Cleaner way to get HABTM value with associated Model using CakePHP - cakephp

Question

I have the following setup:
Model: User
Model: Client
User hasAndBelongsToMany Client
Client hasAndBelongsToMany User
DB Tables:
Users
id
lots of fields
Clients
id
lots of fields
Cliens_Users
id
client_id
user_id
status
Everything is working just peachy but I am wondering if there is a better way to get the status field (associated with the HABTM table) with my Client model.
Here is what I'm doing:
ClientsController.php
public function view($id = null) {
$this->Client->id = $id;
if (!$this->Client->exists()) {
throw new NotFoundException(__('Invalid client'));
}
$this->Client->contain('User.id');
$this->Client = $this->Client->read(null, $id);
$this->set('client', $this->Client);
}
the var_dump on my $this->Client looks like this:
array
'Client' =>
array
'id' => string '1' (length=1)
'first_name' => string 'Matt' (length=4)
'last_name' => string 'Moses' (length=4)
'address_1' => string '123 S Happy Lane' (length=16)
'address_2' => string '' (length=0)
'city' => string 'Yourtown' (length=5)
'state' => string 'TX' (length=2)
'zip' => string '12345' (length=5)
'phone_home' => string '8014567899' (length=10)
'phone_work' => string '8014567899' (length=10)
'phone_cell' => string '8014567899' (length=10)
'email' => string 'matt#matt.com' (length=13)
'created' => string '2012-06-13 04:41:19' (length=19)
'modified' => string '2012-06-13 04:41:19' (length=19)
'User' =>
array
0 =>
array
'id' => string '1' (length=1)
'ClientsUser' =>
array
...
Clients/view.ctp
...
<?php echo $client['User'][0]['ClientsUser']['status']; ?>
...
To me this last line screams "there is a cleaner way" but I can't seem to find anything on the matter. Any thoughts?