This Dog for Hire

said in his gravelly voice as they got near enough for me to hear them.
    “Without a doubt,” Gil said. “You can bank on it.” He smiled at me but didn’t bother to introduce me to the little man, who ignored me so completely at first that I thought perhaps he hadn’t seen me sitting next to Magritte’s crate. When he finally took notice of me, he merely tossed me a hard stare, then turned back to Gil.
    Gil reached in and took Magritte out of his crate, tucked him snugly under his arm, picked up his tack box, checked his other pocket for a show lead and his armband with Magritte’s number on it, pulling them each out and then carefully replacing them, and headed for the grooming area, the little man at his side, me trailing behind like an obedient puppy.
    “The chances are good. Is that what you’re saying?” the gray man said, one eye closed to let the smoke drift by.
    “Excellent,” Gil answered. He found his spot, put Magritte up on the table, and, taking a brush out of the tack box, began to brush him. “You just leave it to me, Doc.”
    Doe reflected on what he bad heard, standing next to the grooming table and puffing on the stub of his cigarette. When it finally got too small to smoke, he held it between two dry yellow fingers, took another from his pocket, popped it into his mouth, lit it with the stub, and despite the fact that there were dogs all over the place, dropped the stub on the floor without bothering to step on it. “I’ll be ringside,” he said.
    After Doc had left, Gil reached into the tack box and took out an electric nail grinder. Magritte backed up a step, but the noose on the grooming table kept him from retreating any farther. Like every other dog I’ve ever met, he hated having his nails done. Gil plugged in the grinder, reached into his jacket pocket, felt around, and came up with a piece of dried liver. Magritte’s tail began to wag, but to his dismay, the treat went not toward his own mouth but into Gil’s. Liver Lips began to make a series of revolting slurping sounds, making me wonder if in another incarnation he had been a construction worker. He turned on the grinder and, lifting one paw at a time, began to work on Magritte’s nails. When he finished the last foot, he leaned his face right into Magritte’s and let the dog ever so gently take the moistened piece of liver from between his lips. Here was a man who truly lived up to his nickname.
    That finished, Gil went on with the rest of Magritte’s grooming routine, wiping him down briskly with a mitt to bring out the shine in his coat, powdering and wiping off his paws, and finally, spraying Show Foot paw tack on his pads to prevent him from slipping in the ring.
    “Make yourself useful,” he said, handing me the tack box. He hoisted Magritte and headed for the nearest exercise pen, the doggy bathroom, where we silently waited our turn on line, standing in the red cedar chips that spilled out as each satisfied customer emerged. The chain-link pens were hung with plastic sheeting, not for privacy, though an occasional dog did care, but to protect passersby from getting what in my neighborhood is called a golden shower.
    When Magritte had finished, Gil lifted him again. The crowds were much too formidable to walk a small dog through the benching area and onto the floor where the judging took place.
    Gil pushed his way through a constantly reappearing wall of people, me following along behind as usual. We stopped at Magritte’s bench, where I dropped off the tack box and Gil handed me Magritte long enough to strap on his bait pouch and secure his armband with a single rubber band around the middle. After pushing and shoving for another two minutes, we were finally ringside.

24
    For No Apparent Reason

    GIL WENT AROUND to the side just below the stands, where only handlers with their dogs were allowed. We had arrived ringside just as the basset hounds were finishing up, so, having manners more suitable for the IRT than any place above-ground, I elbowed and kneed my way around to the far side, where there was a single row of padded red folding chairs, and snagged one. Of course, there were plenty of seats in the stands, but those didn’t place viewers nearly as close as they’d be sitting or standing ringside on the Garden floor.
    Within moments, the basset people were replaced by basenji fanciers, catalogs open, ready to mark the wins.
    Poppy and Addie were on the end of the row, to my left, funereal