Black Ribbon Read Free Page B

into a portable plastic file box. At first glance, I assumed that she must be an agility instructor. Quick introduction to agility: timed obstacle course for dogs. Canine playground. Anyway, the filing woman had straight, bristly hair cut so short that its color vanished into her scalp, a style I associate with agility people, who are so single-mindedly devotedto their sport that they pare down all other aspects of their lives to become the ascetics of dog athletics, lean fanatics with sinewy muscles and burning eyes. Their hair and everything else, too: If it gets in the way of agility, bind it back, or cut it right off. No breasts showed through the woman’s plain white T-shirt. I wondered whether she’d carried her commitment to excess. Like almost everyone else, however, she wore a name-tag pin, a white square with an outline of red curlicues, the words
Waggin’ Tail
across the top, and the motto
Ruff It In Luxury
across the bottom. In between, hand-printed in red Magic Marker, was her name, Heather, with something illegible beneath.
    “Chief Fecal Inspector,” said Heather, her voice and expression as flat as her chest.
    Holding out Rowdy’s health certificate, I stammered, “He’s, uh, he’s negative. We just had a stool sample checked.”
    Heather tapped a blunt-nailed finger against her name tag. “I saw you looking. It’s my job. Chief Fecal Inspector.” The corners of her thin lips inched upward. “Camp rule,” she explained. “Clean up after your dog, or I’m the one who yells at you.” She glanced at Rowdy, who was eyeing the Chesapeake bitch. “And don’t let him leave his mark on the agility equipment, either! Winter? And Rowdy.”
    I nodded compliantly. My customary friendliness and volubility were hard to suppress. For example, I had to fight the urge to ask Heather whether she was, in fact, a double Amazon. She removed a fat brown envelope from one of the manila folders, thrust it into my hand, and directed me to the next stop on my registration pilgrimage. “Get a pin,” she ordered me. As an apparent afterthought, she said, “Welcome to Waggin’ Tail.” The camp’s name seemed to embarrass her. I began to like Heather.
    “Welcome to Waggin’ Tail!” The cry, unabashed this time, emanated from a fortyish woman with a soft, round face, faded blue eyes, a mop of springy yellow-gray curls, and paleskin brightened by networks of prominent veins, red on her face, blue on her legs. Despite the SPF-30 pallor, she had an outdoorsy look. She was plump in the middle and nowhere else, and wore khaki shorts and a Waggin’ Tail T-shirt, gray with red letters.
    “Maxine,” I said. When I’d asked Bonnie what Maxine McGuire was like, she’d provided the only introductory information of any concern to anyone in the fancy:
“Very
nice dogs,” Bonnie had pronounced. As I’ve said, Bonnie and Maxine both had mastiffs. The only representative of the breed in sight, the adolescent male who’d already caught my eye, was dozing under a nearby tree. So how did I recognize Max McGuire? Let me explain that after extended periods of time spent in the company of dogs, even an unlikely ESP prospect like me acquires the ability effortlessly to discern the names of total strangers. Get a dog! It’ll change your life. Actually, I read her name tag. “I’m Holly Winter,” I told her.
    In contrast to Heather, Maxine greeted this unremarkable piece of information with an effusive and nervous-sounding display of surprise and delight. The surprise couldn’t have been genuine—I’d sent in all my forms—but the delight was certainly heartfelt. Its object, of course, was the article I’d write for
Dog’s Life.
If Rowdy and I had looked like the wolfman accompanied by the bride of Dracula, Maxine would still have gushed over us. “What a
beautiful
dog! You
do
show him, don’t you?”
    I nodded. Rowdy preened. Maxine fired off an anxious volley of questions, instructions, comments, and bits of