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tons of charisma. Or let’s just say that Ginny loved him a lot.
    “I’m so sorry,” I repeated. Ginny’s pain was contagious. 1 patted my thigh to summon Rowdy and dug my fingers into the depths of his coat. Then I ran my fingertips over his wet nose. The gesture was completely irrational. Rowdy had been bouncing around sniffing tree trunks, lifting his leg, making friends with Wiz, and accepting her drooly kisses. I didn’t need to touch him to make sure that he was alive. I felt a renewed urgency about calling Leah. A mistake , I thought again, remembering the sympathy card. A simple error. Not Kimi.
    “Thank you,” Ginny said. “People have been...”
    “It helps,” I said. “It helps a little.”
    “Not really.” Cam shook her head. “Nothing does, really.”
    “It would be worse if no one gave a damn,” I said.
    “That’s how it is for most people,” Ginny said. “They can’t even talk about it. They’re afraid that someone’s going to say, you know, ‘only a dog.’ ”
    “One thing about this place,” said Cam, “is that no one’s going to say that. Everyone here understands.”
    I nodded.
    “I was going to bring Merlin,” Ginny told me, “and I had to call Maxine and tell her, and then when I got here, she’d left a card.”
    “In our room,” Cam said. “We’re sharing.” Cam’s face and tone lightened. Her smile was wry. “But Max did forget to sign it.”
    Ginny shrugged. “Maxine’s been running her tail off. It’s a wonder she remembered at all.”
    In the couple of seconds since I’d last had my eye on Rowdy, he’d wandered to one of the many covered trash barrels stationed here and there on the grounds. Fastened to the side of each was a big plastic bag that held a large supply of small plastic bags to be used in cleaning up after dogs and then deposited in the big barrels. The barrels were admittedly a sort of tree-trunk brown, and this one must already have acquired the interesting scent of other dogs. Even so.
    Rowdy, not there!” I ordered him. His glance called me a fool, but he dutifully lowered his leg. “Good boy.” I switched my attention back to Cam and Ginny. “Which cabin are you in?”
    Cam pointed. “The first one.”
    “Oh, I’m next door,” I said.
    Cam and Ginny exchanged a look I couldn’t read. As if first having obtained Ginny’s consent, Cam said, “Lucky you.”
    “To be right on the lake?”
    Their expressions changed.
    “Am I missing something?” I asked. “That’s one of the things Eva was complaining about, that her cabin’s in the second row. I mean, it’s practically on the lake, but...”
    Cam shook her head without disarranging a single dark hair. “Met your neighbors yet?” she asked pertly.
    “Not really. There’s a guy sitting out on the deck, but I didn’t meet him. He was talking on the phone. He had a cellular phone. Am I supposed to know him?”
    Ginny finally gave me a straight answer. “Don Abbott. You know Phyllis. Phyllis Abbott.”
    It took me a moment to place the name. “Oh, Mrs. Abbott. The judge. That’s right. Maxine mentioned they were next to me. Sure. I’ve shown under Mrs. Abbott. I stewarded for her a couple of years ago. In Utility.” Utility. What is Utility? If you happen to be a Mason, I can explain it easily. It’s Third Degree. Really. Three Craft Degrees, First, Second, and Third, leading respectively to the titles Entered Apprentice, Fellow Craft, and Master Mason. Three obedience trial classes: Novice, Open, and Utility; CD, CDX, and UD. UDX? Knights Templar, I suppose. OTCH? Royal Arch. Eerie, isn’t it? The Scottish Rite. The York Rite. The Rite of Canine Obedience. “I liked her,” I continued. “She was very fair. I’d show under her again. What’s wrong with her?”
    If a heretofore pleasant and fair obedience judge had turned mean, I wanted to know. I don’t believe in paying entry fees to show under judges who make snide remarks or invent their own rules. Neither