Muzzled

by June Whyte

  So…when I skidded through the gate and past the pissed off guy with the misshapen cowboy hat who was manning the ticket box and wriggled into the last empty space in the trainer’s car park at Princes Park, Gawler—beside a washed-out, grey Ford Falcon van with Clean me scrawled across the dirty back windows and a caterpillar-like ten-berth dog trailer attached—it was one minute to kennel-closing.

  Yikes!

  A curl of dust stalked the tractor as it dragged the sand track in preparation for the first race. Ben, his normally laid back features creased in a frown, came loping toward me. He had the left front door of my trailer open and a collar fastened around the canine occupant’s neck before I’d even switched off the engine. “Where’ve you been?”

  “Long story,” I told him and grabbed two more leads and muzzles before rocketing from the car. No time for explanations. Not even time to tuck my plain white shirt into the waist band of my requisite black trousers.

  Ben urged the first dog to jump down from the trailer then lobbed the lead at a mate who always helped him out at the track. “Here, Bazz. You take Witchy Woman?”

  “Her rego papers are in my glove box,” I called out and tossed him a blue denim kennel mattress before he took off at a run toward the kennel house.

  “Get that one through, mate, and Kat and I’ll be right behind you.”

  With that, Ben snaffled another lead and opened the second door on the left side of the trailer while I managed the two dogs on my side.

  Naturally, friendly ribbing from fellow greyhound trainers followed me as I made a mad dash toward the checking-in steward at the door of the kennel house.

  “What happened, Kat? Lose your way?”

  “Someone musta nodded off to sleep in the bubble bath.”

  Air tight in my chest, dogs bouncing on the end of their leads, I lengthened my stride and ignored them.

  “Hey, Katrina, darling, if Benjamin’s wearing you out in bed, you can pass him over to me. I’m always up for it.” Of course that remark from Mary Parker, aged in her early forties and dressed like a teenage slut, made me pause long enough to fire a lethal laser glare in her direction. A glare that screamed: ‘Leave my man alone…or die!’ With anyone else my glare would have blistered skin—Mary merely ran a seductive tongue over her bottom lip—then smirked.

  Once my dogs were checked by the stewards, weighed, vetted and settled inside allotted cages on their own mattresses, I let out a relieved sigh.

  “Dunno about you, but I’m ready for a sit down,” I told Ben before setting off for the track’s covered enclosure which housed numerous TAB terminals, three bookmakers’ stands, the stewards’ room, the bar and the track cafeteria.

  “Okay, give,” said Ben and dragged out a chair from the nearest empty table. He lowered his long frame onto the industrial-gray metal seat. “What kept you?”

  “What kept me?” I repeated and let out a sigh as I leant back in my chair, relishing the sensation of a few moments’ inactivity. “Well, Benjamin—I guess it’s been, what-you’d-call, one of those mornings.”

  He wiggled his eyebrows suggestively and grinned. “And…?”

  I laughed at his not-so-subtle hints of our athletic morning activities. “Nah. It’s what happened after you swaggered off into the sunset that caused the problems.”

  “Hey, I don’t swagger.”

  “Yes, you do.”

  A cheeky grin spread across his face crinkling every one of his laugh lines. “No, babe, it’s called walking-like-a-man-who’s-just-experienced-a-death-defying-ride-on-a-roller-coaster-and-barely-survived.”

  I let out a chuckle. “You win. No way can I beat that.” The laughter in Ben’s eyes had me itching to get up and go sit on his lap, just to feel his body against mine again.

  “So, now we’ve got that established,” he went on, eyebrows doing little bitty pushups, “what happened after I left?”

  When I filled him in on the Purple Pants saga, Ben’s lips thinned. His hand moved to cover mine as he leant across the table. “You okay, babe?”

  I nodded, the warmth of his fingers around mine, making me teary. I sniffed and blamed my hormones.

  “This creep an acquaintance of yours?”

  “God, no!”

  “What’s he look like?”

  I screwed up my nose. “Old guy done up like a neon light and driving an ancient Holden that sounds like a bulldozer. I didn’t get the complete rego number but Tanya reckons it’s enough for her cop friend, Paul, to find the owner’s address on the police data base.”

  “And once you get hold of this thug’s address—no way will you be trotting off to question him on your own—” He paused, chocolate colored eyes boring into mine. “Right?”

  I scowled at him. He scowled back. Then, after jerking my hand from his grasp, I raised my eyebrows and peered at him sideways. Was Ben trying to dictate what I could and couldn’t do?

  “Because I’ll be with you.” At that Ben smiled. A slow, gorgeous, eye crinkling smile that made me wish we were still at home, alone, in my bedroom, with the graphics from page 48 of the Kama Sutra open on the laptop beside us.

  As a slow steady thump sent heat trekking to the pit of my stomach and juices to parts of the anatomy I won’t bother mentioning, I licked my lips and ran my fingers through my hair. Ben’s grin widened. He knew what I was thinking.

  Oh boy! I glanced at my watch and scrambled to my feet. Time for the handlers involved in the first race of the day to collect their dogs from the kennel house and prepare them for racing. Plus, if I didn’t move away from Temptation Incarnate right this moment… I’d do something I’d regret later, like take Ben on top of a table in the middle of the betting ring at the Gawler track with a couple of hundred spectators cheering me on. Hell, the chief steward would throw the book at me. And it wouldn’t be the Kama Sutra either. More like Crime and Punishment.

  Before I could move off toward the kennel house to collect Witchy Woman for the first race of the day, an open maiden for dogs that hadn’t yet won a race, Bob and Marjorie Sanders, two of my favorite owners, bore down on me.

  “Hi Kat. How do you think our boy, Clark, will go today?” Bob asked, goosing my cheek with a noisy kiss. “Worth risking a couple of thousand on him?”

  Before I could answer I was engulfed in the comforting scent of vanilla as Bob’s wife, Marjorie, clasped me in a bone crunching bear hug. “Don’t bother answering that old fossil, dear,” she said. “Just ignore him. He’s pulling your leg. I swear—some days my eighty five-year-old husband acts like he’s going through delayed adolescence.” She tutted and rolled her eyes. “Two thousand dollars? We’ll be investing our usual two dollars each-way on Clark—regardless of whether he has a chance or not.” She stepped back and eyed me with concern. “It’s good to see you at the track again, dear. Are you well? Recovered from what that evil man tried to do to you?” She shook her head, tightly permed gray hair like a silver helmet. “If I had my way, he’d be sleeping on a bed of nails every night and never see the outside of a prison again.”

  “I’m fine now, thanks, Marjorie. And glad to be back racing.” I smiled at the two representatives of the RSL Aged Care facility, the syndicate that owned one of my best up-and-coming young dogs. White haired, in their eighties, and devoted to each other, Marjorie and Bob never missed an opportunity to see their dog race. Win or lose, the lively couple treated each outing like a festive event. In fact, when Clark, known to his race-track fans as Wonder Boy, qualified for the final of the Derby a couple of months ago, the RSL organized buses to bring all the residents of the Home to the track. Unfortunately that didn’t eventuate. Due to the ferocity of the fire that burnt my kennels to the ground, Clark, like all my greyhounds, had been suffering from smoke inhalation and had to be scratched from the Derby final.

  Leaving the Sanders husband and wife team to regale Ben with humorous stories of their exploits at the Retirement Home, I joined the other seven handlers with dogs engaged in the first race. Even
after this morning’s stressful activities, I couldn’t wait for the meeting to start. To me, training and racing greyhounds was up there with Christmas—losing your virginity—winning the lottery—a date with the delectable Hugh Jackman…

  Okay, okay, maybe cancel the last one.

  But hey, you know what I mean. The thrill of watching those beautiful canine athletes gallop around the track, striving with every sinew and muscle, gave me goose bumps. No matter how many times I watched greyhounds in action—it was always an enormous buzz.

  My first entrant for the day, Witchy Woman, a black brindle bitch with snow white paws, wriggled and leaped in the air like a firecracker while I struggled to fit a stretchy pink lycra rug over her head and ease it down across her back. It was like she was saying, ‘for Woof’s sake, just let me onto the track so I can show ’em how good I am’.

  “Okay, Witchy, not long now,” I told her and gently tugged her ears. “How about saving all that enthusiasm for the race?” As usual, the wriggling ball of energy ignored my advice. I shook my head at her like a proud Mama with a recalcitrant but gifted child as she bounced outside into the parade ring on the end of her lead. After letting her empty out I trotted her briskly up and down on the grass to warm and stretch her muscles. Box eight should suit the little black brindle bitch as she was a wide runner. Not overly fast out of the traps, she had a powerful finish and I hoped, as she matured, she’d become a handy distance proposition.

  After placing my dog in the starting box nearest the outside fence, I stood back with the other handlers and let out a shaky sigh. It was all up to Witchy now. The lure approached, the lids lifted and, as predicted, my girl jumped last. Please don’t get hurt. Mouth dry, I watched as the little dog stayed wide on the track, negotiated the first bend without trouble and once she found her balance in the back straight, began to lengthen stride. You can do it, Witchy! Although still a pup and at the beginning of her racing career, this bitch was awesome to watch. In full stride she was a perfect example of the old cliché—poetry in motion.

  “Go girl!”

  And go she did. In the back straight Witchy lay fifth—when she rounded the home turn and passed me at the boxes she was third—by the time she crossed the finish line she was two lengths in front and pulling away.

  A massive run—and a welcome addition to my bank account.

  After that it was as though my greyhounds had sprouted wings and could do no wrong. From three dogs to race, Witchy and Clark were winners and the unplaced dog, Bugs, who was knocked out of the race on the first turn, still managed to rattle home for third. From my 50% share of the prize money I had enough to pay last month’s overdue mortgage, cash to pay the feed man and maybe buy a new tire for my car.

  I couldn’t stop smiling.

  Lofty was in the last race of the day, the best-eight nominated for the Gawler division of the Country Championships. If he won today, he’d represent Gawler against the winners of the other country tracks in the final.

  After waiting for Chris, the vet on duty, to apply a one inch track-leg bandage to Lofty’s left hind leg, I floated into the parade ring. Couldn’t douse my enormous grin. Hey, if this winner’s high could be bottled, people would queue at their state’s Greyhound Racing office to apply for a license. Much healthier than popping pills, sniffing white powder or smoking weed. I smiled at Lofty—a picture of canine arrogance strutting on the end of his lead. A short-priced favorite to win the race, you’d swear the dog had studied the bookmakers’ odds and listened to the tote fluctuations on the radio.

  It was as I paused by the railing to let Lofty cock his leg and scratch dirt over his back—show those punters leaning over the fence what a fine specimen of greyhound he was—that I spotted a flash of purple toward the rear of the spectators. My heart stopped, my stomach lurched toward my cracked black shoes and my grin melted and trickled off my face. The color purple? A man was talking to Big Mick Harrison, a bookmaker. Just a blur of purple and then he was gone.

  Ben sauntered up beside me, bringing his usual practical warmth and reassurance with him. “You okay?” he said, one hand resting on the head of a lightly framed fawn dog in a red racing rug. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost?”

  “I think I have.” A shiver skittered through me as I peered at the crowd gathered around the parade ring. “Did you see him?”

  “See who?”

  “The old guy in the purple pants I was telling you about earlier. You know, the creep who stole Stella.” I tightened my hold on the leather lead and edged the dog closer to my side for protection. “Maybe he’s after Lofty now.”

  Ben shook his head, a look of bewilderment on his face. “Why would he be after Lofty?”

  “’Cos Lofty’s red brindle, just like Stella.”

  “That’s not a reason to steal a dog. Come on, Kat, you’re imagining things. A geriatric guy wearing purple pants to a greyhound track would stand out like a neon sign. If he was out there, we’d see him.”

  “Maybe, but it makes more sense that he’d be after Lofty than a GAP dog.” After all, I know what I’d seen and it was definitely a flash of purple. And what about my gut feeling? I’d be foolish not to trust instincts. When I’d gone off alone to meet Peter Manning, I’d ignored my gut telling me things weren’t quite kosher—and look where that landed me. Inside a pale blue satin-lined coffin at Peter’s father’s Funeral Home. No. The new Kat McKinley was more street wise.

  Less trusting.

  I snorted inwardly as I thought of the way Peter had accused me of being naive and too nice, as though niceness was a debilitating disease. Well, if nothing else, this gal learned from her mistakes.

  Alert to my surroundings, I vowed to do whatever it took to protect Lofty. Even if it meant paying a locksmith to install a foolproof lock on my temporary kennel house. I loved the big ugly dog. He was the star of my racing team. A great character. And oh yeah, he now belonged to my mother and if anything happened to my mother’s dog and she didn’t get her outlay back via his race earnings, she’d not only string me to the nearest gum tree by my ears—I’d have to give up training greyhounds.

  And that was unthinkable.

  The steward at the gate who was calling entrants to line up from one to eight ready to go out onto the track, broke into my musings. Ben gave my shoulder a quick squeeze before positioning his dog beside the gate, first in line, while I tacked on the end with Lofty, who was wearing the pink rug, number eight.

  As I followed the rest of the field out onto the track, I took a deep breath and let it out slowly in an attempt to disperse all toxic thoughts. Ben was right. It was probably a woman in purple slacks talking to the two men. Two wins and a third—things were going great today and I shouldn’t let a flash of purple in the crowd spoil my euphoria.

  But what if Purple Pants was here at the track? What if at the end of the race he grabbed Lofty and threw him in his piece-of-shit car and drove off with him?

  Oh, God…the deep-breath-letting-out-toxins trick wasn’t working. Okay, time to appeal to the big guns and ask the Universe to take over. Think positive thoughts and allow karma to replace stress. Easier than reciting your A-B-C. Everything was going to be fine. No-one could get to Lofty while we were at the track. Enjoy the success.

  Dragging these thoughts along with much needed air into my lungs, I followed the officiating steward and the other seven handlers past the starting boxes and on another fifty meters along the track. Hey, no-one could hijack Lofty while we were surrounded by people. I dredged up a smile. However, as we turned and made our way back along the track in readiness to load the dogs into the metal starting boxes, I couldn’t stop myself from scrutinizing the faces of the people lining the fence. You, know—just in case. And the fact that I checked the color of every pair of slacks, jeans, trousers and track-suits on the way, well, that was just plain common sense.

  “Good luck everyone,” I said after we’d loaded the greyhounds into their respective boxes, closed the doors and stepped up
onto the viewing steps.

  All around the air crackled with nervous energy as we held our collective breaths waiting for the lids to rise.

  A cheeky grin creased Ben’s face. “And may the best dog win—even if the best dog is mine.”

  “Pull the other one, Benno!”

  “Ya gotta be joking, mate. That bag of bones of yours couldn’t run out of sight on a dark night.”

  Ignoring the good natured ribbing around him, Ben widened his grin into a cocky taunt. “Hey, at least he doesn’t need spectacles to find the lure like your mutt, Jimmy. My dog, Cool Customer, is a sure thing. Reckon he’ll win by the length of the straight.”

  Ben’s nose squished and his dark eyes twinkled. Ooh, be still my heart. He looked so cute. If we weren’t surrounded by stewards and trainers I’d have stood on tiptoe and kissed him right on the tip of his squishy nose. Especially as that slutty Mary Parker was draping herself all over him and batting her eyelashes at him.

  I sent her a lethal hands-off-my-man glare and elbowed Ben in the ribs. “Your dog win this race? In your dreams, Benjamin.”

  Before Ben could retaliate, the mechanical lure, situated on the rail, fired up with a high-pitched buzz that sent the dogs over the edge, barking and scratching at the grill to get out. As the lure roared past the starting boxes, the lids shot open. I held my breath. Would Lofty jump? Or would he miss the start and find trouble? I needn’t have worried. The pink rug a fashion statement on his red brindle body, Lofty pinged from the outside box, cut straight across the field, and was two lengths in front before they’d passed the winning post the first time around.

  I grinned up at Ben. Now it was only a matter of by how far the big ugly dog would win.

  Thirty point eight seconds later, Lofty galloped past the post in full stretch and the race caller declared Big Mistake the winner by six lengths. What a star! What a champ! In two weeks’ time, he’d be Gawler’s representative in the final of the Country Championships.