Jingle Bell Bark (18 page)

“W
ell,” said Aunt Peg, hopping Zeke up onto his table back at the setup. “We had ourselves quite a day.”

We had indeed. Even though twenty minutes had passed since the Poodle classes had ended—we'd waited and had win pictures taken with the judge before making our way back to the grooming area to begin the process of taking the dogs' elaborate hairdos apart—I was still feeling quite giddy with the excitement of it all.

“I can't believe it,” I said.

“I can,” Terry announced from the other end of the aisle. The man had ears like a bat. “It was like watching the Cedar Crest show out there. None of the rest of us stood a chance.”

Aunt Peg wasn't having any of it. “So you lost in Standards, big deal. You got yours in Toys and Minis. Suck it up and act like a man.”

“Oh please,” said Terry. “Are you ever barking up the wrong tree.”

He gazed unhappily at the grooming tables in his setup, all holding Poodles that Crawford had shown earlier. Each now needed to be undone and rewrapped. The handler, as usual, had picked up another dog and headed back to the rings.

A nicer person might have worked up a modicum of sympathy for Terry, but for me it just wasn't happening. I knew how he felt; I'd been beaten by Crawford plenty of times in the past. Many more times, in fact, than I'd ever beaten him. But instead of feeling sorry for Terry, I was hosting my own private celebration.

Eve, who should have been returned to her table as Zeke and Tar had been, was still on the floor. Taking advantage of the unaccustomed freedom, she'd chosen to dance rings around my legs. In less than a minute, we'd both become hopelessly entangled in the leather show lead. On a normal day, that would have been cause for great concern. The slender leash, twisting through a thick mane coat that had been hairsprayed into place, was bound to cause mats and tangles.

Somehow I just couldn't bring myself to care. I was standing there grinning like a happy fool when Sam came to the rescue.

“Here, let me.” He took the looped end of the leash from my hand and began the convoluted process of trying to separate dog from handler, a task made all the more arduous by the fact that neither Eve nor I was unduly upset by our dilemma.

“I have a homebred champion,” I said to no one in particular.

“We know,” Aunt Peg replied. She watched with some amusement as Sam wound his hands first one way around my legs, then the other, trying to unravel the leather strip. Eve had stopped twirling now; there wasn't enough play left for either of us to move. “Sad to say, you seem to have gone daft on account of it. I'd have to think back—it was many, many years ago—but I don't think my first champion had that effect on me.”

“Nor me,” said Sam, still working diligently.

“I also have a Poodle with a new major,” I mentioned.

“Hard to miss that.” Sam blew out a frustrated breath. “Since you seem to have attached her to your hip.”

“Oh for Pete's sake,” said Peg, watching Eve's coat being twisted into tight knots.

She reached into her tack box and pulled out a pair of sharp scissors. Holding Eve's ear hair carefully to one side, Aunt Peg slipped one edge of the scissors under the collar and snipped. A quick tug and the constricting band snaked loose. Pressure released, the Poodle immediately stepped away and shook her head.

Before Eve could think of what to do next, Aunt Peg had slipped a confining palm around her muzzle. She spun the Poodle in place. An experienced show-goer, Eve knew what was expected. With a movement that was half hoist, half jump, she bounded up onto her table.

“I trust”—Peg aimed a fulminating look my way—“that you can deal with the rest of the problem.”

“You cut my show leash,” I said in disbelief, holding up the snipped fragments as evidence. Now that there was nothing attached to the other end, the coil slid down my legs and pooled innocuously at my feet.

“I did indeed. Somebody had to do something, considering that you were content to stand there looking like an idiot. Be glad I didn't slap you. I considered that option as well.”

Well, yes, I supposed that was something to be thankful for. Small favors and all that.

Sam, damn him, was looking as though he was trying not to laugh.

“Buck up, Melanie,” Peg said sternly. “Show leads are a dime a dozen. You can get another at the concession stand. You were entirely too happy for your own good.”

Too happy for my own good? That was a new one. I glared at my ruined leash. “You've fixed
that
now, haven't you? I'll have you know that was my lucky show lead.”

All right, in the same way that I don't believe in jinxes, maybe I don't set much store by lucky talismans either. But my aunt, the queen of high-handed tactics, needed to be taken down a notch. And considering that Eve had just been wearing that leash on the occasion of winning her first major, I figured I had a pretty good shot of making my case. Judging by Aunt Peg's suddenly stricken look, I was probably right.

“Oh dear,” she said.

Sam was laughing in earnest now.

Magically, Terry appeared at Aunt Peg's side. He was drawn to trouble like a moth to a flame. I wondered why he was holding a stainless steel dog bowl in his hands. I didn't have long to speculate.

“I could throw a bowl of water over her if you like,” he offered.

“You're not helping,” I said.

“What on earth makes you think I'm trying to be helpful?”

There was that.

“Okay,” said Sam, stepping in between us. “Back to your corners, everyone. We all have work to do.”

“And some of us,” I said pointedly, “need to go shopping.”

“Don't be such a crybaby,” said Terry. “We must have twenty leashes in our tack box.” He walked back to his own setup, dug around in a drawer, and came up with a small plastic pouch holding a new black lead. “Catch,” he said, tossing it in my direction.

I snatched it out of the air and examined the bag. The leash looked exactly like the one I'd just lost.

“Not so fast,” said Aunt Peg. Now she was the one holding the tattered remnants of the sliced leash. “Maybe this one could be fixed. What if that one isn't a lucky leash?”

“Too bad.” I tossed it into my tack box. “Thanks, Terry.”

“No prob.”

“
Yes
, there's a problem.” Aunt Peg was grinding her teeth now. She hated it when no one paid attention to her. Especially since it happened so seldom.

And may I be the first to mention that in this particular instance it served her right?

“Don't worry,” Terry said blithely. “All our leads have major mojo. That's why Crawford wins so much.”

Sam was past laughing now; he sounded as though he might be choking. Thank goodness Crawford hadn't been there to hear
that
assertion. I doubted any of us would have survived the fallout. And although I was quite certain Terry hadn't meant for us to take him seriously, Aunt Peg seemed to be considering it. She retrieved the leash from my tack box and gave it a look.

“Major mojo,” she said. “That might make a good name for a Standard Poodle. I'll have to give it some thought.”

There was still an hour to wait before the start of the non-sporting group. In the interim, Eve and Zeke were brushed out, rewrapped and—after all four Poodles had gone outside for a long walk—put back in their crates. Tar, who would be showing again in the group, rested atop his table where his hair wouldn't get mussed.

The Poodles had been to enough shows to know the routine. Once crated, Faith and the littermates immediately flopped over on their sides and went to sleep. Tar, knowing he couldn't relax just yet, kept a watchful and curious eye on the activity in the surrounding area. The big black Poodle was the first to spot the slender, middle-aged woman making her way purposefully through the crowds and heading in our direction.

Sam had gone to get lunch while Aunt Peg and I held down the fort. As I scanned the crowds waiting for his return, my gaze, too, fastened on the woman that had caught Tar's eye.

The dog show world is actually a rather small community. Exhibit enough and after a while everyone begins to look at least somewhat familiar. I couldn't remember seeing this woman before, though.

Dressed in a workmanlike suit—skirt loose enough to run in, jacket with plenty of pockets for holding brushes and bait, and all in a dark, murky plaid that wouldn't show the dirt—she bore the same look as any number of exhibitors on the grounds. As she drew near, a gold pin fastened to her lapel and winking in the overhead lights, announced her breed affiliation: Goldens. I was about to point her out to Aunt Peg, who was rooting around in her bag for a granola bar, when the woman announced herself.

“Finally!” she said, skirting expertly around the last row of crates and wending her way through the tables to our setup. “I knew if I kept looking, I'd find you sooner or later.”

Aunt Peg straightened and immediately smiled. “Cindy! I'm so glad you made it. Let me introduce my niece, Melanie.”

Cindy turned out to be Cindy Marshall, Pepper's breeder from New Jersey. The mention of her name reminded me that the two women had been planning to have lunch together at the end of the week. I'd forgotten to ask how that had gone.

“I had to cancel,” Cindy said when I asked. “Something came up at the last minute. Isn't that always the way? But then Peg said she was going to be showing here, and I was entered, too. I'd told her if I got a free moment, I'd stop by and say hello.”

To nobody's surprise, the talk turned immediately to dogs. Peg and Pepper's breeder didn't know one another well, but once they started discussing the day's activities, they became as chummy as a pair of old friends. Cindy leaned down, peeking inside the crates to say hello to Faith, Eve, and Zeke, then greeted Tar with the utmost care.

“I won't even touch,” she said with a little laugh. “I've been around dogs my whole life but it's hard not to be intimidated by all that hair. I don't know how you Poodle people do it.”

“It's not so bad once you get the hang of it,” Peg replied. “I can't imagine coping with shedding.”

She walked over to Tar and placed a hand on his flank where the hair had been shaved to the skin. “Right now, when he's all sprayed up and waiting to go back in, you want to confine your patting to the clipped areas. Later, when he's done, you just treat him like any other normal dog. That's all they are, really. The hair is just a giant sleight of hand.

“It's one thing for you to be reticent about it; you're trying to be polite. But there's nothing more annoying than a judge who doesn't want to put his hands down inside the coat. How on earth do they expect to feel what the exhibitor is trying to hide? If a judge can't deal with hair, they should only be doing breeds they can eyeball.”

“Like Dobermans,” Cindy said in agreement. “Or Whippets.”

“Or Siamese cats,” Terry piped up. Shiba Inu tucked under his arm, he walked down to our end of the aisle and placed the dog on an empty table next to our setup where he could join in the conversation.

He leaned in and kissed Cindy on the cheek. Terry, a newer face in the dog show world than I was, nevertheless managed to know just about everybody.

“Where's Brad today?” he inquired after Cindy's husband.

“Playing golf,” Cindy sighed. “In December. Probably freezing his buns off and loving every minute of it. The man's an addict.”

The three of us glanced at each other guiltily. And we weren't?

“Besides,” Cindy continued, “he's never really enjoyed the whole dog show scene. Years ago, when we were newlyweds, he used to come just to humor me. But devotion like that wears off. It's really just a matter of time.”

Cindy turned to Peg. “I've found that dogs are really more a woman's thing, haven't you? So few men seem to get the same enjoyment. If I ever found one that did, I think I'd be tempted to hang on to him with both hands.”

Interesting. I wondered if Brad the golfer might have something to say about that.

“I didn't expect to see you here today,” said Terry. “You're quite a long way from home.”

“Three states, to be exact. And shows in Allentown this weekend, too. But of course you know the good judges would be all the way up here.”

That was the story of an exhibitor's life. We lived and died by the judging assignments.

“How did you do?” asked Aunt Peg.

“Points on a puppy,” Cindy said with satisfaction. “You can't ask for better than that. It will make the long drive home feel worthwhile. How about you? I see this one is headed for the group. Were your others as successful?”

The catalog was brought out; the major entry and our wins exclaimed over. Cindy congratulated us on our good fortune. Then she apologized once again for missing lunch with Peg and said, “I really did want to talk to you about Henry Pruitt. I'd been thinking about what you said about his two dogs. The first time we spoke, I told you I'd be happy to come and get Pepper. Then I believe you said there was some sort of problem with Henry's daughters?”

“They've inherited the dogs as part of their father's estate,” I said. “And they seem to feel that as purebred Golden Retrievers, Pepper and Remington should be worth money. Rather than simply finding them good homes, the daughters are determined to try and sell them.”

“To the highest bidder,” Peg added with a wink.

“I see. Well, in that case, my offer won't do you much good. But I thought since I was taking one boy, I might as well have them both. Remington didn't come from me, but I feel as though I know him from Henry's pictures. At my house there's always room for another Golden. And if I'm lucky, I might be able to come up with a home where the two of them can stay together.”