Of Birds and Beagles

by Leslie O'Kane

  My heart sank. I knew Russell would never cheat on me; he was the most loyal, trustworthy person I’d ever met. What bothered me was that he clearly felt bad that he’d chosen not to tell me about an encounter with an ex-girlfriend. My love-conquers-all mantra from a few minutes ago now struck me as inane. The nature of love isn’t to “conquer.” Love trumps all, yes, but it isn’t worth diddly squat when it comes to poker, basketball, or common colds. And it was definitely irrelevant in overcoming phobias.

  Gathering my wits and my focus, I forced a smile and told Kelsey, “That’s nice to hear. I like it when my reputation precedes me. It saves time.”

  “You’re a dog whisperer, right?”

  “I consider myself a dog therapist. I don’t know how much whispering therapists actually do.” Inwardly I chastised myself for attaching a snarky phrase at the end of my every remark.

  At least, unlike Kelsey who continued to eye Russell like he was a rock star, I maintained eye contact and a smile, despite Magoo’s distracting presence. The bird was currently making Basenji-like yodels; there were rescue booths for many breeds at this event, and Kelsey-plus-parrot must have been near the barkless dogs’ booth at some point. Baxter and Pavlov, meanwhile, seemed content to wait silently for us to end our conversation.

  “I couldn’t have been more surprised to learn about Russell’s new girlfriend’s choice of professions,” Kelsey said. “Considering.”

  “I’m making progress being around dogs,” Russell quickly interjected. “And Allie is more than worth the effort.”

  “How sweet,” she said in a patronizing tone. “You two make a really cute couple.”

  “Thanks,” I said, trying not to grit my teeth. We were told that quite often, although once or twice, with our short stature and dark brown eyes, we’d been mistaken for brother and sister.

  I was starting to actively dislike this woman as I studied her features. She struck me as much too obviously aware that she was really pretty; she had an outdoorsy, L.L. Bean-model thing going for her.

  Baxter cleared his throat. I promptly introduced him to Kelsey. After the two exchanged greetings, Kelsey said to Baxter, “Rusty and I were perfectly suited for each other. He’s afraid of dogs, and I hate them.” She laughed, which further annoyed me. Bad-mouthing dogs, especially when you’ve only just been introduced to the organizer of a dog-heavy event, was unnecessary and obnoxious.

  “There’s an owner of a chocolate lab around here someplace who made a crack that dog haters shouldn’t come to the Expo. Maybe you two had recently crossed paths.”

  I felt Russell’s posture stiffen, and he pulled me a little closer, obviously wanting to arbitrate before our obvious discord worsened. Right about now, he was searching his memory banks for common interests between his ex-girlfriend and me. Other than our attraction to him.

  Not surprisingly, that mental feat was so challenging that Russell had fallen silent. Meanwhile, Baxter was now studying the parrot.

  “Your macaw needs to be secured,” Baxter told Kelsey. “All pets are supposed to be on a leash, except in designated areas.”

  “Oh, that won’t be a problem, Baxter. He’ll stay right here on my shoulder the whole time.” Kelsey flashed a flirtatious smile and brazenly put her hand on his chest. First Russell’s bicep, now Baxter’s pectoral. The woman apparently had a thing for touching men’s muscles. “Trust me, my dear boy. Magoo is better trained than any mutt here. My ex has a horrible Doberman, who’s supposedly around here someplace. He couldn’t train that dog not to bark at Magoo, so I had to train Magoo not to be afraid of dogs.”

  “Actually,” Baxter said, stepping back to shed her palm from his chest, “I’m surprised all the dogs here aren’t barking their heads off at your parrot. My cavalier sure would be.”

  “Is Barker here?” I asked, remembering the dog’s name, even though I’d yet to meet him; the names “Baxter” and “Barker” were easy to remember. “I totally love King Charles cavaliers.”

  “As long as you mean the dog, not His Royal Highness himself,” Russell remarked, in an odd little non sequitur. I gave him a loving smile. The poor guy had been so beleaguered in these last several minutes. Furthermore, I was now feeling sorry for him for ever having been romantically linked to Kelsey. Beauty doesn’t compensate for a crappy personality.

  After giving Russell a smile, Baxter told me, “No, Barker’s home. But let me show you that exercise course I was telling you about.”

  Kelsey joined our group without hesitation as we walked past three booths to the corner of the room. Within a fenced-in, roughly thirty-by-thirty-foot square, the floor was covered in sod. A zig-zagging course had been created with a string stretching three inches above the sod. The participating dogs and their owners were queued in a line, and one at a time, the owner brought in a dog to chase a handful of feathers that looked like a large fishing lure, as it zipped to and fro on the course.

  “Some dogs will immediately happily chase after the feathers,” Baxter started telling me. “Others have no chase instincts whatsoever.”

  “Yoo-hoo,” someone called from a distance. That could only be my dear—if sometimes exasperating—friend, Tracy Truett. Tracy had a radio talk show in Boulder and had a brash-but-engaging personality.

  I caught sight of her and waved. She was a large, attractive woman who bleached her short hair to a white-blond hue, then dyed the ends blue and spiked it. She’d said her inspiration was Ursula, the villain in the Disney movie The Little Mermaid, sans the octopus body. Tracy had told me yesterday that she would be at the pet expo and would report on the event in her broadcast. She was just now entering the chasing area with Bailey, her new-to-her beagle, in her arms. “I’ll be right over,” Tracy called. “We’ve been waiting in line forever.”

  “Go get that squirrel,” Magoo said, mimicking Kelsey’s voice perfectly. She must have trained the bird to chase squirrels. He then let out a squawk, an obnoxious noise that I could imagine Kelsey also making.

  Meanwhile, Tracy set Bailey down on the grass, and he raced toward the four of us, barking. Then Bailey stopped at the fence. His paws were spread, and his tail was in an erect position that revealed his agitated state as he barked at Magoo.

  “Doesn’t seem like a few feathers on a string is as alluring to Bailey as a live bird itself is,” Tracy said as she strode toward us. “Would you mind looking at some of the other exhibits until my dog gets his five minutes here?” she asked Kelsey.

  “I’m only staying for a moment,” Kelsey said with a fake-polite smile.

  As if tacitly entering a staring contest, Tracy and Kelsey maintained eye contact, while Bailey continued to bark. After a long pause, Tracy craned her neck and shifted her gaze to Kelsey’s shoulder. “Is that bird poop, or part of the fabric’s design?” she asked, pointing.

  Kelsey gasped and tried to check for splatters on her blouse. “Is there something on me?” she asked Russ, who immediately said, “No. She’s just pulling your leg.”

  Tracy picked up her dog, turned around, and set him back down so that he was now facing the course instead of Kelsey and Magoo. “Let her rip,” Tracy called to the young man at the controls, who was kneeling just inside the fence near the gate.

  Her adorable beagle went tearing after the lure, barking at it as he ran. I looked at Magoo, who was peering at Bailey in a way that reminded me of Snoopy from “Peanuts” when he was impersonating a vulture eyeing his target. Ironically, the “Beagle” was now in the role of the prey.

  “Go get that squirrel,” Magoo said again. I gasped, only now putting two and two together.

  “Kelsey! Grab Magoo!” I shouted. “He’s staring at Bailey as if—”

  Magoo spread his blue-and-green wings and flew at the little dog’s head.

  The macaw landed on Bailey’s back for a moment. The dog yelped and snapped wildly in the air, his droopy ears flapping. “No!” Tracy hollered, barreling toward bird and beagle, waving her arms.

  Magoo chomped po
or Bailey’s ear.

  Chapter 3

  Tracy gasped. Bailey let out a high-pitched squeal of pain. Magoo then flew back toward us, alighting gently on Kelsey’s shoulder.

  I gave Pavlov a sit-stay command, then vaulted over the fence and rushed to Tracy’s side as she stared at Bailey, seemingly too stunned to pick up her injured pet. “I’m going to kill that woman!” she growled under her breath at me.

  The wound on Bailey’s ear was small, but bleeding profusely. “He might need a couple of stitches, but he’ll be fine.”

  Tracy’s face had gone white. She seemed to be immobilized.

  “Give me his leash,” I told her. When she still didn’t move, I grabbed it from her hand.

  Baxter had started speaking into a Bluetooth and called out to Tracy that a vet would be here shortly. Meanwhile, I fastened the leash around Bailey’s neck, then picked him up. Russell followed me into the enclosure, but was keeping at arms’ distance as Bailey yelped and shook, flapping his ears as if to shake off water. Within a minute or two, a thin, elderly man with a medical kit arrived, pulling on a white jacket as he strode through the gate toward us.

  “So much blood,” Tracy murmured as if half asleep. I realized belatedly that she was fainting. Thankfully, Russ sprang into action and managed to ease her safely into a supine position on the sod.

  “This wasn’t my fault!” Kelsey cried. “The dog must have looked like an overgrown squirrel to Magoo.”

  “Then you needed to keep Magoo on a leash!” I fired back.

  “This is too your fault!” an onlooker cried, sweeping up her Dachshund protectively. “Get your vicious bird out of here!”

  Kelsey snorted. “You’re not vicious, are you, sweetie?” I heard her say, undoubtedly speaking to Magoo, but my attention was focused on Bailey. I had managed to trap his head under my arm as I cradled him, which seemed to be calming him down some. But when the vet touched him, he began to panic and tried to scramble out of my grasp. I could barely keep ahold of him, and my arms were getting scratched.

  “I’m going to need to sedate the dog so I can stitch this ear without him biting me,” the vet said to me. “Can you hold him steady?”

  “I hope so,” I replied, struggling to quiet the wiggling dog.

  “Who’s a good boy?” Baxter said to Bailey, suddenly beside me, swooping in to reinforce my grip. I tried not to react to our faces being inches from him, although I felt awash in gratitude for having a kindred spirit nearby.

  The vet lifted a pinch-worth of fur-covered flesh and gave Bailey the shot. Moments later, the poor sweet dog relaxed in my arms.

  “Here. Let me take him.” Baxter swept Bailey from me and cradled him with just one arm. He then handed me a towel and wet wipes, which I quickly availed myself of.

  “I have an office in the back,” Baxter told the vet.

  They hurried out of the public view.

  Tracy remained on her back on the sod, but she was cursing up a storm. I couldn’t blame her. Not only had her darling dog been injured, but she’d had to endure the embarrassment of lying flat on her back with a crowd of people gawking at her. To worsen matters, a woman cried, “Hey, that’s Tracy Truett! The radio talk-show host!”

  “I’m inspecting the ceiling,” she called out, lifting her hand in acknowledgement to the woman. She then gave us all a thumbs-up.

  I yanked off my sweater, glad to see that my blouse had managed to remain unscathed. When it came to desirable outfits to wear when talking to an audience about dog training, blood-stained clothing was at the very bottom of the list.

  As Russell began to help Tracy to her feet, Kelsey and I locked gazes. She glanced at Pavlov who was sitting beside her, who in turn was watching me and primed to race toward me if I gave him the silent or verbal command to come. I had once tested him for ninety minutes, and he had remained in his “stay” position. I scanned the faces of the dozen or so witnesses, and they were all glaring at Kelsey and Magoo.

  “Now, this is a dog,” Kelsey said of Pavlov, who was sitting at attention by her side.

  I climbed back over the fence, grabbed Pavlov’s leash and gave her the “release” hand signal, followed by a hug.

  A middle-aged woman in a forest-green Pets! Pets! Pets! vest put her hands on her hips and glared at Kelsey. “It was irresponsible of you to bring an unsecured pet in here!”

  “It’s your fault that that adorable beagle is bleeding!” a Hispanic woman nearby shouted, leveling her finger at Kelsey.

  “I know that.” She raised her palms. “And I’m really sorry. But let’s at least be honest. He’s not adorable. That nonstop yipping of his is like being trapped in a tool shed with a thousand mosquitoes.”

  “Your bird took a chunk out of my dog’s ear!” Tracy shouted, obviously regaining her strength. “He’s the Mike Tyson of the bird world. Beagle Bailey is traumatized and scarred for life!”

  “Oh, please! It was a ten-second incident.”

  The crowd started grumbling, and Kelsey made let’s-keep-it-down gestures with both hands. “But, yes, your pet is slightly injured. I’ll pay for his vet bill, and two visits with your dog-therapist friend, Allie, here. So that he can recover from his trauma.” She made air quotes at the word “trauma.”

  “You’ll pay me two-thousand dollars,” Tracy fired back, “or else I’m taking you to court to let a judge decide. And I’ve got two dozen witnesses, a canine expert who’ll testify, and, no doubt, at least one video of the entire incident!”

  “Look, lady, fair is fair. You shouldn’t expect to profit by hundreds upon hundreds of dollars from our pets’ ten-second scuffle,” Kelsey countered.

  Tracy launched into an explicative-laden tirade. I stepped between the two women. “Tracy, stop shouting,” I told her quietly, facing her to assure myself that Kelsey couldn’t overhear. “You’re only weakening your cause.”

  She grabbed a cluster of her wild, blue-tipped hair and let out a growl, but otherwise held her tongue.

  With Tracy all but exploding, I was reluctant to leave, but I also detested being late for my presentation; such a large potential audience was a rarity in my field. I gave a plaintive look to Russell, who had thoughtfully retrieved my sweater and tucked it over his arm.

  “Let’s let the vet do his job,” he said. “Kelsey, let me walk you out—”

  “She can’t leave,” Tracy said in a still-smoldering voice. “I’m filing a police report! Cruelty to animals!”

  “I didn’t bite your mutt’s ear!”

  “Aiding and abetting an assault,” Tracy fired back. “Knowingly harboring a vicious animal.”

  “Allida needs to go give a presentation now,” Russ said. “Tracy, you need to go check on Bailey. Just don’t watch the vet until your dog’s all cleaned up. I’ll stay with Kelsey and Magoo until you return.”

  Tracy looked at me with pleading eyes. “But what about Bailey? You’re his second mom.”

  “I know, but I made a commitment to give this talk, Tracy, and I’m already late. I’ll cut it short and come back to check in on Bailey and you in twenty minutes. Okay?”

  Tracy nodded.

  “Heel,” I told Pavlov, feeling like a “heel” myself for deserting my friend.

  “Look. I’m sorry your dog lost some blood and some...of his ear,” Kelsey said to Tracy.

  That struck me as bad phrasing. Worried that Tracy would take a swing at her, I turned back. “Unfortunately, I happen to live next door to Shirley the Squirrel Lady,” Kelsey continued. “If I hadn’t trained Magoo to chase off the squirrels, they would literally eat me out of house and home. I was certain he’d stay put on my shoulder. Magoo has never once attacked my neighbor’s Dachshund, which is much more squirrel-like than a beagle.”

  “Well, bully for you, lady,” Tracy retorted. “Your parrot only attacks squirrels and the occasional beagle!”

  Russell caught my eye and gestured for me to go ahead and leave. I obeyed, and Pavlov maintained her perfect heel position beside me.


  “And,” Tracy continued, “whether you like it or not, you owe me for damages beyond my vet expenses!”

  The rest of her reply mercifully faded into the general din, although I was pretty sure she called Magoo an “ear-eating Polly-wanna-cracker.”

  I reached the stage, and Jana gave me a welcoming grin. She seemed to be engaged in an informal Q-and-A with her audience of hunters while waiting for me.

  My relief at leaving the bird-versus-beagle argument instantly faded and morphed into alarm as I spotted at least a half-dozen rifles, one held by Jana; the others by men in the audience who were lurking near the stage.

  Jana, still wearing her microphone, must have seen my reaction. She said, “No worries, Allie. All of the firearms are mine, and none of them are functional. They’re for demonstration purposes only. Two of them are plywood cutouts, even.”

  “Yeah,” some potbellied man in combat fatigues said, laughing. “So if you’re an anti-gun Commie and start a demonstration, I’ll blow your head off!”

  Still laughing at his stupid pun, he started to take aim at me with what was indeed merely a black-painted piece of wood shaped like a gun. He froze as he caught sight of Pavlov, who’d promptly taken a protective stance. He quickly put the fake rifle down and took a step back. “Just kidding. Your dog isn’t trained to attack, is he?”

  “She. And only upon my command. That’s the one command I’ve taught her that I hope to never use.”

  An equally out-of-shape woman grabbed the man’s arm, and the two of them left the area. They didn’t have a dog with them.

  I scanned the surroundings and realized I’d made a mistake by agreeing to hold my presentation immediately after Jana’s. Not realizing that Jana would bring rifles—albeit disabled—I hadn’t given any thought to how her presentation for hunters might scare off my audience of families with young children. I’d named my talk: “Behavior Basics for the Family Dog.” I’d been counting on families whose dogs had separation anxiety, didn’t get along with the cat, chased the garbage truck, and that sort of thing.