Evil Breeding Read Online Free Page B

spring day. His expression suggested that since he had yet to meet a human being he liked, I shouldn’t waste any effort in trying to make myself the first. I trailed after Peter as he stomped by the row of sixteen or eighteen spacious, sturdy chain-link kennel runs attached to the freshly painted barn. The shepherds, being shepherds, ran to the ends of their runs to baric at me. Peter made no effort to silence them. Rather, he ignored them as diligently as he ignored me. The dogs made so much noise that even if I’d wanted to ask a question or make a comment, I wouldn’t have been able to make myself heard. The kennels had concrete floors and were as clean as any I’d ever seen. The dogs looked healthy and were as clean as their livingquarters. In the distance, I noticed two more outbuildings, also with kennel runs attached, but Peter didn’t offer me a tour of those, and I didn’t ask.
    When I’d driven up, the doors to the big barn had been shut. I’d parked my car on the gravel by the side of the house. Now the barn doors stood open to reveal not only the interiors of the dog runs and a collection of farm and kennel equipment, but an old black Ford pickup, some sort of unpretentious little foreign car, a luxurious black sedan that stopped maybe a few inches and a few thousand dollars short of being a limo, and exactly the kind of shiny new van that would let the dogs and me travel to shows in safety, comfort, and style.
    I thanked Peter, who was already too far away to hear me, climbed into my old Bronco, and hoped it would start. It did. On the way home, I kept seeing glimpses of my battered car, my modest house, and, indeed, myself through the unflattering eyes of the rich. Whenever I signaled a turn, the car’s wipers swept across the windshield. The upholstery had triangular rips on both front seats. The tape player would work for weeks and then unpredictably destroy a cassette that I couldn’t afford to replace. When I opened the windows, dog hair flew out, but the dog smell stayed. Pulling into my own driveway again, I wished that I had a garage and that I occupied all three floors of my house instead of just one. Brushing undercoat off my denim skirt, I wished I’d had something better to wear to Mr. Motherway’s than an outfit almost identical to his maid’s. The back stairs to my house needed painting. I’d have to do the job myself. As I put the key in the lock, I realized that I had the hands of what I often was: a manual laborer. And I wished for something I’d ordinarily have laughed at: a professional manicure.
    But when I opened the door to my kitchen, Rowdy and Kimi came bounding toward me. Their lovely ears were flattened against their heads, their dark eyes smiled, their wolf-gray coats gleamed, their beautiful plumy white tails wagged across their powerful backs, and they sang in unison the universal malamute song of joy:
Woo-woo! Woo-woo-woo!
    “I am richer with you,” I solemnly told the dogs, “than I would be with other people’s money. I wouldn’t trade with anyone.”
    If I’d been Geraldine R. Dodge, I wouldn’t have had to trade. I could have had my perfect dogs. And money, too.

Chapter Three
    L IKE GERALDINE R. and Marcellus Hartley Dodge, Steve Delaney and I maintain separate residences. The Dodges had adjoining estates. Hers covered about two thousand acres. His? I don’t know. Those were just their country homes. They also shared a Fifth Avenue town house.
Shared
is probably the wrong word. Mrs. Dodge always had ten or twelve dogs with her. Consequently, I suspect that occupancy of the Dodge town house was more a matter of taking turns than of actual sharing. A dozen dogs wouldn’t drive Steve away. There are often more than that at his clinic, and his own dogs, India, the shepherd, and Lady, the pointer, live with him above the clinic, which is in Cambridge and, come to think of it, probably closer to my place than Mr. Dodge’s house was to Mrs. Dodge’s. Our