by Jean Gill
And so my life plodded on. I passed whole stretches between nightfalls without telling myself that Marc had promised he’d be back. My tail wagged when I saw Beryle smile at me. She sneaked me little bits of cheese or saucisson and gave them to me if I’d sit for her. She told me that Jean-Pierre worked too hard, had lots of worries and that when he was on holiday he was a different man. This different man took her out for meals, kissed her a lot, played with his children, wore shorts. But I just had to take her word for it as there was no way they were taking me on holiday. I’d heard Jean-Pierre telling Beryle that.
I let Gilles and Fred chase me around the garden and tried not to knock them over when I changed direction. I wasn’t scared any more of them whooping while they ran, or of their little hands diving into my fur. Sometimes we sat together, and I felt the old warmth of the puppy-pile flooding me as their skinny little bodies flanked mine. If Gilles was there on his own, he’d tell me about school, how he liked English but got stuck in Maths, and how he’d have to work on his Maths because he wanted to be a doctor. And if Fred was there on his own, he’d tell me about how his big brother was the most important thing in his life, how he didn’t think he’d manage when Gilles went up to big school and he was left to fight his own battles. And I’d listen and wonder what it really meant, being a brother.
All in all, I was starting to belong, when it happened. I had two feeding-times, early and late. Early was peaceful, just me and Beryle, and I could relax. Late was like eating in the middle of a wolf-attack. Gilles and Fred were just home from school, charging around the kitchen, grabbing biscuits or crisps or some cheese out of the fridge, passing behind me, beside me, pushing each other and shouting. Beryle was shouting back at them to get them to behave and the stress was buzzing in my head like a hornet. Usually, Jean-Pierre was still at work but on this occasion he had come home early, right into kitchen chaos, where I was trying to swallow the second half of my bowl of food.
His voice boomed over the others. ‘Stop that racket, all of you.’ Beryle turned red, probably from stopping in mid-shout. Gilles let go of Fred, who lost his balance, grabbed at a chair and kept falling. His half-eaten sandwich fell straight into my dog bowl where I was concentrating on eating and I snapped at the unexpected treat as it arrived in mid-air, followed a second later by Fred’s hand as he kept falling and stretched towards my bowl to break his fall. Fred shrieked, whether because he was shocked by falling or whether because he saw my teeth snapping near his hand, I’ll never know. He started to cry and Beryl pulled him up, sat down herself, pulled him onto her lap and comforted him. Jean-Pierre was glaring at me. I turned back to the remaining food, a pleasant aftertaste of bread and cheese lingering in my mouth.
‘That is it!’ the voice boomed. ‘If anything, he’s becoming more aggressive!‘ I felt sorry for Gilles as it was only the sort of brotherly spat that would be forgotten in five minutes when the two of them would be building Playmobil cities together.
‘But Jean-Pierre...’ Beryle began. Fred was choking on his tears, crying because he was crying and couldn’t stop, not because he wanted to. A bruise was already starting on his knee.
‘You’ve been too soft with him from the start – I did warn you! Two months now and he’s getting worse!’ Beryle cuddled Fred closer. ‘And I’m not having a threat to my child staying in this house a moment longer!’ I looked at Gilles, wondering when he too was going to burst into tears. His face was ashen.
‘Dad, Izzie didn’t mean it,’ he whispered. And my heart broke as I heard my real name at the same time as I understood. I was the aggressive one. I would have to go. Even then, I thought Fred would sort it out, or Beryle. Fred sobbed louder. Beryle opened her mouth.
‘I’ve never seen him do that before.’
‘You would say that, wouldn’t you! Well even if it’s true, it’s once too many.’ Look, I begged them with my eyes, cheese sandwich, not a mark on Fred, not a mark. I would never. But I knew from the taste turning sour in my mouth that there was no trace of cheese sandwich. I knew how slow Human perceptions were. Perhaps even Fred thought I’d meant to bite him.
‘No, Beryle. You saw that programme on TV. A dog that will bite someone who touches his food is dangerous and I’m not having a dangerous dog round my children. Another little accident like that and Fred might not be so lucky.’ The lucky individual was still crumpled and bemused on his mother’s lap, his shoulders heaving, his lip trembling.
‘What are you going to with him?’ Beryle asked, her voice quieter and quieter. I could hear the hum of the fridge.
‘The only responsible thing. I’ll take him to the S.P.A. refuge.’
‘No!’ screamed Gilles. ‘You can’t get rid of Izzie!’
‘One day you’ll understand, son.’
‘I hate you!’ Gilles rushed from the room and his feet thumped two stairs at a time up to the slam of his bedroom door.
‘We promised Marc,’ Beryle said.
‘Not to take on an aggressive dog, we didn’t. And he’s moved to another life, no chance of him taking the dog back, so it would be cruel to even tell him. No we’ve got to do the responsible thing, however hard it is.’ Jean-Pierre tousled the hair of his younger son. ‘The dog will be well looked-after and they’ll find an owner with no children, who can give him the discipline he needs – no soppiness.’ His gaze made it clear where the soppiness had come from. Beryle returned the gaze, hard-eyed, her arms tightening round her son. ‘I’m sure Daddy’s right,’ she lied, ‘Izzie will find someone who loves him as much as we do and can look after him better.’
And so, after some collar-dragging, I found myself left at the S.P.A.. Sirius of the Soum de Gaia, aggressive dog, not to be trusted with children.
Chapter 8.
The outlook was limited. Unless you liked concrete, fencing and dozens of dogs. One of whom was staring up aggressively at my knee-caps, unable to crick his neck enough to meet my eyes.
‘What are you in here for?’ he demanded. Terrier fur covered a long short body that said ‘dachshund’ but his pricked ears and pointed muzzle suggested a soupçon of German Shepherd.
I wasn’t really in the mood for discussing racial backgrounds and I had a strong feeling that being a Soum de Gaia didn’t count for much among the inmates here, even if it might help spring me in the extremely unlikely situation that Marc didn’t find me quickly. How exactly he was going to find me was another of those questions that I buried as deep as ever the black Kong toy went in the rose bed.
‘It’s a mistake,’ I told the Dachs-terrier.
His eyes stayed hard. ‘That’s what they all say, so you might as well own up.’ A black, middle-sized pure mongrel charged back from the bars, where he’d had his nose poked through, right by two of the Humans. He was still panting as he gasped, ‘Child molester,’ and six pairs of canine eyes levelled on me, as high as they could reach.
It was the kind of silence that raised my hackles and laid my ears back, ready for attack. None of them were more than middling size and the one-eared whippet was little more than an extra number but the black mongrel and two labrador types, female, were well-muscled, the Dachs-terrier didn’t look like he’d back down easily, and I would really rather not feel the bulldog’s teeth on me, anywhere. She was the one who spoke.
‘Bitten three of the little horrors now,’ she declared.
‘Maisie’s our top scorer against kids,’ I was informed. ‘She’s hoping to hang onto her record and you being a big boy and all, we were wondering.... how many?’
‘One,’ I said, ‘but I didn’t.’
There was a marginal shift towards happy in the wrinkles on Maisie’s face. ‘Three,’ she confirmed, ‘in three different families. Hate them, the way they dart around like rabbits, and shriek and pull you about.’
‘And the really little ones always smell of food, then the moment you chew a bit of stale breakfast off their bib, the Mother’s shrieking like you’d eaten the baby.’ Wrinkling his wire-haired face, Da
chs-terrier reflected. ‘Anyone eaten a baby?’ Negative responses. ‘No, I suppose not. It’s one of those crimes that get talked about and just don’t happen,’ he said, almost wistfully. He turned back to me. ‘They keep sending Maisie off to a family,’ he explained, ‘because she’s so cute, there’s always someone choosing her, and all they want is one less mouth to feed so they don’t mention the fact that Maisie isn’t what you’d call good with children...’
‘I’m very good with them,’ Maisie contradicted. ‘Sort them out in under twenty-four hours even with parental surveillance.’
‘... and then she’s back in here with us till the next sucker turns up.’
‘Good old Maisie,’ came the chorus from the labradors and Maisie flexed her wrinkles to their cutest.
‘I like children,’ objected the black mongrel.
‘You’re just an old softie, Prince,’ Dachs-terrier told him, wuffing under his breath to me, ‘six years old so no chance of a family, too old, and we all know what that means. He can forget his retirement plans.’
’Hey, boys and girls, grub’s on its way.’ A wave of barking had started out of sight and reached the pen beside ours, where another group of three or four dogs were pressed against the wire at the path-side, ears alert and tails starting to wag.
‘You’re in luck, big boy. It’s the princess,’ Dachs-terrier wuffed. ‘Just smell that.’ We all inhaled, deeply, breathing in young sweat, the salt tinged with sweet female scent. Vanilla and hot, clean hair. Shoe polish over dried mud from the river I’d played in with Newfie. She smelled of smiles.
We could hear the clanging of the cage door and glimpse Human clothes, jeans, a bucket swinging amid the eager press of hungry hounds. Her voice, purring. ‘Now then you lot, no pushing, no shoving, no stealing each other’s food. Hey, Jack, how are you today? Clementine, well hello, you.’ She had a word for everyone in turn, by name and the cages where she had been already were quiet, transmitting sleepy dog vibrations, even some of the sighs and snores that come from a full tummy when all’s right with the world. The same calm descended next door, we upped our volume and it was our turn. The cage door rattled and in came the one they called Princess.
‘Hold on now, Jack. And Melba, just hold on a minute.’ She put her bucket down on the concrete floor, gently pushed away Dachs-terrier and a labrador who were investigating a quicker route to food than seemed on offer. The bucket was covered and the Princess crouched beside it and looked me straight in the eyes, her arms held out towards me. I stood stock-still and looked back at her. She had the most undoggy eyes I’ve ever seen. I could see all different coloured rings but don’t ask me to distinguish the colours - I’m not Human! Hazel, I heard someone say, later. You can count on two paws the Humans I’ve looked long in the eye; make it four paws to include dogs, followed of course by a serious knockabout so my memories of the dogs’ eyes are somewhat blurred by the subsequent gnashing of teeth. I’d seen eyes full of love, eyes hard and angry, tired eyes, guilty eyes – but never eyes like these. It was as if the river and the Newfie and my master on the bank had all been distilled into two little pools of fun and friendship. I couldn’t look away.
‘So you’re the little new boy,’ purred the voice. ‘You don’t look so bad. We never get the full story, you know. Sometimes you’re made out worse, sometimes better, sometimes it just depends on who you’re with... people can be so stupid with dogs, so ignorant.’ As if aware that her voice was becoming harsher, she shifted position and resumed, purring again. ‘So little boy, Sirius, are you going to say hello? Come and see me little boy, Sirius...’ she kept looking at me as if she was trying to read something in my face. I still couldn’t move but I couldn’t look away either and I wanted to hear her talk to me again. The purr was reaching right down to my double dewclaws and I liked it. I liked it a lot. She laughed aloud. ‘Izzie,’ she said. ‘Izzie, come and have a cuddle little Izzie.’ The princess towed me into her eyes, steady as the Newfie against the fastest river current, and I was saved, her fingers running through my fur.
The door clanged behind her when she left. I’d been given my own food bowl, and the Princess made sure we’d finished eating, without stealing or scrapping, before she picked up her bucket and moved on to the next pen, leaving a hypnotic calm behind her.
‘They’re not all like that,’ Maisie pointed out, her eyes gradually de-glazing.
‘No-one’s like that,’ said Prince.
‘What is she in for?’ I asked.
‘Poor innocent!’ Maisie rolled on her back laughing, but not for long enough to let anyone take advantage and try a quick dominance challenge. I had the feelng that Maisie was a match for most dogs and I wouldn’t want to face her in a no-holds-barred session. I avoided thinking about three children.
‘Storytime at dusk, everyone, and we’ll get Sirius here up to speed. But for now, let’s have some peace and quiet.’ Dachs-terrier, Jack, stretched out on his back, and was soon cycling his back legs in dream-chase. His confidence in leaving himself so vulnerable made me feel secure, even amongst these strangers, but I wasn’t ready to open up that far and I hugged the side of the cage, protecting one flank, just in case. I kept an eye on the others from time to time, taking turns as to which sleepy eye I flicked open, but gradually sleep took me, shredding the stress of the day into dream cushion-foam.
Twilight, the violet hour, when your eyes turn wolf, ready for the night hunt – or ready to prevent the night hunt as you guard your flock on the mountain beneath the stars. A Soum de Gaia doesn’t need to be taught to protect; the instinct is deep in our blood along with the courage to fight bears, wolves and wild dogs. Twilight is the call of the wild to the wild, the unleashing of the inner wolf to the ancient battleground of dog eat dog. The great protectors of Soum de Gaia legends, Cesar, Achilles, Boudicca, had all been able to tap their inner wolf – and control it. ‘Rip out an enemy throat and lick a friend’s,’ was the protector’s maxim, according to Mother. Her brother worked the mountainside and had prepared from puppyhood, learning from his aunties, uncles and Human. ‘The difference between great protectors and good protectors is a matter of seconds; great protectors can switch from enemy mode (rip throat out) to friends (lick) in one movement. And the dog that takes too long to switch is doomed, whichever way he gets it wrong. And you must feel the bond that gives you strength, the bond that links you with your flock, so that you will protect them with your dying breath.’
This Soum de Gaia woke to twilight, sheepless, penned myself. I could see the start of night-shine in the others’ eyes and some restless pacing told its own story of inner wolves. ‘Storytime!’ The howl came from a pen down-wind of me so I had no idea who started the call but it was taken up all round the compound until Jack barked, ‘Newcomer first,’ and the silence of listening dogs invited me to begin.
Between dark and light, between wolf and dog, I howled my tale to the unseen voices that echoed mine as they lived my life with me. We sang the mountains and my brothers, my Choosing and my Undoing.
‘It isn’t fair!’ my voice belled out.
‘It isn’t fair!’ sang out around me.
‘I didn’t do anything wrong!’
‘He didn’t do anything wrong,’ the pack agreed.
‘And Marc will come for me!’ I howled. ‘He promised.’
‘He will come!’ the voices echoed, reaching for the crescent moon that glowed in a darkening sky.
‘He will come,’ I was hoarse as I finished the big story of such a little life. ‘He will come.’
Jack nudged my leg. ‘Sleep now, little brother. We keep watch over you.’ He barked an ending to the twilight. ‘The dark has risen. Until tomorrow, my friends.’
‘Until tomorrow,’ rose the chorus and then I dropped into a sleep deeper and blacker than under-river.
And so the new pattern of my days took shape. I found out that the Princess was only one of the Humans who brought our food and the time dragged longer and longer between her visits a
s I looked forward to them more and more. One non-feeding time, she turned up with a collar and lead. ‘Now then Izzie,’ she said, crouching and holding out her arms, as she had the first time, ‘I want to know a bit about you to help me find you a home, because you’re just beautiful aren’t you. Look at those big brown eyes of yours.’ She was purring again and it was just the same as before – there I was, with a chain fastened round my neck and the lead in the Princess’ hand. I didn’t have to be shown an open cage door twice – I was out of there! I’d like to say I felt guilty about leaving Jack, Prince and the others languishing in the pen but I was all nose, sniffing dog, dog and different dog, followed by strange petro-chemicals, then overpowering Human sewage that blasted my nose out of action until I cleared it with some sneezing and coughing. I’d been towing the Princess along nicely, mostly on my right but criss-crossing if something interested me, when a sudden jerk on my neck halted me. I looked back but she was still smiling so that was all right. She just hadn’t been properly lead-trained. So I started off again at a good pace, to show her how it went. Ow! Jerk again.
‘You really haven’t been trained to walk nicely, have you,’ she said. Funny, but that was just what I’d been thinking. I figured we’d get there, between us, and wagged my tail to encourage her. You won’t believe this but the poor girl was all over the place, and amazingly rough at times for such a slim thing. I’d get her walking nicely and then she’d suddenly veer off to the right, giving such a yank, I’d have to follow her. Worse, she’d sometimes veer left, tripping me up as she crossed me. Didn’t she know that was bad manners? And she made it clear that she wanted to be on my right all the time – I call that downright fussy to the point of compulsive. Or we’d be trotting along nicely and she’d stop, when there was no smell of any interest at all, and then when I’d really caught hold of a good scent and dug my heels in, she wanted me to walk straight on! No sense to it whatsoever.