Stud Rites

sperm. The flower-print dress probably didn’t help. As the videotape does not reveal, Leah gave up on the police to seek out Betty Burley, who Would grasp an abbreviated explanation and, having understood, would act.
    I apologize for my inability to give a firsthand account of Betty’s subsequent movements. My excuse is that at the very moment Betty must have pointed her finger in public accusation, Judge Mikki Muldoon took a flamboyant giant step backward toward the center of the ring and swept her arm up to send the entire group of malamutes around the ring. As those beautiful dogs melded together in a circle of gray and silver, black, white, and gold, Betty Burley’s voice rang out above the cheers. ”Timmy Oliver, you slimy little hypocrite!” Betty cried. ”You smarmy, greedy, evil little lump of blubber, you did it!”
    In front of me, Pam said loudly, ”High time, too! Selling puppies on show grounds! The nerve! I don’t know what made him think he could get away with it! Good for Betty! At least someone here’s got the guts to let that jerk have it!”
    As Timmy edged toward the gate, passed under the denuded trellis, and actually entered the ring, Freida Reilly joined Betty in pursuit of him. Freida’s accusation, I am told, was rather different from Betty’s. Despite what I assumed was a tranquilizer from the doctor’s emergency bag, Freida’s rage was similarly intense. ”Timmy Oliver, you stinking little rat!” she bawled. ”So it was you! Of all the damned unmitigated gall! Trying to ruin my national specialty! And leaving me stuck with the job of moving the body of my judge off the grounds of my show!”
    Timmy Oliver’s actions in the ring are shown on tape. You can see that he bends over the judge’s chair and sends his hand darting after Mikki Muldoon’s handbag. And when Timmy stands upright, you can see the gleam of what Kevin Dennehy informs me was a Colt Mustang Pocket Lite, a .380 caliber autoloader that Mikki Muldoon had no business carrying in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and no business leaving around anywhere at all. The presence of a handgun in the ring, though, certainly made Kevin feel right at home, and Detective Kariotis must’ve shared Kevin’s sense of finally belonging in the show world, because the two cops pressed forward confidently to the gate and were just entering the ring when Mikki Muldoon, determined not to cede her kingdom to an upstart, shot out her arm, pointed her finger straight at Casey, and picked her Best of Breed.
    As Timmy Oliver marched toward Casey, the nasty little Colt in his hand abruptly silenced the screams and ”bravos.” Reaching Casey and taking the dog’s lead, Timmy told Casey’s owner-handier, ”Sorry about this, Al, but I got no choice.” You can hear Timmy on the videotape. I’ve listened again and again. And you can see him press that gun right up against Casey’s gorgeous head and dig it into that gold-mahogany coat until the trusting dog must have felt the cold of metal on his warm skin. You can’t hear what Al says to Casey, but you can tell that he says something, and you can see the color drain from Al’s face as Timmy leads Casey away.
    With no word or signal, the people outside the ring moved back to clear a broad path to the open door. Casey parted crowds all the time; he was used to it. And Mikki Muldoon was equally accustomed to exerting authority. Furious at having her judging interrupted and her Best of Breed stolen from her ring, she was on Timmy’s tail when through the wide door to the parking lot burst the four big heads of Poker Flat’s Risky Business, Poker Flat’s Hell’s Belle, Ch. Poker Flat’s Snow Flurrie, C.D., and Ch. Poker Flat’s Paper Chase, C.D. The four big bodies of this team entry of Battering Rams followed. Confronted with Casey, they came to a halt and spread themselves across Timmy’s escape route. The five big, beautiful dogs—the team and Casey —knew nothing of Colt Mustangs. Poke-Poke-Pokers though they were, the Battering Rams, show dogs all, knew that the one place they were never to stick their noses was straight into the face of another dog.
    As Timmy Oliver and Casey paused before the canine blockade, Judge Mikki Muldoon stepped swiftly to our breed club’s preview display of auction items, seized that historic sign that had hung over one of Eva
    B. Seeley’s own kennels, raised it swiftly in the air, and smashed it down on top of Timmy’s head.
    ”Not