A Bite of Death

by Susan Conant

  "Why the hell doesn't he just leave the dogs home?" Rita said when I explained the problem to her.

  "India doesn't understand, and Lady needs him."

  "Don't you?"

  "No. At least not the way India and Lady do."

  Even so, he arrived without them at about nine, not long after I'd taken the pizza carton away from Kimi, and we had a longer talk than we'd managed on the phone or could have had with all four dogs around.

  "So," I said as we sat on the living room floor—still no rug to go in front of the fireplace, but a great blaze of seasoned Maine white birch—"there's no mystery about Kimi, and if she bothered the neighbors or anything, it wasn't any more than any other dog, really. Also, I'm starting to get a new take on Elaine Walsh, and it's making me wonder whether someone might not have been after her, not Kimi. And that would mean someone who didn't know her, or at least someone who didn't know her very well––didn't know that she bought cottage cheese only for Kimi and didn't eat it herself."

  "There is one thing about Kimi." Steve talks slowly and sounds Midwestern. He says yerp for Europe. When he talks about a "whore movie" he means something with a monster in it, not a prostitute.

  My great pizza victory had left Kimi calm and happy. She was sprawled on the floor next to Steve with one of her forepaws in his hand. He was rubbing the fingers of his other hand gently and slowly up and down the bar of black that ran from the cap on her head down to her nose and tracing the black goggles around her eyes. "It's . . . Look. A couple of times when I first saw Kimi, she had this odd thing. Patches of coat missing. Just small patches, almost bald. Like she'd lost a chunk of hair, in a fight maybe."

  "I don't understand."

  "I didn't, either. I still don't."

  "Hot spots?"

  Hot spots are areas of red, wet skin that usually develop in hot weather. They itch so ferociously that the dog licks and scratches them in a futile search for relief that exacerbates the problem and ruins his coat.

  "Nothing like that. Honest to God, it looked to me just like it had been pulled out."

  "What did Elaine say about it?"

  "This was before Elaine. The other one."

  "Donna Zalewski? I didn't know you saw Kimi then."

  "Yeah. Anyway, the owner didn't act concerned about it. Sometimes, especially if it's a pretty dog like this one, they'll get all upset if something's wrong with the coat and want you to run every test. Some of them get worried that it's contagious and they'll catch it. And if it's mange, some owners have hysterics. But this wasn't, and whatever it was, it didn't bother the owner."

  "But it bothered you."

  "Yeah."

  "Why? Couldn't it have been an allergy or something? I mean, it cleared up."

  "It didn't look like an allergy. And there were no wounds, nothing that looked like she'd been fighting. She hadn't been chewing, according to the owner, and I didn't see her chewing, or scratching. It looked to me like someone had been pulling out clumps of her hair. That's what it looked like to me."

  "Abuse?"

  He held Kimi's head in his hands. "Sometimes you can't miss it. Sometimes you can't tell at all. But usually, what you see is that the dog's been kicked, or the dog cringes when a hand's anywhere near him. Sometimes you just wonder."

  "Did Donna Zalewski seem like . . ."

  "I couldn't tell. No, I mean she was one of those people who'd come in with a whole long written list from the breeder. She wasn't out to save money. She wanted everything done right. She knew this was a very dominant bitch, and she knew she had to start obedience training. She knew it was overdue. Things weren't so bad then. That started with the next one. Kimi knew she could take advantage of her. They always know who can be pushed around."

  "So she pushed Elaine around. But not Donna Zalewski? At least not so much."

  "That's how it seemed to me. I didn't spend a lot of time with them."

  "And maybe Donna Zalewski . . ."

  "Maybe."

  "But why would anyone . . . ? I've never heard of that before."

  "Me neither."

  * * *

  Sheila Moss looked the way I remembered her, but older and thinner. The long brown hair that had probably flowed thickly twenty years ago hung thinly, limp and gray-streaked. Her face matched her hair, limp and streaked in brown and gray. Maybe she smeared brown eye shadow on the upper and lower lids. Maybe exhaustion did it for her.

  We were sitting on a Haitian-cotton couch that must have been white once and probably hadn't come from the store embellished with quite so many streaks of red Magic Marker. A great many oversize pillows were piled here and there on the floor, all covered in Marimekko fabric in patterns I could remember from my childhood, when my mother used to take me to the old Design Research store in Harvard Square. The window shades were Marimekko, too, swirls of primary green and orange fighting to remain cheerful under the dust and through the rusty water stains. On the wall facing the couch hung a long, wide length of fabric stretched on a frame, a blue pattern of onion-shaped domes.

  "I'm sorry I didn't have time to pick up after the kids," Sheila said. "My last client was at six, and I didn't get home till seven-thirty, and then I had to drive the babysitter."

  Of course she hadn't had time to pick up. It would have taken at least a month, and I'd only called that morning. Toys were everywhere—three Big Wheel tricycles, a set of giant orange cardboard blocks, a wooden indoor slide, a green plastic rocking boat, hundreds of bristle blocks, stacking cubes, Cuisenaire rods, peg dolls, natural wood trains and tracks, stuffed bears in all sizes, hardcover picture books, and enough Lego blocks to make a detailed model of New York City. On the battered oak coffee table in front of the couch were arrayed a half-chewed slice of whole-grain toast, a carefully folded disposable diaper (soiled, and not with urine), a chipped pottery teapot with a dirty beige glaze, and two large chipped-to-match blue pottery mugs. Heavy brown baked clay showed in the chips.

  "It's fine." I wanted to sound sincere because, in a way, I was. "I haven't picked up after my dogs, either. I really appreciate your finding time to see me."

  "I've always been sorry I didn't keep training Id."

  That's right. Id. Where but Cambridge? This can be a humiliating city for a dog. Sheila must have read my face.

  She apologized. "The name started out as a joke, about how much he sleeps. That he's mostly unconscious? It sounds silly, but it's too late now. Anyway, I liked training him, but it took so much time, and I couldn't manage it."

  The Ridgeback, whose name I have trouble repeating, was curled up asleep on the floor with his head on one of the Marimekko pillows. He was even bigger and leggier than I'd remembered him, like a young calf kept as a house pet.

  "Lots of people just come for eight weeks or so," I said. "It is time-consuming. And for people who have families and jobs and everything, it can be too much."

  "Especially back then," she said. "I was just finishing graduate school, and the children were mostly in diapers."

  "All at once?" She'd said she had four children. "You have twins?"

  She laughed. "No. Ben feels strongly that toilet training isn't something to rush. That they should come to it in their own time. And they were still tiny. Josh, our oldest, was only three. And I was breast-feeding the baby. Getting the dog then wasn't perfect timing."

  "How did you happen to get a Ridgeback?"

  "We knew some people who had them, and we wanted a dog who'd be good with children. And he really is. We didn't realize how big he was going to get, but it doesn't matter. He's the gentlest dog I've ever known. He doesn't even fight with other dogs. Sometimes the cat sleeps next to him. We have a cat, too. Adler." It probably meant something I missed. Somewhere, the Mosses also had a litter box. It needed emptying. "And if he notices her, he'll lick her and wash her fur."

  "Who were the people? With the Ridgebacks?"

  "Kelly and Joel Baker."

  Although she'd been talkative and friendly until then
and had referred to the Bakers as friends, she didn't have much to say about them, and since I couldn't imagine what aspect of Ridgeback anything my imaginary column was supposed to be about, I had trouble formulating questions about the giant gentleman asleep on the floor.

  Before long, I said that I'd better be going. "I've probably kept you up past your bedtime," I apologized.

  She laughed. "I haven't even started to cook dinner yet."

  It was almost ten o'clock.

  "Ben—my husband—likes to eat late. He lived abroad for a couple of years, and he picked up the time schedule. And tonight he has a seminar that lasts until ten. And after I do the dishes, I've really got to give the dog at least a little walk, and then I really ought to work on our billing. Ben's is too much for him. So don't worry. The night is young."

  "The Superwoman syndrome," Rita said. "Didn't you recognize it?"

  I'd tapped on her door before I'd even gone into my own place.

  "Jesus. Four kids. A big dog. Some kind of therapy practice. And the house is falling apart, but it's gigantic. It's like a museum of used stuff from Design Research with a few hundred thousand dollars' worth of new toys dropped all over everything. And at ten o'clock at night, she's going to start cooking for him, and then she's going to do the dishes. And that's not all."

  "Superwoman isn't a viable role," Rita said. "It isn't for anyone. Some women manage to create a facade of succeeding with it, but the price they pay is just as high, even if it's less visible."

  "If she knew about his affair with Elaine, that would have been a strong motive, I think. After all the work she does? With all she must have to put out? But I really can't understand it. If I found myself in a marriage like that, I wouldn't murder the other woman. I wouldn't wait for him to have an affair. I'd just kill him, I think. What choice would you have? If you wanted to survive?"

  "You'd have one or two others," Rita said. "None of them would be easy."

  "For a start, I'd like to take at least one or two of those children and give them to the Bakers. And speaking of the Bakers, what's the story there? And don't look at me like that. Elaine's name was never mentioned, and Sheila brought up the Bakers. I didn't. But then she didn't seem to want to say anything about them, even though she said they were friends."

  "They know each other. Not that well, I think. She and Kelly used to have lunch," Rita said. "Maybe they don't anymore."

  I knew there was something she wasn't saying. "And?"

  "And I don't know. What I know is that Ben told Sheila not to refer to Joel Baker anymore. Sheila told me that."

  "That's the rumor you heard about him?"

  "Yes."

  "Well, so what?"

  "You don't get it. There's no reason why you should. It's in code, I guess. When I hear that about a male therapist, I don't need to ask why. Sometimes people almost spell it out, anyway. They tell you not to refer women."

  "Joel Baker?"

  "I didn't ask to hear this, and I don't intend to pass it along. And don't you."

  "Of course not. Is it true?"

  "How could I possibly know? Sometimes when I hear this about a male therapist, it pretty much just confirms what I've already suspected. Or in a couple of cases, heard from a patient. But Joel? No. I've never heard anything like this before. You know, I'm telling you strictly in confidence. And I have no intention of passing it along to anyone else."

  "Are you going to stop sending people to him?"

  Rita's face looked pained. "I haven't decided," she said.

  "Sheila Moss didn't strike me as a gossip. She doesn't seem malicious."

  "Oh, she isn't. Her intention was protective, I'm sure. She just wanted to protect any women who might be hurt."

  "I guess she'd know about that. About hurt."

  The next morning, I wasted some time with the woman who was refusing to come back to life, at least on paper. Then I finished drafting a column on Canine Good Citizen testing, an AKC program to encourage responsible dog ownership by issuing CGC certificates to dogs that pass the test, which requires ordinary decent behavior, not formal obedience training. My column argued that clubs should support the program. My heart, however, quoted Winifred Gibson Strickland, author of Expert Obedience Training for Dogs, who says that if something is worth doing, it's worth doing right. Obedience competition is an aristocratic meritocracy, and dogs deserve the chance to earn their titles, especially dogdom's royalty, the Alaskan malamute. (You can't say that in Dog's Life, of course.)

  It was dark out and close to dinner by the time I'd walked and trained my prince and princess, and I left them in the palace while I ran down the block to buy myself some chowder at the Fishmonger, which is one of a row of three food shops on Huron Avenue near the corner of Appleton. The fishmonger herself is so down-to-fish that her establishment transcends yuppie, and the seafood she sells tastes fresh even to someone from Owls Head, Maine, who would rather eat dog food than supermarket fish, and, in fact, once won a bet by doing just that.

  When I left the Fishmonger, I found the Bakers' Ridgebacks, Nip and Tuck, leashed to a lamppost outside. Joel and Kelly were emerging from the next shop. Snow was beginning to fall.

  "All alone?" Kelly asked me.

  "They've had their outing," I said, and added, to Joel, "Not the kind of walk yours get. No wonder they're in such great shape."

  Since Rhodesian Ridgebacks come from Africa, you'd predict that they'd hate a New England winter, but Nip and Tuck eyed the snowflakes with malamute-like gleams of joy. Red-brown coats shining, cleanly muscled bodies prancing, they looked like the foundation stock of some new and improved breed of reindeer.

  "Kelly deserves all the credit for that." Joel sounded proud. There are some husbands in Cambridge who would have replied that their wives didn't have anything better to do than walk the dogs.

  "It's half self-indulgence," Kelly said.

  When I heard the word, I realized that she did look indulged, or at least cared for. The sleeves and hem of her thick down parka weren't dog-shredded, and the pockets weren't torn, probably because, as I noticed when I'd seen her dog-walking, she owned at least six or eight parkas and could discard any clothing that the dogs tailored for her. She wore lightweight, expensive hiking boots, but her feet were so small that the boots looked pretty, almost dainty. Furthermore, her clothes matched: red hat, gloves, and scarf, tan everything else. Rita has reminded me that most people don't exclaim in surprise when they notice that colors they're wearing happen not to clash.

  "Ignore her," Joel said. "She hates being out in the freezing rain as much as anyone else."

  He looked quite soigné himself. His wool topcoat obviously hadn't come from Goodwill, and he didn't need a haircut.

  "Right." She smiled. "I'm just a martyr to the dogs."

  While I was standing there hoping that the Bakers would invite me to dinner—and while they weren't inviting me—a new Volvo station wagon pulled into the tow zone at the curb next to us. Sheila Moss stepped out. Her coat must have come from Afghanistan or Nepal via one of the ethnic shops in Harvard Square. It was made of some thick, brown burlap-like material patched with bits of leather and fur. In place of buttons, it had elaborately looped frog fasteners, two of which were badly ripped. On her feet were those hideous, rational sandals, worn over thick Ragg wool socks. In any other city in America except possibly Berkeley, California, she'd have been mistaken for an eccentric beggar, but by Cambridge norms, she exuded prosperity.

  I somehow had the idea that since Sheila had been telling people not to refer to Joel, she might do something old-fashioned and embarrassing, like cut him dead, or something modern and embarrassing, like confront him with the issue, as Rita would say. All Sheila did, though, was greet Kelly and me first, then Joel, and the Bakers probably didn't even notice.

  "Oh, God," Sheila said. "I'm late as usual. And there's nothing to eat in the house except hot dogs for the kids, and that's not exactly Ben's idea of dinner, is it? You know, the tortellini at Forma
ggio aren't bad, especially the spinach ones. Have you tried them?" She stopped. "What am I saying?" she added nervously. "You don't buy them, do you? You make your own."

  "Not very often," Kelly said. "And if I had four children, it'd be never." Her pretty face showed no sign of grief, but she smacked her lips to Tuck and began stroking the Ridgeback's head.

  "Speaking of which," Sheila said, "I've got to go and get mine."

  I couldn't tell whether she meant the tortellini or her children. Rita is right about trying to be Superwoman, you see. It's impossible to succeed, and if you make the effort, anyway, you risk sounding as if you can't tell your offspring from some lumps of gourmet macaroni. Or maybe that's motherhood.

  11

  Even though there's a Laundromat only about a block up Concord Avenue from my house, I hired Ron Coughlin, who's my plumber as well as one of my dog-training buddies, to install a coin-op washer and dryer in the basement for my tenants and me. In winter, Cambridge sidewalks develop icy ruts. Between the sidewalks and the streets, hardened mounds of filthy, packed stuff that was once snow form barricades that are no fun to scale when you're carrying a basket of laundry. Since most of Rita's clothes are dry-clean-only (a category in which she places her one pair of jeans), she hardly uses the machines at all, but I do my own laundry, and so did my third-floor tenants at the time, a cat-owning Swiss couple who shared the housework so fifty-fifty that neither would carry laundry up and down stairs or transfer wet clothes from the washer to the dryer without the other's help. They were the ones who heard the key clanging in the dryer, where it must have fallen out of the pocket of the jeans I'd worn the first day I visited Elaine Walsh, and who returned it to me.