The Wicked Flea

the Trasks’ wily-fox scheme to myself. On the one hand, the scam was none of my business. On the other hand, Charlie is a dog, and dogs are my business. Morally speaking, where does that leave me? On the side of the dog. Where else?
    That reminds me. Zsa Zsa. All along, it had seemed to me that there was something terribly wrong with her. Her bad hips must have caused her terrible pain, she probably had an aggressive temperament to begin with, and Sylvia was an irresponsible owner. All true. But there was more. On the day of horrors, the cops had no sooner shown up, taken Wilson into custody, and set about taping off the area and taking down names, when Zsa Zsa collapsed and had a seizure that went on and on. I had the comfort of knowing that although she looked as if she were suffering, she was deeply unconscious. Even so, I threw hysterics until the police agreed to call a vet. But Zsa Zsa died. Although she’d instigated the dog fight, I felt sick at the idea that Rowdy had inflicted a mortal wound. To my relief, the police ordered a necropsy—a veterinary autopsy—just in case Zsa Zsa’s death had some connection with Sylvia’s. It didn’t. And according to the vet who performed the necropsy, the stress of the dog fights may have triggered the seizure activity, but Rowdy hadn’t killed Zsa Zsa. The main finding of the necropsy was a brain tumor. I felt stupid. I’d known all along that there was something aberrant about Zsa Zsa. I should’ve guessed what it was. All the members of Ceci’s dog group felt the same way I did. In the peculiar fashion of people devoted to dogs, we mourned a dog we hadn’t even liked.
    The dog group is in partial hibernation for the winter, but Ceci has stayed in close touch with Noah, who is planning to regularize and upgrade his position as mayor of the dog group by running for mayor of Newton. Ceci is working hard on his one-issue campaign: Noah promises that if elected, he will lead Newton into a new era of fully fenced off-leash dog parks throughout the city. If I lived in Newton, he’d have my vote. On the subject of Newton’s public servants, let me report that Officer Jennifer Pasquarelli has been reinstated after successfully completing a social skills training program. Kevin informs me that Jennie graduated at the top of her class. I notice, however, that Kevin has still not introduced Jennie to his mother.
    Douglas has also entered a social-skills program of sorts. It’s a self-help group for sexual addicts. He dropped out of treatment with Dr. Foote. So did I. Dr. Foote knew that Douglas was frightening women by exposing himself in the park, she knew that he had witnessed Sylvia’s murder, and she did nothing to protect the women or to bring Sylvia’s murderer to justice. Furthermore, she was of no help to Douglas or to me.
    But those aren’t the reasons I quit seeing her. No, I dropped out because of an incident that occurred only a few days after Anita’s near-slaying. The incident should have amounted to nothing. In the shrink-infested quarters of Cambridge and Newton, therapists and their patients run into one another all the time at restaurants, theaters, health clubs, parties, and everywhere else. Big deal. As it happened, I ran into Dr. Foote in Harvard Square. She was crossing the street from the Harvard Coop to the kiosk, and we were crossing in the opposite direction. By “we” I mean, as always, Rowdy and Kimi. Being the sort of friendly human being who does not need to be sent off for social skills training, I smiled, nodded, and said hello to Dr. Foote just as if she were a normal human being instead of a psychiatrist. The dogs, who are even more socially skilled than I am, were as quick as ever to pick up on my gregarious attitude and to add their own conviviality, which took the form of bouncing up and down in an unmistakably merry and entirely nonthreatening manner while issuing throaty peals of woo-woo-woo. And instead of returning our greetings and going on to admire the dogs, just what did Dr. Foote do? I’ll tell you. She screamed and ran. Since I couldn’t imagine what had upset her, I tried to go to her aid. The dogs, I’m proud to report, were just as solicitous as I was. In brief, Rowdy, Kimi, and I sprinted through the crowd by the Coop and had no difficulty catching up with Dr. Foote before she reached Brattle Square. When we did, she keeled over. Abruptly. I’d never before seen anyone black out so rapidly. One second,