Further Adventures of Lad [23]
in country life so filthily mean as an evicted trespasser. Don't let's say anything to the Mistress about it, Lad. It'd only worry her! And--and she'll think I ought to have invited all those panhandlers up to the house to get dry. Perhaps she'd be right, too. She generally is."
A week later, Lad received a summons that made his heart sink. For he knew precisely what it foretold. He was called to the bathroom; where awaited him a tub half full of warm water.
Now, baths were no novelty to Lad. But when a bath tub contained certain ingredients from boxes on the dog-closet shelf,--ingredients that fluff the coat and burnish it and make all its hairs stand out like a Circassian Beauty's, that meant but one thing.
It meant a dog-show was at hand.
And Lad loathed dog-shows, as he loathed tramps and castor oil and motorcycles.
After a single experience, he had never been taken to one of those canine ordeals known as "three-or-more-day shows." But the Mistress and the Master rejoiced at his triumphs at such local one-day shows as were within pleasant driving distance of the Place. These exhibitions entailed no great strain or danger. Lad's chief objection to them was that he hated to be chirped to and pawed and stared upon by an army of strangers.
Such a one-day event was the outdoor Charity Dogshow at the Beauville Country Club, forty miles to northeast of the Place; an easy two-hour drive. It was to be a "specialty show"; at which the richness and variety of prizes were expected to atone for the lack of A. K. C. points involved.
A premium-list of the show had been mailed to the Place; and one of its "specials" had caught the Mistress's quick eye and quicker imagination. The special was offered by Angus McGilead, an exiled Scot whose life fad was the Collie; and whose chief grievance was that most American breeders did not seem able to produce collies with the unbelievable wealth of outer-and-undercoat displayed by the oversea dogs. This particular special was offered in the following terms:
Embossed Sterling Silver Cup, 9 Inches High (Genuine Antique) For The Best-Coated Collie Shown.
Now, Lad's coat was the pride of the Mistress's heart. By daily brushings she kept it in perfect condition and encouraged its luxuriant growth. When she read of McGilead's eccentric offer, she fell to visualizing the "embossed sterling silver cup, 9 inches high (genuine antique)" as it would loom up from the hedge of dog-show prizes already adorning the living room trophy-shelves.
Summer is the zero hour for collies' coats. Yet, this year, Lad had not yet begun to shed his winter raiment; and he was still in full bloom. This fact decided the Mistress. Not one collie in ten would be in anything like perfect coat. And the prize cup grew clearer and nearer, to her mental vision. Hence the series of special baths and brushings. Hence, too, Laddie's daily-increasing gloom.
At eight o'clock on the morning of the show, the Mistress and the Master, with Lad stretched forlornly on the rear seat of the car, set forth up the Valley on the forty-mile run to Beauville. On the tonneau floor, in front of Lad, rested a battered suitcase, which held his toilet appurtenances;--brushes, comb, talcum, French chalk, show-leash, sponge, crash towel, squeaking rubber doll (this to attract his bored interest in the ring and make him "show") and a box of liver cut in small bits and fried stiff.
Lad blinked down at the suitcase in morose disapproval. He hated that bag. It spelt "dogshow" to him. Even the presence of the delicious fried liver and of the mildly dramatic squeaking doll could not atone for the rest of its contents and for all they implied.
As the car sent the miles slipping behind and as the Mistress and the Master glanced back less and less often for a pat or a cheery word to their sulking chum, Lad's dislike for that pestilential bag grew sharper. True, it held squares of fried liver;--liver whose heavenly odor penetrated through the musty leather smell of the suitcase and to the dog's acute senses. Also, it held a doll
A week later, Lad received a summons that made his heart sink. For he knew precisely what it foretold. He was called to the bathroom; where awaited him a tub half full of warm water.
Now, baths were no novelty to Lad. But when a bath tub contained certain ingredients from boxes on the dog-closet shelf,--ingredients that fluff the coat and burnish it and make all its hairs stand out like a Circassian Beauty's, that meant but one thing.
It meant a dog-show was at hand.
And Lad loathed dog-shows, as he loathed tramps and castor oil and motorcycles.
After a single experience, he had never been taken to one of those canine ordeals known as "three-or-more-day shows." But the Mistress and the Master rejoiced at his triumphs at such local one-day shows as were within pleasant driving distance of the Place. These exhibitions entailed no great strain or danger. Lad's chief objection to them was that he hated to be chirped to and pawed and stared upon by an army of strangers.
Such a one-day event was the outdoor Charity Dogshow at the Beauville Country Club, forty miles to northeast of the Place; an easy two-hour drive. It was to be a "specialty show"; at which the richness and variety of prizes were expected to atone for the lack of A. K. C. points involved.
A premium-list of the show had been mailed to the Place; and one of its "specials" had caught the Mistress's quick eye and quicker imagination. The special was offered by Angus McGilead, an exiled Scot whose life fad was the Collie; and whose chief grievance was that most American breeders did not seem able to produce collies with the unbelievable wealth of outer-and-undercoat displayed by the oversea dogs. This particular special was offered in the following terms:
Embossed Sterling Silver Cup, 9 Inches High (Genuine Antique) For The Best-Coated Collie Shown.
Now, Lad's coat was the pride of the Mistress's heart. By daily brushings she kept it in perfect condition and encouraged its luxuriant growth. When she read of McGilead's eccentric offer, she fell to visualizing the "embossed sterling silver cup, 9 inches high (genuine antique)" as it would loom up from the hedge of dog-show prizes already adorning the living room trophy-shelves.
Summer is the zero hour for collies' coats. Yet, this year, Lad had not yet begun to shed his winter raiment; and he was still in full bloom. This fact decided the Mistress. Not one collie in ten would be in anything like perfect coat. And the prize cup grew clearer and nearer, to her mental vision. Hence the series of special baths and brushings. Hence, too, Laddie's daily-increasing gloom.
At eight o'clock on the morning of the show, the Mistress and the Master, with Lad stretched forlornly on the rear seat of the car, set forth up the Valley on the forty-mile run to Beauville. On the tonneau floor, in front of Lad, rested a battered suitcase, which held his toilet appurtenances;--brushes, comb, talcum, French chalk, show-leash, sponge, crash towel, squeaking rubber doll (this to attract his bored interest in the ring and make him "show") and a box of liver cut in small bits and fried stiff.
Lad blinked down at the suitcase in morose disapproval. He hated that bag. It spelt "dogshow" to him. Even the presence of the delicious fried liver and of the mildly dramatic squeaking doll could not atone for the rest of its contents and for all they implied.
As the car sent the miles slipping behind and as the Mistress and the Master glanced back less and less often for a pat or a cheery word to their sulking chum, Lad's dislike for that pestilential bag grew sharper. True, it held squares of fried liver;--liver whose heavenly odor penetrated through the musty leather smell of the suitcase and to the dog's acute senses. Also, it held a doll