Tales of Tank

Tank has been really enjoying our time together now that the kids are back in school. We walk to school and then around the neighborhood until almost 10am. Then we head to the dog park where he gets to run and play and wade. He's a happy dog these days.
Last night he was in a funk. He stayed in his kennel when everyone came home only coming out to ring the bell to go outside. I figured that he's probably pretty worn out from all our activities of late and just left him alone. Around 10:30pm he started making a strange noise from our room. He s.l.o.w.l.y. crept out of the kennel and into the hall huffing and growling at the same time. The hair on his back stood straight up. He made is way from the hallway to the dining room, then to the kitchen, then to the back door all the while making this crazy rumbling sound mixed with some strange breathing thing that dogs do when they're tracking something. I quietly followed him through the house and silently opened the back door.
Once out of the house he tore through the backyard making more aggressive sounds disappearing into the lavender bushes then barking into the neighbors yard. This continued for a number of minutes and I just couldn't watch for fear that he'd get whatever it was that was invading our yard. I waited, listening, until he was done. A few minutes later he scratched the door, signaling me that he's ready to come in. I ran back and opened the door but he didn't want to come in...he turned and ran back to the middle of the yard, turned the side of his body to me, looked at the lavender bush and pointed. Like a bird dog, my Jack Russell pointed towards whatever it was!
I thanked him kindly for alerting me but declined his invitation to check it out.
He huffed and came back into the house, got a quick drink of water and returned to his kennel.