopted, `oh, I can't begin to remember how many' dogs there, says Connie Bennington.

They wanted a dog, mainly for their other dog, another shelter find named Cody who, Connie believed, was lonely. They've got plenty of room - a fenced-in acre on their Dayton land - and an easygoing attitude: `Our dogs sleep on the bed with us,' Connie says.

No. 8011: Labrador mix; black, brown and white. Stray, picked up in Clayton Oct. 11. Male, not neutered.

Euthanized Oct. 15.

It took Cody about a day to get used to the newcomer, whom the Benningtons named Shadd.

`It was clear he'd never had people food, and we know he'd never had much attention. We'd pick him up and kiss him and snuggle with him - he just didn't know what to do.

`Now he's a big baby. He's rotten,' says Connie. `He and Cody play like they've known each other forever.'

No. 7892: Chihuahua mix; black. Stray.

Euthanized Oct. 10.

Neutered and made fully shot-worthy by the Benningtons' vet, who's grown used to their shelter mutts, Shadd is letting his hair grow out, spending his days outside with Cody when the weather permits. It's a dream life for a dog, and it certainly was a change for Shadd, who came from nowhere into the land of enchantment and a new best friend named Cody.

`It's amazing,' says Connie, `what a little bit of love and attention can do. This dog, he's a stinker.'

She smiles.

No. 2557: Chow; black and red. Stray, picked up in Harrison Twp. April 13. Male, not neutered. Note on file: Ear infection. Very friendly dog.

Euthanized April 16.

Nobody came for Ace. But he stayed healthy during the two-week holding period mandatory for dogs with tags. He stayed healthy and he stayed happy. After passing his vet check, Ace went up for adoption.

He was there when Del Thacker came in with his adult daughter, who was looking for a dog of her own.

`She told me I had to see this dog,' Thacker recalls. `I don't know why.'

It was a match, and Del, who wanted a bigger dog with none of the housetraining troubles of puppies, adopted Ace that day.

Thacker works a swing shift, and Ace, he says, `just rolls with it.' Nothing's chewed, no `accidents,' no trouble.

`He's real laid-back, that's what I like about him,' says Thacker, who heard sketchy stories of Ace's police-training background from the shelter staff. `I really don't know (where he came from). Here he's just Ace. Big Ace, that's what I call him at home.'

Home. Ace's home. That says it all.