Fifteen Dogs

by André Alexis

  – Tsk, tsk, tsk … here, boy!

  a hand as it travels in the fur of your back as if searching for something, the sweetness of an unlikely perfume. Kingston Road was always familiar yet somehow always strange. Then again, what about Beech or Willow? They were among the avenues he did not know well. He recognized them by their smells and the way their names looked on street signs, but they were little more than ways to the lake, ways that shimmered in his memory: stretches of green and grey, lawns and sidewalk – dubious, hard to recall. But knowing a territory is knowing what is left to know. Beech and Willow were part of what Prince had left to explore, part of the Beach’s great wealth.

  Just as importantly, the Beach was where dogs were usually kept on leashes. This was a relief, because although, like Majnoun, Prince had learned to defend himself, he disliked having to subdue other dogs. For one thing, every dog dominated was one fewer to whom he could speak or teach his language. On occasion, he allowed himself to be bitten, but this was no better. Dogs who assumed they could dominate you made the poorest listeners. Then again, as he got older, it was more difficult to deal with those who were aggressive. So, odd though the thought was to him, Prince was grateful for leashes.

  Then, too, the Beach was where humans, for the most part, left him alone. They had better things to do, it seemed, like keeping large balls in the air or gliding on shoes with small wheels or plunging themselves into the lake – whose waters reeked (marvellously) of urine, fish and a thousand dirty socks. The most serious problems Prince had with humans came when he was forced to defend himself against a dog that belonged to one of them. Humans could be brutal in defending their dogs and, what’s more, Prince knew there would be difficulties if he bit one of them. So, on the rare occasions when humans attacked him, Prince ran for it, bolting over territory he knew as well as he had ever known territory.

  Perhaps unsurprisingly, Prince’s most moving poems were about the Beach. ‘The Lake Comes to the Fringe,’ for instance, was composed in 2011, during the summer before his death.

  The lake comes to the fringe

  while lights go up around the bay.

  Somewhere near, cow flesh is singed.

  Smoke floats above the walkway.

  I’ve eaten green that comes up black,

  risen cold from torrid mud.

  I’ve licked my paws and tasted blood.

  What is this world of busy lies?

  Some urban genie feeding food to flies!

  With the Beach, in his final years, Prince had found a home again, at last. Cruel and unbiddable, Apollo took it from him.

  To begin with, Prince lost his sight. Blindness descended on him over the space of two days, after a gust of wind sent sun-poisoned sand into his eyes and ears. At first, it was as if a grey mist hung over the world. The mist was thin but persistent: a softness, halos around sources of light, things in the distance vanishing as if behind an approaching white curtain. Then, the mist grew thick and close, as if it had turned to fog. Finally, all was grey and Prince could see nothing: no lights, no halos, no cars, no people, no buildings. Only a grey that was grey like grey blinkers over his eyes.

  Though his blindness took time to efface the world, it was as traumatic as if it had come between one moment and the next. Prince was under the wooden staircase near the top of Glen Stewart Park when he realized that he could no longer see a thing. That is, he was well away from any of the homes that were ‘his.’ So, now blind, he had to make his way through the Beach to … where, exactly?

  Being an old but obviously bright dog, Prince was welcome in a handful of homes where he would be fed, petted and sheltered. The humans in these homes were all kind – none was as overbearing as Randy had been – but Prince had not wanted to be stuck in any particular house, choosing instead an independence that allowed him to explore his territory, to compose his poems in solitude, to encounter the world on his own terms. Also: after a few days, he inevitably grew tired of the behaviour his presence elicited in humans: cooing, fur rubbing, rolling about on the ground with him, smugness, condescension, chirpily rendered orders

  – Here, boy! Here, boy!

  – Roll over! Roll over!

  and fluttering-voiced addresses

  – Who’s a good boy, eh? Who’s a good dog?

  No matter how much he tried to accept that their behaviour was dictated by their nature, Prince sometimes found human attention so distracting that he couldn’t think straight. For this reason, in summer, he often stayed out, sleeping in whatever makeshift den he could find – bushes, benches, boxes, etc. In winter, it’s true, he was forced to seek shelter, staying here or there for weeks at a time. But even in winter Prince tried to keep a certain distance from humans. Now that he was blind, with whom would he stay? Whose company would he choose, knowing that he might be with them for good?

  There were only two homes he seriously considered. One belonged to a woman in a small house, far away from Glen Stewart and so far from the beach that he might not experience his beloved lake often enough. She was kind. She allowed him more freedom than any other human had, content to feed him and let him alone, patting him when she imagined he needed it. The woman smoked, however, the smell of cigarettes almost obliterating all others. And the ‘feel’ of her was sometimes frightening. From time to time, it was as if she longed to kill something. So the woman’s place would not do as a permanent den. That left the house on Neville Park. It was on the edge of his territory, not far from the lake. The humans in it – a woman and three men – were all kindly disposed toward him. Even better: none clung to him or condescended. They put food down when he was there, let him out in the morning, let him back in the evening. The female paid the most attention to him, but he could bear her affection because she was not often demonstrative.

  In general, humans were – as far as Prince was concerned – overly emotional and emotionally obvious. You could tell a human was angry from three blocks away, and that’s without the creature growling, lunging or baring its teeth! They were beacons of emotion and it was often disruptive being near them. There were, of course, exceptions. Certain humans were unreadable or unstable. They could change mood in an instant, going from kindness to murderous intent without warning. He was very nearly kicked to death by one such, a man talking to himself on a park bench who called him over in a singsong voice and then kicked him hard in the ribs when he was in range. It was lucky for Prince that people had been around to protect him, but the incident confirmed his belief that humans were all – save Kim – potentially lethal. Naturally, this belief was at the back of his mind when he chose the house on Neville Park. The woman and three men had never been cruel to him, though there was always the chance they could turn.

  Grey though the world was, it was still alive with scents: new scents, old scents, scents that were landmarks and others that, in their vividness, threatened to lead him astray. The trees and the beams of the wooden steps and bridges gave off a familiar and comforting smell – principally, dog’s urine. As well, there were plant smells that he knew and could situate: this garden (at the edge of the park) with its flowers and weeds, that one with its vegetables. There was the smell of creek water, mud, dust, small animals, perfume, human sweat and bodies. He could, he felt, make his way to Queen Street, because his sense of smell was almost as acute now as it had been when he was younger. The real difficulty, he thought, would come not with the terrain itself but with the usual hazards: the humans in his way, dogs sniffing at him, and so on. But he fell down the first flight of steps he came to, smacking his head on the landing, his bearings momentarily lost.

  How frightening it was to fall directionless into that grey nothing! Prince yelped instinctively. Once he’d recovered from the shock, however, he found that the pain was bearable – he’d known worse – and the fall taught him to be more cautious. Glen Stewart Park, familiar though it was, was hazardous. So he moved more deliberately, sniffing out every smell, listening for any danger, putting one paw cautiousl
y in front of the next, trying to anticipate the flights of steps and the changes of direction the walkway took.

  But he fell down the next flight of steps he came to as well. This time the pain was severe. It felt as if he had broken something inside. He yelped, then struggled to stand up. And when he was up on his legs, he was unsure of which direction he was facing, there being no up no down no to nor fro. The only good thing – if you could call it a good thing – was that he’d fallen off the wooden walkway and into the grass beside the spring that ran through the park. He would not have to worry about stairs, so long as he stayed beside the water. If he went in the right direction, he would find one of the roads out of Glen Stewart.

  Despite his tendency to introspection, Prince was something of an optimist in hard times. Having a task to perform liberated him from himself. So it was that, now, having to make his way out of the park, he ignored his blindness – or, rather, accepted it – and went on his way as deliberately as he could, unsteady on his feet, his ­journey distracting him from worry. He made his way to Glen Manor Drive without too much trouble. He knew this stretch of ground (its smell and feel) so well that he scarcely had to think, his body doing the thinking (or remembering) for him. He found the path that rose up from the park to the road and then he followed the road down toward Queen, walking unsteadily on the sidewalk, looking like a drunken creature, until he came to the first corner.

  Crossing a street was distressing in the best of circumstances. Glen Manor Drive was not busy – it was seldom busy – but cars always came at you so quickly. He had seen what they did to dogs who did not get out of the way. Their bodies were crushed into the road and left to rot until not even the hungriest things – blackbirds or maggots – would eat them. He preferred to cross at stoplights with humans around to shield him. Here, now, there were no lights and he was on his own and he could not help going slowly. He stood at the edge of the sidewalk for a long time, listening intently, and then, because he had to cross and knew it, he stepped onto the road, sniffing and listening, backing up suddenly on hearing a noise that might have been a car, almost losing his direction, before somehow making it to the distant point across the street, relieved to feel the step up to relative safety. And how wonderful to smell the great red house, its grounds, where he was sometimes fed and petted. He knew exactly where he was! He briefly considered begging at the house but he didn’t want to risk being delayed there. So he went on.

  The second corner was more difficult. He had to cross the street, then continue on around a curve where there was no sidewalk. He could see it in his mind. He knew where he was. He could smell Ivan Forrest Gardens before him to one side and the lake in the distance. He sat at the corner to collect himself, to ready himself for the crossing. It was then that he became conscious of humans approaching. No, what he heard was a group of humans bearing down on him: a crowd, it sounded like, coming fast, their soft-soled shoes slapping on the pavement, their breath escaping in collective gusts, and then the smell – sweat, rubber, genitals and dust. The wind brought it all to him like a foretaste of trouble.

  What was going on? Was he in their way?

  He made himself as unobtrusive as he could, curling his tail beneath him, crouching down. And then they were on him.

  – Watch out for the dog!

  Someone hit him.

  – Christ on a cross! Get out of the way, doggy!

  Someone hit him again, perhaps the same someone, stepping on his tail, pushing him aside. Prince yelped, made himself as compact as he could, then listened to the sound of them as they passed: feet slapping the road, dirt grinding on pavement, the soles of their shoes squeaking. Prince had always found these stampedes bewildering. But not knowing where the runners were coming from or how many there were made this instance alarming. At some point, one of the humans reached down to pat him on the head, and that contact, coming out of nowhere as it did, was the most frightening thing of all.

  As suddenly as it was upon him, the stampede was gone, the sound of it receding. His heart beat violently and his body shook and it took him a long while – sitting at the intersection of Pine Crescent and Glen Manor – before he could go on without shaking. It occurred to him that it might be better to travel at night, to wait until all one could hear were crickets and the occasional, threatening shush of a passing car. But he pressed on, courageously stepping onto the street and making his way to the other side of Pine Crescent, then down into Ivan Forrest Gardens, where there were trails but no streets and no cars.

  For a moment, as he made his way through Ivan Forrest, Prince almost forgot that he could not see. This was the part of his territory he knew best. He could navigate the terrain by the smell of his own urine alone. More: he could almost see the trees and posts where he had left his markings. He still went slowly, of course, the aches and pains of his body slowing him. He listened for humans, sniffed about for a piece of something to eat, stopped to accommodate such dogs as wanted to sniff his anus or genitals. Any fears he’d had that, vulnerable as he was, he might be attacked, were allayed. His fellow dogs could tell at once that he was in distress. They all expressed their sympathy, treating him with a kind of deference after licking his face and smelling his breath.

  Prince spent what was left of the day in the gardens, recovering from a journey that would have taken him no time at all had he been younger or, even, sighted. That night, he slept close to a willow. He imagined himself hidden, but he was very nearly in the open, easily seen by all the creatures that walked, flew or crept past him on their way through the gardens.

  In the early morning, he shivered himself awake and was almost surprised to discover that he was still blind. His blindness was so new it did not yet seem real. He was fifteen. His old bones – and his recent injuries from falling – made it painful for him to rise from the ground. His teeth chattered. The world was its morning self: quiet, the occasional, distant sound of a vehicle, the rattle and clang of the streetcar when it passed, the raw smell of a new day coming through the dew, mist and cold. He was disoriented and, now, more frightened than he’d been the previous day. He could smell the lake and he made his way toward it, leaving the park behind.

  Prince had only one thing in mind: the house with the woman and three men. As it happened, circumstances favoured this part of his journey. There were few people about. Few people and few cars. He crossed Queen Street cautiously, stumbling like he was rabid, listening for cars or streetcars with every step. There were more streets to cross, more cars to listen for, but as he went south, the lake grew ever more present, leading him on to the end of the street where, all at once, the road was gone and he stumbled onto the boardwalk.

  Even on his worst days, the lake buoyed his spirits. It was a measure of Prince’s distress, on this morning, that he stopped only to take in the smell of it – licking his nose and moving it back and forth in the direction of the water – before carefully following the boardwalk, all the way to the bottom of Neville Park and up to what would be his last home.

  Prince’s first weeks in Neville Park were not unhappy, despite his blindness. He had survived a frightening journey, and the inspiration that came of survival – the exhilaration of having made it – carried him through the days, as he learned to negotiate the house without hurting himself.

  He’d chosen his hosts well. The family took him in and they kept him even after discovering that he could no longer see. The woman in particular was kind. She put down food when it was time and took him for the short walks that were all he could manage, the aches and pains of his injuries in Glen Stewart almost crippling him, his deterioration quickening, it seemed, with his decision to settle in one place.

  He missed his territory and his independence. In these first weeks, Prince would sometimes forget that he could not go out on his own until, forcing himself up to go to the door, he would bump into a chair or an appliance or a human. But there was compensation. As he accepted the idea that he would never see again, he began to rely on
his memory and, in doing so, his memory became sharper (or, at least, more vivid), until he held a picture of the Beach in his imagination that he came to treasure almost as much as he had treasured the real thing.

  Nor was death, whose approach he could feel, a source of worry. He thought about it, of course. He wondered when it would come and he mourned his ever-diminishing capacities, missing the things he had once taken for granted: sniffing out the breath of a dog he did not know, for instance, or running because the sheer pleasure of some great thing could not be expressed otherwise, or digging out bits of food half-buried in sand, or biting down on a newfound stick. The death that approached was a source of curiosity more than anything else. His final poems, which are among his most poignant, reflect Prince’s mood.

  ‘What is the name of he who comes’ is the last poem he composed and it is characteristic of the work done while he was blind.

  What is the name of he who comes

  with eyes closed and fingers black,

  the one who draws the curtains back

  when dawn has come?

  ‘Agha Thanatos’ or just plain ‘Death’?

  When will I know which is right?

  Prince’s poetry was, indirectly, the cause of his only true regret in the months before his death. As his strength faded, it became unavoidably clear that his work and his language would, with his death, disappear from the face of the earth. In the same way that the world had left him when he’d grown blind, so would his language leave the world. It would be effaced, all of the dogs who spoke it having died out.