Stud Rites

that’s how you ended up coowning Comet.”
    ”It worked out for everyone. James saved himself a bundle in handler fees. Timmy got some cash. I paid a decent price. Of course, after Timmy got back on his feet, he had second thoughts. You had to feel sorry for him. He never wanted to sell Comet, but he had no real choice.” Duke spoke with the easy self-confidence of someone who’s never been the object of anyone else’s pity.
    Loud applause tugged me to the present. The Bred-by-Exhibitor bitches were sailing around Judge Muldoon’s ring. I smiled at Duke. ”Whatever you paid, I think you got a great deal. I’d have given anything to own Comet.”
    Duke pulled out a metal comb and started to do a little last-minute work on the bitch. ”Christ,” he said, ”who wouldn’t?”
     

 
     
    IN SPECIES after species, from turtles to alligators to human beings, sperm counts are dropping and, with them, the size of male genitalia. According to radical environmentalists, chemical pollution is to blame for a multitude of diverse and alarming signs of feminization: hermaphroditism, retained testicles, shrunken members, unpaired gonads. It’s males who are losing their virility, you see; females are staying the same. In Florida’s Lake Apopka, for instance, the sexual organs of the female alligators have remained as capacious as ever, while those of their mates have shriveled to a fourth their former size, and, yes, I know that Masters and Johnson shored up a lot of shaky male egos by declaring that size doesn’t matter, but let’s be honest: What Masters and Johnson had in mind or in hand or in wherever was trivial variation; it wasn’t one-fourth.
    When the news first reached me, I didn’t believe it either. I didn’t want to. Eventually, though, my defenses broke down, with startling consequences for Rowdy, who found himself flipped onto his back on the kitchen floor so I could take a close-up look and make sure everything was exactly as it had always been, as I’m happy to report that it appeared to be, so far, yes, but for how long? The matter suddenly took a grave and terrifying turn. The reproductive future of turtles, alligators, and human beings I could joke about. But the breed of breeds, pinnacle of dogdom, acme of woofy evolution, howling apex of canine creation, shining quintessence of the utmost in real dog, yes, the incomparable Alaskan malamute—extinct?!!
    Not if I could help it. So that’s why I thought about freezing Rowdy’s sperm—not for now, but for the future, for the good of the breed.
    ”For the good of the breed,” said Lisa Tainter, our show secretary, who was crowding up against me to watch the judging and, in addressing Freida Reilly, spoke almost in my ear. Easing away from Lisa, I glanced down and caught sight of a sheaf of R.T.I. leaflets in her hand. ”When it comes to the gene pool,” Lisa declared, ”it’s better to be safe than sorry.”
    Before I say anything else about Lisa, I want to make it clear that, like everyone else at the national, I was grateful to Lisa for serving as show secretary, in which capacity she had done a massive amount of unenviable paperwork without, so far as I knew, creating a single snafu. I also need to say that Lisa is a sweet, kind person and a responsible, ethical breeder. Finally, let me point out that a highly developed interest in Alaska and all things Alaskan is, of course, perfectly common and understandable among fanciers of the Alaskan malamute, many of whom travel to Alaska, collect Eskimo art, and accumulate libraries of old books by early missionaries who made their way from village to village by dog sled. Most of us do not, however, carry our passion to the point of habitually costuming ourselves in the traditional garb of the native people of the forty-ninth state.
    But Lisa Tainter was an exception: From the fur-trimmed hood of her skin-side-out parka to the heavily insulated toes of her authentic-looking mukluks, the woman habitually dressed for a hunting trip on frozen tundra and often, in fact, carried a variety of pelts and hides. How Lisa endured life in her portable sauna, I don’t know. Her face was usually red, and her forehead and nose were often beaded in sweat. Today must’ve been moderately comfortable for her. Although the exhibition hall was heated, cold air poured in through the door to the parking lot. Lisa’s breed loyalty, however, remained fast throughout changes in the seasons. July and August