seventeen

The other three agility cats had arrived with their people by the time I carried Leo into the building in his travel carrier. I knew Sue and Dave O’Brien and their Abyssinians, Dessie and Jimma, from photo shoots I had done at several cat shows. They introduced me to Jared Spencer, eleven years old, his mother, Dawn, and his well-named Maine Coon, Moose.

The demonstration would take place inside a portable enclosure that the local cat club owned. The sides were made of eight-foot-square PVC frames with netting stretched across them linked four to each side to form a square. Long strips of netting were stretched at the top edges of the panels and extended about eighteen inches toward the center to block any cat who tried to climb out. Heavy blue fabric hung along the bottom three feet to block the cats’-eye view of people’s feet outside the ring. For extra security, Marietta had set up a portable kennel as a sort of foyer at the enclosure’s entrance. We kept our cats in their carriers until we were inside the closed kennel and then got them out one at a time. No one wanted a loose cat running out the door.

The others seemed to have decided the running order earlier, and Leo and I were first. No one said so, but I had the distinct feeling they all expected Team Janet to botch the thing. I looked at Leo, and felt my throat thicken with pride when I saw how calmly he was taking the whole weird situation. Marietta appeared outside the kennel-cum-staging area.

“Classes are finished, so we’re spreading the word about the demo. Dave, you’ll say something by way of introduction?” Dave nodded, and Marietta checked her watch. “Good. Let’s start in ten minutes.”

I checked that I had my tube of stinky fish paste in my training pouch and then set the pouch on top of Leo’s carrier. The O’Briens looked a bit surprised at my gear, and Sue wrinkled her nose when I opened the fish-paste tube. “It’s pretty stinky, I know, but Leo loves the stuff,” I said as I unzipped the carrier and lifted Leo to my face. He pushed his cheek into my chin and mmmrrrowwllled. “No fish paste until after you run, Leo mio.”

Tom caught my eye and waved from behind the growing group of spectators and pointed at Norm, who also waved. We had agreed that they should stay out of Leo’s sight until after the performance.

“Where’s your teaser?” asked Dave. His voice had a worried edge.

“My what?”

“Your teaser. To lure him over the obstacles?”

“I don’t use one,” I said. “I trained him with a clicker and, well, the stinky fish paste.”

Sue and Dave exchanged a look, and Dave said, “So you’ve trained him like a dog.”

I started to respond, but when I looked at Dave I saw Jared standing behind him with a big grin on his face and a clicker held up in one hand. He gave me a thumbs up with the other. I smiled back and said nothing.

At the appointed hour, Dave introduced himself as vice-president of the Fast Cat Feline Agility Club and explained the basics of the sport. He directed those who wanted more information to the club’s display and promised to be there to answer questions after the demo.

“Okay, Catman, we’re up next,” I whispered to Leo. “You know what to do, and remember, you run for the random-bred cats of the world.”

I stepped to the arena entrance and Leo went rigid when he saw the obstacles. He squirmed and let out a loud Mmrrrowwlll! A soft laugh rippled through the spectators outside the enclosure and I heard a voice say, “He’s ready.”

I set him down at the start line and said, “Stay.” More laughter, but it quickly morphed into an appreciative murmur when people saw that Leo stayed put and watched me while I got into position. Then I pointed to the first obstacle, the stairs, and said, “Leo, stairs!” He scurried up the three steps and down the other side. From there I signaled him over the one-bar and two-bar hurdles, around a left turn, through the tunnel and then a hoop. “Easy, easy,” I said, signaling him with my palm to slow down as he approached the weave poles. “Weave, weave,” I said out of habit, but he didn’t need me to tell him. From there he shot forward over the three- and four-bar jumps, through the second tunnel, and through the final hoop. “Leo mio!” I squealed. He turned toward my voice and launched himself, and I caught him in my arms. He draped himself over my shoulder and let out a loud “Mmrrowwwllll,” which I understood to mean “Fish paste now!”

People started to clap and cheer, and I heard “Wow! That was amazing” and other comments, and then Alberta asking people to hold down the volume because it might make the cats nervous. Leo didn’t seem bothered by the racket, and I carried him back to the kennel and squeezed out a jackpot stretch of fish paste for him.

“You guys totally rocked it!” said Jared, his grin even bigger than the one he’d flashed in support of clicker training. “You gotta compete with him!”

“He’s entered next week,” I said, grinning, and then I kneeled to put Leo in his carrier with another smear of fishy nomness.

“Nicely done, Janet,” said Dave.

“Outstanding!” came a familiar voice, and I turned to see Tom grinning like a Cheshire cat. “I had no idea he would run like that!”

“That was so exciting!” said Norm. “I wish Bill were here.”

I couldn’t stop smiling.

Sue didn’t say a word, but she was busy getting Dessie ready for her turn. She picked up the lithe little cat in one hand, a feather teaser in the other, and went to the course enclosure. Dessie started out fine, but when she exited the first tunnel, she leapt into the air and spun around as if something had startled her, then streaked to the far side of the course and straight up the netting to the top of the panel. She hung there, eyes wide and tail flicking, until Marietta brought a ladder into the enclosure and Dave climbed it and brought her down. Sue’s face was crimson when she came back to the staging area.

I scanned the audience while the O’Briens put one cat away and got the other out. Alberta had her back to me and seemed to be hugging someone. When she let her loose and turned around, I saw that it was Louise Rasmussen. She had sunglasses on, which seemed odd until I remembered that Alberta thought the woman’s husband had given her the makings of a black eye. As I watched, Louise appeared to introduce a man to Alberta. Her father, I guessed. He was turned sideways to me and I couldn’t get a proper view of his face. Marconi? I’d soon know.

Dave and Jimma had a nice run. Jimma did all the obstacles and got a few extra leaps in as he tried to catch the odd creature dangling from Dave’s teaser wand. I got a look at it when they finished, and confirmed that it was indeed a feathered mouse. I decided that an afternoon stroll through the vendor stalls would be in order. Leo would enjoy a mouse with feathers.

As soon as Dave had Jimma back in his carrier, Jared brought Moose out. He was big even for a Maine Coon, and I was sure he must outweigh Leo, Dessie, and Jimma together. Stretched full length he was probably as tall as Jared. He was a brown tabby with yellow-green eyes, and he wore the fur around his head and neck like a king’s mantle. Long tufts of fur stood out beyond the tips of his ears, giving him a wild look that belied his gentle demeanor. Jared lugged him into the course enclosure and set him down. The big cat flicked his left front paw, then the right, for all the world like a sprinter loosening up at the starting blocks. Moose held his long tail high in the air and fluffed out wide as my forearm. He was not a cat you’d want to cross. Jared said, “Moose, go!” and they were off. The boy and his cat were a team, and my eyes went wet as I watched them run.

“Stunning,” said a low voice behind me. Tom smiled when I turned my head, and the lump in my throat got bigger when I saw that his eyes were moist, too. Was it Saint-Exupery who said, “Love does not consist in gazing at each other, but in looking outward together in the same direction”? I thought so. And there was no denying that we saw animals, and good bonds between animals and people, in the same light.

Beyond Tom I saw that Alberta was still talking to Louise Rasmussen. The man with Louise was now in full view, and I saw that we’d already met. It was indeed Anthony Marconi, my mother’s new love, Louise Rasmussen’s father, and that odious Charles Rasmussen’s father-in-law.