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To tell the truth, I loved dog shows. I went to one or two in Colorado every year. Baxter and I never missed watching the Westminster on TV. We’d eat microwaved popcorn and talk about each dog, weighing our own favorites. Even so, the next morning, I was sprawled on the carpet of the living room floor, with our three dogs, feeling gloomy. As Baxter left for work at the crack of dawn, he’d warned me he would be gone at least twelve hours today and every day this week. He had already made some improvements yesterday, while I was off training Jesse’s and Valerie’s dogs. He’d replaced last year’s judge by swapping her categories. She was now the judge of the Working Class category, and the Terrier Class was now being judged by a man named Mark Singer, whom I’d never met, but had excellent credentials.
Meanwhile, I was still checking for falling pieces of sky. Part of my fearfulness was due to a terrible loss I’d endured. Pavlov, my beloved German Shepherd, passed away four months ago from a degenerative spinal disease that Shepherds are especially prone to. I loved my Cocker Spaniel and our two King Charles Cavaliers dearly, but nobody could take Pavlov’s place. She was my protector as well as my loyal companion. That made it all the harder to be confident that my days of stumbling into homicide investigations were behind me. One day, I knew, I would get myself another big dog, but not today, and not this month.
My cellphone rang. I smiled at the caller’s picture; it was Baxter—a face I totally adored. We greeted each other, and he said, “Sweetie, can you reschedule your noon appointment and come up to Fort Collins Fairgrounds? A presenter has apparently gone missing, and we might need you to fill in. He invited his clients here this afternoon and was going to walk them through a couple of laps in one of the arenas.”
I paused, confused. Surely he’d meant for me to fill in as a handler. “In agility trials?”
“No, conformation.”
“But I haven’t shown a dog since I was a teenager.”
“I know. But for the time being, I’d just like to be able to say that you can be the guy’s backup. And reassure a couple of worried entrants. Chances are he’ll show up tomorrow or so and you won’t need to show the dogs in the actual competition. He just hasn’t been answering his phone, and nobody’s seen him is all.”
“By ‘he,’ do you mean Cooper Hayes?”
“Oh. That’s right. You two are casual friends. Sorry, sweetie. My mind’s going in three different directions at once.”
“Maybe he’s not answering his phone because he felt humiliated at being asked to relinquish has job as the Terrier Class manager.”
“Could well be. But he told everyone at the time he still wanted to stay on as a presenter. He undoubtedly feels beholden to the show-dogs’ owners. They’re the ones that pay him. And he’s also willing to be on-call if a presenter gets ill. He told me once he considers himself the dog-show equivalent of a public defender. When newbies don’t know who to hire or aren’t sure if they’re willing to commit to the big bucks, the Fort Collin’s Dog Club has been giving his name to anyone who calls in and asks.”
I already knew all of that about Cooper, but Baxter was talking too quickly to be interrupted. He got a little agitated when he had too many cups of coffee. “There’s only one Terrier that Cooper was supposed to show,” he continued. “A Bull Terrier named Waxy.”
“Waxy? Like candles?” Bull Terriers were short and muscular, with oversized muzzles. Target, the chain store, had a Bull Terrier mascot named Bullseye—not a great name, in my opinion, but better than Waxy.
“I suppose. Can you fill in?
I agreed, although I asked him to call me if Cooper showed up after all. I got ready slowly, then made the fifty-minute drive, hoping the whole time that my phone would ring to no avail. I truly didn’t want to make many pre-show appearances. My taking on two dogs for the agility trials was plenty of work where I was concerned.
There were two or three dozen cars in the parking lot, and I once again felt leery as I entered the larger of the two buildings. My memories of all the acrimony that erupted last year at this venue were fresh in my mind. My heart seemed all too willing both then and now to put me into “fight or flight” mode. My best course of action would be to head straight across the huge space toward Baxter’s office, which he’d described as “underwhelming,” without looking side to side to increase my chances of running into anyone I knew. With luck and a nice, brisk pace, I could avoid being stopped by someone who wanted to rehash last year’s fiasco.
“Hey, Allie,” a familiar voice called. I turned. Not even ten steps inside the door, I complained to myself. It was Tracy Truitt. She was a friend, not a disparaged member of the dog community, but she was always looking for stories for her newsy radio talk show and/or podcast. She was wearing her typical bold colors, fire-engine red Yoga pants with a purple iris pattern on her draped tunic. She strode toward me, saying, “Aha. As soon as I heard Baxter was running the show, I figured I’d see you here sooner or later.”
We exchanged hugs. “He’s not really ‘running the show’. Just the Terrier Class conformation portion.”
“Close enough. But...guess what! I enrolled Bingley in the agility competition!”
I stared into her eyes, assuming she was kidding. Her beagle was thoroughly spoiled and only trainable in spurts. “He’s...never done any agility training, has he?”
“No. Which is why I decided to wait here until you arrived. We’ve got to get started as soon as possible. I’ll hire you to train him for however-much free time you’ve got available between now and the competition.”
“But the agility trials take place in just four days! Even if I worked with him twenty-four hours a day, he won’t get anywhere close to competition ready! Besides which, you have to register him and get him measured, and all of that takes weeks and weeks!”
“I know someone willing to pull some strings for me. This is just a one-time thing, so it’s not going to ruffle anyone’s feathers. Or fur, as it were.” She grinned. “Hey, that rhymes!”
“But I can’t get Bingley anywhere near even attempting to run the agility course.”
“I know. It’s not like Bingley or I will be crushed when we come in last.”
Tracy gave me a long look. We were close friends, and I enjoyed and liked her, even though she was a real character. Yet she often tried to avail herself of my services. She’d convince herself that doing so was good for my business. Sometimes she was right and gave me invaluable publicity. Other times she just plain exhausted me.
“Honestly, Allie, you worry too much.”
“Why are you entering him in agility? Why not let him come in last in the Beagle conformation instead? He’ll have no idea what his handler wants him to do there either, but at least he’s leash trained. Sort of.”
“Well, I wasn’t going to enter him into any competition, but then Baxter said how he was all busy here trying to handle a batch of kerfuffling Terrier Terrors, and I realized I could get several shows’ worth of stories out of it.”
“Oh, Tracy. Please don’t tell me you’re going to do a Vlog and podcast and make this an enormous deal! You know what a mess that caused the last time you did it at the Pet Expo in Denver!”
She cocked an eyebrow and tapped her chin with her index finger. “Hmm. Are you talking about the show where you and Baxter met, and he turned out to be ‘The One’’? she asked, adding air quotes. “You mean that disaster?”
“Quit with the selective memory, Tracy. You passed out when your dog was bitten by a parrot, and you wound up being accused of murdering Russell’s ex-girlfriend.” The show had taken place almost two years ago, before Russell and I split up. At the time, I was doing my utmost to convince myself that my feelings for Baxter were merely platonic.
“I remember. I just choose to always put the happy memories in the forefront.” She grinned and gave me a playful jab in my shoulder. “You should try that sometime.”
I couldn’t help but smile. We both knew I’d once been advised by the head of the Boulder Police detectives to close my dog-therapy business in order to reduce the murder rate in Boulder.
“Besides, it’s not like Bingley has to balance things on his nose and walk a tightrope. I mean, all he’ll have to do is follow you around the course, and Bingley has been really good at that. Most of the time, I don’t even need a leash, thanks to your training.”
“He’s a Beagle. He is always going to be a Beagle. He’s adorable, but a pill. Secondly, the rules of agility trials dictate that the handler can’t lead him over the obstacles. Or even touch them. Or lure the dog with food or toys. Furthermore, the dogs must run through tunnels...those things that look like oversized clothes-drier attachments. They have to jump over walls, panels, double and triple bars...go over a seesaw, which is scary for a dog. Climb over a bridge. The weave posts are utterly counterintuitive for dogs. Sorry to rain on your parade, but the whole idea is a nonstarter, Tracy.”
She held up her palms. “Okay, okay. I’ll hire you to handle him and to train him.”
“No, Tracy. That’s the exact opposite of what I’m trying to tell you. I already have my hands full with two Terriers. I can’t add Bingley to the mix.”
“Sure, you can. You can fit him into crazy hours that nobody else would presume you’d be open for business.”
“I am not going to work with Bingley at three a.m., Tracy.”
“It’ll be great for your business. He’ll be clickbait. Everyone will want to watch you and Bingley on the obstacle course.”
“I know you’re going to tell me that all publicity is good publicity. But I am not going to make myself look like the world’s worst trainer.”
“Nor should you. I’m going to narrate and explain that I only gave you a few days to do this, and you only agreed to do this because we’re friends, and because we wanted to publicize the dog show, and...drum up support. We wanted to demonstrate to folks who’ve never seen agility races just how hard this competition really is.” She spread her arms. “I mean, I’m proof of that right there. I thought it would be a breeze.”
“No, Tracy.”
“Don’t make me play my you-owe-me-one card,” she said, putting her hands on her hips.
“Arggh.” I snatched up my wallet from my dog-trainer travel pouch (otherwise known as a fanny pack, but it was way too pricey to be called that). “Fine. Here’s a card of someone who works with newbie agility training. Use her, and I’ll try to work with him in addition.”
“Awesome. You won’t regret this, Allie. I promise your business will expand from all the notoriety you’ll get from the funny videos that audience members will post.” She started to walk away.
“I didn’t agree to show him in the agility trial.”
“But you will.” She turned and stepped closer to me. She studied my eyes, a sadness in her own. “Allie, come on,” she said gently. “The lawsuit still hasn’t been settled, right?”
I shook my head.
“I know how much you guys must need money. We both know Bingley’s antics are going to be hilarious in the video, and the audience will love it. Let me do this one little thing for you.”
She had made a good point. Then again, there were so many possible problems. “What if it backfires? And I wind up looking like a complete incompetent?”
“It won’t backfire. I won’t let it.”
I shut my eyes for a moment. “Baxter and I called a moratorium on discussing the stupid lawsuit. It’s not like we’re desperate. We’re just getting a little strapped for cash. That’s the real reason he leapt at this assignment.”
“And we’re going to make lemonade from the lemons. We’ll get a YouTube out of it that will make viewers laugh, and you’ll look great in it.” She gave me a nice hug. She grabbed my shoulders afterward and said, “I’ll splice in shots of you working with one of the Terriers as well as my Beagle boy and generate some free publicity. What can go wrong?”
“That’s exactly what you said about my business plan with the combination dog kennel/training business.”
She shrugged. “We didn’t predict a new housing development springing up at your property line. And some crazy cat ladies moving into them. But this time I’m right. Law of averages.”
Once again she turned and called, “Toodles” over her shoulder. I watched her walk away. By ‘crazy cat ladies,’ Tracy was referring to the houses built in the former cornfield that abutted our property line, right next to our barn, which we had converted into a kennel and dog-training facility. Six of the new families owned cats, and two of those families insisted that their cats had a right to be allowed to roam freely; there was no way to keep an outdoor cat within a fence.
The cats quickly discovered that they could tease the dogs enclosed in the kennel by climbing onto the windowsills at night and slipping into the building whenever the doors were open during the day. Unbeknownst to us, one of the free-roaming cats got shut inside of the barn one night.
In the wee hours the next morning, a panicked woman came over and pounded on our door, promptly greeting us with the accusations that our dogs must have eaten her cat. Baxter immediately countered that, because our dogs were in our house or in their kennels in the barn, the cat must have been eaten by coyotes. That was not one of his more sensitive moments. The woman went ballistic. I pointed out that the cats loved to slip inside the building and suggested we try there. We marched over to the barn, Baxter opened the door, and her cat bolted out the door and back to her home. We promised we would thoroughly check the barn for trespassing cats from then on. Even so, a finger-pointing argument ensued.
Baxter and I believed cooler heads would prevail in another day or two. Instead, a few weeks later, we got a visit from a government official for possible land-use violations. They had received a flurry of complaints about our dog-kennel business, along with a petition signed by every resident in the new development. As it turns out, Baxter and I had been granted the right to use my property for training dogs and as a “kennel,” but the new homeowners claimed that was not the same as an “animal boarder,” and therefore we were operating an illegal “dog ranch.”
Tracy sincerely wanted to help us financially by entering a dog that would often not sit or stay into a competition that required the mastery of astonishingly complex tricks. She had a big heart. Meanwhile, all I would need to add to her video was a nice pratfall while I buried my pride. And probably my career.