Stud Rites

BY THE SAME AUTHOR

Black Ribbon

Ruffly Speaking

Bloodlines

Gone to the Dogs

Paws Before Dying

A Bite of Death

Dead and Doggone

A New Leash on Death

and coming soon in

Hardcover from Doubleday

Animal Appetite

All of the characters in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

This edition contains the complete text of the original hardcover edition.

NOT ONE WORD HAS BEEN OMITTED.

STUD RITES

A Bantam Book / Published by arrangement with Doubleday

PUBLISHING HISTORY

Doubleday hardcover edition published June 1996

Bantam paperback edition / March 1997

Excerpts from the script of the Showcase of Rescue Dogs held at the 1993 Alaskan Malamute Club of America National Specialty reprinted by permission of the Alaskan Malamute Protection League.

All rights reserved.

Copyright © 1996 by Susan Conant.

Cover art copyright © 1997 by Daniel Craig.

Library of Congress catalog Card Number 95-44439.

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. For information address: Doubleday.

If you purchased this book without a cover you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as ”unsold and destroyed” to the publisher and neither the author nor the publisher has received any payment for this ”stripped book.”

ISBN: 0-553-57300-4

Published simultaneously in the United States and Canada

Bantam Books are published by Bantam Books, a division of Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group, Inc. Its trademark, consisting of the words ”Bantam Books” and the portrayal of a rooster, is Registered in U.S. Patent and Trademark Office and in other countries. Marca Registrada. Bantam Books, 1540 Broadway, New York, New York 10036.

PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

OPM 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2

To Virginia, in memory of her beloved husband, Howard Devaney, whose caring and generosity were the foundation of the Alaskan Malamute Protection League

Acknowledgments

Many thanks to Jean Berman, Judy Bocock, Fran Boyle, Gail Castonguay, Virginia Devaney, Dorothy Donohue, Grace Franklin, Judy Kern, Roseann Mandell, Amanda Metzger, Devin Scruton, D.V.M., Jan and Rocky Smith, Geoff Stern, Margherita Walker, and Wendy Willhauck. I am also grateful to my husband, Carter Umbarger; to my muses incarnate, Frostfield Firestar’s Kobuk, C.G.C.; and Frostfield Perfect Crime, C.G.C.; and to an editor to kill for, my beloved Kate Miciak.

For the appearance of American and Canadian Champion Williwaw’s Kodiak Cub, R.O.M., the inimitable Casey, I want to thank his breeders and owners, A1 and Mary Jane Holabach, and his co-owners, Frank and Lynda Sattler. Special thanks to A1 Holabach for handling Casey in my fictional ring. I also want to thank Robin Haggard, Jim Kuehl, and Cathy Greenfield, D.V.M., for the appearance herein of Champion Poker Flat’s Rainman, C.D.X., T.D., W.W.P.D., W.T.D., C.G.C., known as Joe; and Robin and Jim for joining Joe in my book and for letting me borrow Champion Poker Flat’s Paper Chase, C.D., W.T.D., W.L.D., W.W.P.D., W.P.D., C.G.C., Champion Poker Flat’s Snow Flurrie, C.D., W.T.D., C.G.C., Poker Flat’s Risky Business, W.T.D., W.W.P.D., and Poker Flat’s Hell’s Belle. Jim has given me permission to mention the underground video classic known as ”Poker Flat Presents: Malamute Obedience Bloopers.” Vanderval’s Tundra Eagle, C.D.X., W.P.D.X., W.L.D., in whose eyes I see the brilliance of my beloved first malamute, Tasha, reappears in this series with the permission of her breeder, owner, and handler, Anna Morelli. In real life, as in this book, rescue malamute Czar is owned and handled by Lorraine Rabon.

Mr. and Mrs. Harold Jenkinson

request the honour of your presence

at the marriage of their daughter

Crystal Marie

to

Mr. Gregory Philip Lofgren

on Saturday, the second of November

at three o’clock Okalani Banquet Hall

Danville Milestone Hotel and Conference Facility

Danville, Massachusetts

and afterwards at the reception

R.S.V.P.

LATE IN THE EVENING on a narrow street in Providence, Rhode Island, the handsome woman catches a stiletto heel in the antique-brick sidewalk. As she regains her balance, the diamond on the third finger of her left hand refracts the inadequate light of a pseudo-gas lamppost. She curses aloud. A phrase comes to her: one little candle. Better to light one than to curse the quaintness. She smiles. She has gained in wit far more than she has lost in looks. Besides, in preparation, she has shed forty pounds. Her rings are loose on her finger: the diamond and its friend, the platinum band. Her legs are as good as ever, and the tweed suits packed in her leather suitcase will serve their intended dual function of proclaiming her essential, if adopted, Englishness while disguising the dog hairs she is bound to pick up. Blocks ahead of her, a dog walker pauses to let a little terrier mix lift a leg on a tree. Owner and dog move on, turn a corner, vanish. The woman’s eyes search for what she has been told are the interior lights of her hired Porsche, her rental car, as it is called on this side of the Atlantic. An American car, she reflects, would have come equipped with some sort of automatic device, bells or whistles to warn her that she had flipped the wrong switch or failed to close the door all the way. The Porsche itself, an intelligent and subtle machine, may have issued an elusive caution that, if heeded, would have spared her this late-evening nuisance of running out to make sure that the battery did not drain. As it was, an anonymous neighbor had rung up her cousin, who could hospitably have volunteered to dash out instead of sending a long-lost relative on this bothersome errand.

This dark street, however, threatens none of the famous
violence in America
so beloved by the British press. This is a safe street in a charming neighborhood. Except for the click of her heels on brick, the swoosh of autumn leaves, and the distant hum of traffic on some unseen thoroughfare, the handsome woman hears nothing. Reaching the Porsche, she is more irked than alarmed. Fumbling with the key, she peers through a window in the hope of spotting a low glow of light, a sign that she will not, after all, need to delay her morning’s departure to have the wretched battery recharged. She is eager to arrive at the final destination of her journey. She looks forward to hearing that she is as beautiful as ever, that she hasn’t changed at all. Her last feeling is one of mild irritation. Her last thought is that the miserable battery has, after all, gone dead. The blow is swift, powerful, and fatal. As her body falls, the dim light again catches her diamond. Hurried hands slip the rings from her finger. Frightened eyes do not see the woman as handsome. In the murderer’s view, she has not aged well.

More than twenty-four hours later, in a poorly lighted parking lot on a second dark night, the old man impatiently awaits his companion. What can be taking so damned long? The pollen count must be high. The air is damp and thick. Breathing is difficult. The old man is in a foul mood. His position entitles him to respect. His gnarled hands pat his pockets in search of cigarettes. He never coughs. Rather, he admits to a frequent need to clear his chest. The sound could be mistaken for the low rumble of a big dog. Hearing it now, the murderer is not deceived. This blow, too, is swift and powerful. This blow, too, is deadly.