Bubbles and His Girl

By the serene shore of a lake in New York's Central Park, an Afghan hound named Bubbles (or, more formally, Babou Bali Hai of Quo Vadis) regards his pensive mistress Cheryl Bellamy with a gaze soulful and adoring. Cheryl, 14, and her brother Athelston (or Boots) use the park to train Bubbles for the show ring. Cheryl handles him and, though Bubbles and his mistress have earned only one blue ribbon together, it is obvious that they are always, and classically, first with one another.

PHOTO

NAT FINKELSTEIN