This Dog for Hire

stacked—standing in standardized positions according to breed—and checked the angulation of their legs, the line of their backs, the width of chest, the breadth of skull, their proportions, balance, overall beauty of form. Then the dogs were gaited, running one at a time with their handlers in a pattern set by the judge or all or many at a time, circling the ring, some breeds at what seemed like breakneck speed.
    It had taken me a while to understand movement, thinking it was different for each breed. It is. And it isn’t. Though a saluki and a Westie move very differently, in each case you’re looking for the dog to move like a beautifully made, well-oiled machine.
    From the movement, which is different with different structure, you can see if the dog would be able to work at the task he was bred for, rousting a rodent from its nest, moving the sheep, treeing the raccoon, finding the fox, bringing the shot-down bird to hand, whatever. At least, that’s the theory.
    In practice, much of the breeding for the ring was producing empty-headed beauty queens who wouldn’t last half an hour doing the work that breed was originally bred to perform.
    I watched some of the dogs gaiting, heard some cheers from the far left corner as the judge there made her selection, and then began to scan around the rings, finally spotting someone I knew.
    His head was tilted just a tad to the left, as if he were listening to something very important that was difficult to hear. He still needed a haircut. His shaggy brown hair covered half his collar. And he was wearing the same damn Harris tweed jacket he always wore to the Garden. That meant he’d wear a blue blazer and a red tie tomorrow, for Best in Show. Some things never change.
    I watched him for a while and thought about coming up behind him and grabbing his cute ass, just the way I always used to, asserting my right to be just as vulgar as any man, but when I got up to walk down the stands, I reminded myself that I had work to do. So I went straight to the Am Staff ring, not to the bull-mastiff ring where Chip Pressman stood, his arms folded across his chest, his catalog dangling from his right hand.
    American Staffordshire terriers are sort of elegant pit bulls, the differences minor enough that some dogs have dual registration. That, however, was no reason for the people in either camp to like or respect each other’s dogs. Deep in their hearts, Am Staff people tend to think of pit bulls as scrappy, unpredictable, badly bred mongrels. And pit bull people regard Am Staffs as beauty queens, dogs no longer up to scratch. A dog who wouldn’t face his opponent by approaching the line scratched in the dirt of the pit lost the fight. Worse to some, he was considered a coward: If you said a pit dog turned, is meant he had turned back from the line, that hr wasn’t game. But if you said a Doberman turned, it meant something entirely different. It meant he turned on his master. He wasn’t a coward. He was an ingrate.
    The handlers were stacking their dogs, lifting each leg, one at a time, and placing the paw carefully down in just the spot that would make the dog look best. The more confident handlers let their dogs free-stack, holding their attention with bits of dried liver or bait, which the handler might even place in his own mouth and soak with his own saliva to make it all the more appealing. Or appalling, depending upon your personal taste.
    The bait gets the dogs to lean forward, making them look elegant rather than clunky., bringing them up on their toes, making their necks seem longer, giving the proper angle to their shoulder assembly and a nice extension to their rear legs.
    The dogs focused on the liver. The handlers watched the judge. After walking down the line of stacked dogs, dogs always between the handler and the judge so that the handlers did not obstruct the judge’s view, she gave the signal to move the dogs around the ring. The muscular beauties ran with their handlers. The judge watched carefully, occasionally whispering to the steward, who made notes j in his book.
    I left before the Best in Breed was selected. I'd see that dog tonight, when the groups were judged. It was seldom what I eared about. It is the behavior of a dog that interests me. To some people I’ve met over the years, behavior equals obedience. But while some compliance is necessary for the safety of the dog and the sanity of the owner, it is the delicious peeks inside a dog’s mind