Paws before dying

what I thought was, maybe the system got screwed up, and the radio signals got to Rose’s pacemaker. But that can’t be right, because it wouldn’t bum. It would make the pacemaker go berserk, but it wouldn’t burn her hand.”
    “So why...?”
    “Why. Yeah. I just put this together today, at the match. Look, the school where Rose taught, Case, sounds like a real neighborhood school. And it’s small. There’s only one kindergarten, and that’s what Rose taught. At Jack’s, just after she died, I heard that maybe four years ago, she had a kid in her class, and she thought he was being abused. Physically. And she filed this charge or something against the parents, a 51 A. Someone there sort of blurted out that the parents were real Newton types, the last people you’d expect. He said they were Mr. and Mrs. Newton. Among other things, they were the presidents of the PTA. And what I put together today is that it was the Brawleys, the same people. Someone was talking about how Marcia Brawley did all this stuff, and one of the things was being president of the PTA, and Marcia Brawley’s kid is the right age. So at first I thought, well, maybe there was a weird accident, right? Electric storm, radio waves, Rose’s pacemaker, and the signal accidentally gets to her. But if the signal comes from these people, that’s just too much of a coincidence. She accuses them of child abuse, she files this 51 A, and it just so happens to be their electronic fence. And since they lived right across the street from the tennis courts, and they knew her, they’d know she’d be there. They’d’ve seen her training there. So they had this grudge against her, and they had this damned fence. But it just doesn’t compute, not with the burn marks.”
    “When was it this happened? Four years ago?”
    “Something like that.”
    “Why would they wait four years?”
    “I don’t know. But I agree. Either they would’ve done something then, or you’d think they’d mostly want to forget it. And what would they get out of it? There are some kinds of hurts that can smolder for a long time, and if people want revenge, they don’t care when. But this? And while we’re on the subject, I’ve been thinking about this judge Rose reported to the AKC. Sam Martori. Rose could be pretty tough. She reported him for ethical violations. It was in the Gazette and everything, and it wasn’t all that long ago. But this thing with the Brawleys isn’t something like that. It just doesn’t fit. Anyway, that fence wouldn’t leave burn marks, not on her. Even if the radio waves somehow got sent in her direction, they might screw up the pacemaker, but they wouldn’t burn her hand.”
    “Are you sure it’s that kind of system?”
    “What other kind is there?”
    “A plain old shock collar. With a transmitter.”
    “Right. That’s possible. You hire a guy to come to the house and train the dog not to cross the boundary. Or you do it your, self. But I don’t think it works all that well, at least not the way those fences do. I’ll tell you, whatever’s been done to this dog is something that works. But it is possible.”
    “Holly, how sure are you that these are even the same people?”
    “Pretty sure. How many PTA presidents are there? And don’t forget, these are people who’ve done something god-awful to a border collie. A border collie! That part all fits. But am I totally sure? No. Even if they have a regular shock collar, what’s bothering me is that... It isn’t so much that they didn’t have anything to gain. It’s that a lot of other people did.”
    “Like?”
    “Heather Ross. You know who she is? You’ve seen her at shows, in Open and Utility. Silver-haired woman with a silver standard poodle, fabulous obedience dog.”
    He nodded. “A robot.”
    Maybe you know that that’s a backhanded compliment. A robot is a dog that works precisely but mechanically, without dash and spirit.
    “Not really,” I said. “And he’s kind of a monster out of the ring. Anyway, she and Rose go way back, probably thirty or forty years, for all I know, a long time. And I think they were major rivals all along. You know what those poodle people are like.”
    “Unlike the golden retriever people.” His voice smiled.
    I defended myself. “You think you’re kidding, but you’re not. They’re much more competitive. And Heather and Abbey— that’s her daughter—did know about the pacemaker. I know that for sure. And in the ring,