The Barker Street Regulars

to know? As usual, we’d entertained the lobby ladies, taken the elevator, visited people, and ended up on the fifth floor. Everywhere we’d gone, I’d encouraged Rowdy to return greetings, to play up to everyone who liked dogs, to bless everyone with his great gift for making every single person feel loved and special. If some people acted a little odd? If a man we hadn’t met before grabbed Rowdy’s ear and had to be helped to let go? If Nancy cried out at the sight of Rowdy and wailed, “Rowdy, Rowdy, I love him! I love him!” Becoming a therapy dog meant learning to accept ear grabbing, tail pulling, hugs, shrieks, and moans as well as gentle pats, sweet talk, and requests to give his paw. So when Ceci screamed at the sight of Rowdy, flung her arms in the air, dove at him, and threw herself around his neck, how was he to know that he’d been recruited to participate in theft? How was I?
    Rising to her feet and catching her breath, Ceci cried, “Isn’t he the most beautiful thing you’ve ever seen? Isn’t he wonderful? Isn’t he a gorgeous big boy? What a handsome dog!” She paused. “Ceci Love. Althea’s sister. Call me Ceci. Love is such a, well, it’s such a name, isn’t it?” Without waiting for me to introduce myself or Rowdy, she gushed, “Why, he looks like a show dog! Is he a show dog?” Before I could answer, she began to tell me about every dog she’d ever owned, most of which had been Newfoundlands. I now understand that although Ceci seemed lost in the past, she remained sufficiently oriented to the here-and-now to plant herself between Althea and me, thus blocking my route to her sister. “Kitty was a jewel, a gem, a perfect, perfect dog, our only Landseer, that’s black and white, you know, all the others were black, never white, white is a Great Pyrenees, lovely breed, but give me a Newfie any day, and she never would sleep anywhere except right at the foot of my bed, if I had to get up in the night to go, well, tinkle, or get a little snack, she’d follow right along with me, and then when I crawled back into bed, she’d lie right down there at the foot and...”
    You get the idea. I tuned out the babble. Instead, I studied the woman, who, on close examination, looked something like a diminutive version of a younger Althea, at least if Althea had slaved over her appearance. Ceci’s face showed Althea’s striking bone structure, but unlike Althea, Ceci wore several different shades of brown and beige eye shadow, dark mascara, eyebrow Pencil, blush, and pearly pink-beige lipstick, as well as foundation and, for all I know, six or eight other facial cosmetics as well. Her champagne hair, a little shorter than shoulder length, was skillfully styled to sweep back from her face. She was dressed in lots of apricot-beige jersey—a skirt, a loose top, a matching jacket— and wore leather pumps, pearl earrings, a pearl necklace, and a bright silk scarf with a pattern of blue cornflowers that matched her eyes. I didn’t have to be Sherlock Holmes to realize that Ceci was a woman dedicated to looking good. What I did not sense about her was vanity. On the contrary, I had the impression that the careful hair, the artful makeup, the attractive, flattering clothes and jewelry were meant for other people and, specifically, meant to make other people happy. I sensed in Ceci a little girl who had learned that the way to please people was to be good and that being good meant looking pretty.
    Ceci’s monologue continued. “Ah, Newfs, my husband was mad about them, too. Simon, now, Simon passed on two years ago, and for the first year, the first eighteen months, it was a terrible struggle to keep going alone, to live in that house all by myself, to rely on myself, not that I can’t manage the practical details of life, I manage very capably, but there seemed to be no point whatsoever to going on at all, and of course, I missed Althea’s company dreadfully. We used to go to Symphony and out to lunch, didn’t we, Althea? We had lovely times together. And then, of course, everything happened all at once, one loss after another, Althea having to be moved here—”
    “A fate worse than death,” muttered Althea. Her wry smile made it clear that she was commenting on her sister’s tactlessness rather than on her own move to the Gateway.
    Oblivious to Althea’s remark, Ceci went on. “And not a week later, my Simon died.” Here I heard deep, genuine grief. When she said Simon, she