Stud Rites (16 page)

Administering an unwarranted leash correction to the innocent Amber Waves, Sherri Ann fiercely defended herself: ”I very well may have happened to
mention
my lamp to you in passing, Freida, but I definitely did not
offer
it to you. In fact, I remember perfectly that at that point, I was thinking of keeping it for
myself.”

As if responding to some inaudible, invisible cue, Sherri Ann and Freida turned in unison to Betty Burley, who stared silently back at both of them.

”And furthermore, Freida,” Sherri Ann continued loudly, ”when I donated it to Betty to help save her poor rescue dogs, I did
not
do it
behind
your back, and-”

”You damned well
did!”

”No, I did not! I made no secret of it. I did it
right
over
here
at Betty’s nice little booth, yesterday, right out in the open. Ask
anyone!
And it has been sitting there, on display, at Betty’s booth ever since then, as you’d
know
if you’d even so much as gone out of your way to stroll by there!” Anticlimactically, Sherri Ann added, ”Which you obviously
have not.”
Turning to Betty, Sherri Ann demanded to know whether Freida had even
once
visited the rescue booth.

Taking a tiny step backward, Betty replied that she had no idea.

Freida’s eyes narrowed. She nervously fingered one of the pewter puppy earrings. ”Well, Betty,” she began in a voice like permafrost, ”is this the thanks I get for all the support I’ve offered you? I gave you that booth space, and I
slaved
over the schedule to squeeze in your showcase on the evening that you wanted it. I gave you every single thing you asked for! And
this
is what I get?”

I thought:
Neither you, Freida, nor you, Betty, gets a litter of puppies sired by Sherri Ann’s Bear. And that’s why you’re both so mightily put out with Sherri Ann.

Betty’s lips twitched. ”Why, Freida,” she replied, her voice oozing dignity and graciousness, ”I am absolutely astonished to discover that I have been operating on what is clearly a set of erroneous assumptions. I am particularly amazed to hear that the booth and the showcase are somehow my own personal property! Until this moment, I have assumed that the visible presence of rescue at this national was just as important to everyone else who cares about this breed as it was to me.” She finished with the trace of a naughty little smile.

Freida really had been cooperative about the booth and the showcase. She couldn’t afford to be otherwise, Betty had maintained. No one running for the board of our national breed club could risk a reputation for opposing rescue.

”I am one hundred percent pro-rescue!” Freida snapped. Her pewter dogs danced. ”But you know as well as I do—”

Shrugging her tiny shoulders and addressing a heaven evidently populated by rescued malamutes, Betty bulldozed on. ”Money!” she exclaimed, as if she’d just now discovered the invention of currency. ”Is that what this is about? About failing to meet the basic survival needs of the rescue dogs because
some
people are afraid that it will be money taken away from trophy funds, and they’ll have to go home without a lot of knickknacks and bric-a-brac and gewgaws that supposedly prove—”

Heresy! And hypocrisy. The glass-fronted china cabinets in Betty Burley’s dining room were jammed with loot her dogs had won. I must admit, though, that I understood Betty’s attitude perfectly. The costly show trophies presented to other people’s dogs might well be junk, but by virtue of being won by one of my own dogs, even the most trifling bauble always became an inestimably precious icon.

Freida’s face had turned an alarming red. ”Betty, you are getting carried—”

”Carried away?” demanded Betty. ”Well, if I get picked up and carried away, it’ll be the first help of any kind that anyone doing rescue has ever received from a lot of the breeders here!”

An unfamiliar male voice mumbled in an undertone. Peering over my shoulder, I witnessed an historic moment: Victor Printz was uttering comprehensible words to a fellow human being. ”... more of Betty’s Christ damn sob stories,” I actually overheard him say. ”Don’t know what Sherri Ann thought she was doing giving so much as a plugged nickel to her and her bunch of mongrels.”

Victor Printz was addressing a distinguished-look-ing gray-haired woman whose face I’d seen in show photos, but whose name I’d forgotten. She nodded to Victor. ”Most of this rescue business is a lot of crap.” Her deep, resonant voice brought her name and identity to me: Harriet Lunt, a member of the board of our national breed club and a lawyer who specialized in matters that concerned dogs. She published articles in the dog magazines about co-ownership agreements, stud dog powers of attorney, contracts between breeders and puppy buyers, and all that sort of thing. ”I, for one,” this cyno-legal eagle continued, ”don’t mind saying that I don’t believe in throwing away
good
money on
trash
dogs.”

In my anger at Harriet Lunt, I forgave Betty Burley everything. Two pieces of paper had disappeared, and Betty had blamed me. So what! After years of fighting the vile opposition of people like this snotty Harriet Lunt, Betty had every reason for her incendiary temper. No matter what, Betty was always on the side of the dogs. Therefore I forgave Betty anything.

”I must say, though,” Harriet Lunt observed in a tone of condescending resignation, ”that sometimes at those god-awful rescue parades, the tear-jerking goes on for hours. At least their little performance last night was blessedly short.”

Looking down at the old
Malamute Quarterly
s in my hand, I saw that I’d have to buy the top one. I’d torn the front cover. I’d ruined the bottom one, too. My grip had made crease marks, and the sweat from my hands would leave permanent stains. As proof of my honesty, let me report that I immediately paid for all five issues I was clutching.

Then I swerved around and gave Harriet Lunt the kind of eye-to-eye stare that it’s dangerous to direct to a strange dog. Furthermore, when I spoke, I smiled very broadly, thus baring my teeth. ”Trash dogs, huh?” I said. ”Interesting perspective.” I added, ”My name is Holly Winter. I’m a columnist for
Dog’s Life.”
That’s true. ”But right now,” I said, meaning as of the last three seconds, ”I’m writing a piece for the
Gazette.”

Pure-bred Dogs/American Kennel Gazette:
the official publication of the American Kennel Club, and one with which I have no connection whatsoever except, when I get lucky, as an occasional freelance contributor. ”And I couldn’t help hearing what you said just now,” I chirped, ”and when I did, I said to myself, ’Well, now, Holly, isn’t this someone with a distinctive point of view that AKC will certainly want represented!’ Because, you see,” I confided, ”with AKC so in favor of breed rescue, making the whole thing so politically correct, it’s unusual to hear someone express a divergent opinion.” I showed Victor my fangs. ”And you, too, of course,” I told him. ”So, if the two of you don’t mind, I’d just love to quote you. What did you say your names were?”

With an indignant toss of her head, Harriet Lunt said that she couldn’t imagine what I thought I’d overheard. ”I, for one, have always been a very, very strong supporter of rescue,” she announced, ”and I know for a fact that Victor has been, too.”

She gave me her full name and Victor’s. I promised to quote her. Now I have. Victor again broke his lifelong silence to inform me—Holly Winter, the eyes and ears of AKC—that his wife, Sherri Ann Printz, a top breeder, had donated a valuable item to Alaskan Malamute Rescue. Said precious donation to be auctioned off on Saturday night. His wife had made it herself. She’d used the hair of a legendary dog, a malamute, Ch. Northpole’s Comet, R.O.M.

In her deep courtroom voice, Harriet Lunt added what felt like a contribution to the defense of Sherri Ann Printz. ”Sherri Ann is so proud of her beautiful lamp! Last night, at the end of our Parade of Veterans and Titleholders, she took me by the arm and led me right over to the little rescue booth so I could admire it. She can’t help showing it off to absolutely everyone. It is truly a work of art.”

I wasn’t thinking about art, though. Or even about the lamp. What kept ringing in my ears and through my mind was Harriet Lunt’s voice. Jeanine has been sure about those cruel people:
Men,
she’d said damningly. Arlette had corrected her:
Deep voices.
Harriet Lunt’s voice was as deep as a man’s. She had a resonant voice: a voice that carried. And
trash
was Harriet Lunt’s word.

”I COULD HAVE strangled the pair of them,” I raged at Betty Burley. ”Simultaneously. One with each hand.”

Betty and I were lingering just outside the ring, where the judges’ education seminar was continuing. Betty was studying the demonstration dogs. Maybe she was interested. Maybe she was avoiding eye contact with me. I’d reported only what I’d just heard; I hadn’t told her about Jeanine. ”Victor Printz is an ignoramus,” Betty decreed. ”But Harriet Lunt is a lawyer. She’s an educated woman. She should know better.” She sounded troubled.

”Speaking of knowing,” I said abruptly, ”I want to know what you know about James Hunnewell’s sister.” The whole sentence came out as a single word:
IwannaknowwhatyouknowaboutJamesHunnewell’ssister.

”Not a dog in that ring I care for,” remarked Betty, who had once spoken admiringly of Rowdy, but only after she’d had two glasses of wine.

”That silver male is very nice,” I said.

”Nice?
Really? Is
that
your idea of nice?”

”Yes,” I said. ”It’s one of them. Betty, James Hunnewell’s sister?”

”Will you look at those feet! Poor thing couldn’t make it one turn around the block!”

”Gladys Thacker. Gladys H. Thacker. The
H
must be for Hunnewell.” My reason for pressing Betty was the piece of surprising information I’d picked up from Detective Kariotis at the end of our interview. ”Gladys Thacker’s going to be here tomorrow,” I reported to Betty. ”I heard it from the state police. Well, she’s not necessarily coming here to the national, but to Massachusetts. The story is that she’s very concerned to see that her brother gets a Christian burial.”

”What does she expect? Hindu rites?”

”I have no idea. And who’s going to bury him here, anyway? They’ll release the body... Well, I can’t imagine that she’d have to come here and get it.”

”Well,” said Betty, ”we can only hope that this Thacker person has the nerve to turn up. I, for one, will be most interested to have a very lengthy discussion with her.”

Betty, I believe, placed no special emphasis on the words ”I, for one.” My own ears added the emphasis. ”Betty,” I demanded suspiciously, ”did you show Cubby’s pedigree to Sherri Ann Printz?”

Without answering the question, Betty huffily said that what Sherri Ann or anyone else may or may not have known, and may or may not have done, was a complete mystery to her. ”If you did not go through my tote bag and take that pedigree, and I do believe you, Holly, then I do not know who did.” Rocking her head backward in what I took to be the direction of the breed club’s booth, she changed the subject, more or less. ”A fine show of support I got back there!”

”I’m sorry,” I said, ”but I was dealing with something else. Remember? Besides, you were taking care of yourself fine without my help.”

”I wasn’t thinking of you,” she said, as if I’d have been useless, anyway. ”I meant everyone else, including Timmy Oliver. You’d think he’d—”

”You
might,” I said. ”I wouldn’t.”

”I suppose Timmy is very peeved with me,” Betty reflected, ”but if he didn’t want my honest opinion of that poor bitch of his, he shouldn’t have asked. But, no, he just had to go and drag me out and show her to me.”