The Last Family in England. Matt Haig
of wagging the night before.
Henry looked at me and gently nodded his head. In a rare display of affection, he licked my cheek. ‘You have done well, Prince. I am proud of you.’
I was giddy with pride, and my head filled with park music. ‘You are a good teacher, that’s all.’
‘No, no, Prince. You must not be modest. A happy human Family should not be taken for granted. It does not, as you are well aware, happen by accident. Only those Labradors who devote everything to the cause can achieve such harmonious results.’ He looked over at his own master, Mick, who was busy talking to Adam on the park bench.
‘Anyway, this morning’s tutorial is on Sensory Predictive Awareness,’ he said, turning back towards me. Of course, as a former sniffer dog, this was always Henry’s favourite subject and one in which he excelled. He maintained that not only could you smell trouble, but also that you could smell it in advance.
‘Prediction equals protection, it’s as simple as that,’ he said, as we sniffed our way around one of the oak trunks. ‘If you can smell trouble before it happens, you will be able to protect the Family at all times. The trouble is, the further things are away from happening, the harder they are to smell, and if we leave it to the last minute it is often too late. But the thing to remember is that the future is already locked in the present. If you can not only smell things in the present but also understand what these things mean, you will be able to unravel future possibilities.’
Sensing my bewilderment, he attempted to clarify.
‘In every room of your Family home there will be thousands of smells competing for attention. These will be smells of the past, the present and the future. Take, for instance, the smell of a human. If they have left the room, the scent lingers. You are smelling the past. If they are still in the room with you, then this is the smell of the present. But is it not also possible to smell the human before they enter the room? Of course. So we smell the future every day without even realising it. There are clues all around us as to how everything will end. Smell, that is the secret. Without being able to develop this most important sense the future remains a complete mystery. That is why humans have failed so miserably every time they try. They rely too heavily on seeing things, be it the stars or the palm of their hand. That is why we must look after them, to protect them from future danger. The key is to –’ Henry stopped and sniffed the air. At first I thought he was doing it for dramatic effect. But no. I could smell it too. I looked past him and saw that, right on cue, trouble had arrived. The scariest, sweatiest, most salivating Rottweiler I had ever seen or smelt in my life was staring straight at me.
‘What the fuck are you looking at?’ he growled.
‘Nothing. I’m sorry. I was just –’ I sniffed anxiously for Adam. He smelt miles away.
‘It’s all right, Prince,’ Henry said as he stepped forward. And then, to the Rottweiler: ‘My friend and I are minding our business. We do not want any trouble.’
‘Fuck off, you fucking fuck. The park belongs to me. Can’t you fucking smell? This is my fucking kingdom and I don’t want to share it with two gay fucking Labradors. Now fuck off or I’ll bite your fucking throats out.’
This, I felt, would have been a good time to make our exit. Henry, however, had other ideas.
‘Who are you?’ he asked.
‘What?’
‘I wondered who you were? What you were called?’
‘I’m Lear. Not that it is any of your fucking business.’
‘If you say this is your park, my friend, it is all of our business.’
White globs of saliva dropped from Lear’s vast jaw.
‘Er, Henry,’ I said. ‘Perhaps we should go somewhere else.’
But Henry was not intimidated. ‘Why does it always have to come down to territory?’ Henry asked with an inquisitive sniff. ‘I mean, why is it so important to you? What are you scared of?’
‘Scared?’ said Lear. ‘Scared? Fuck off. I’m not fucking scared of anyfuckingthing.’
‘Please, would it be at all possible for you to mind your language?’ said Henry. ‘We’re Labradors.’
‘I wouldn’t give a fuck if you were the fucking ghost of Lassie, to tell you the fucking truth.’ Lear inched closer to Henry, gaining mass as he did so.
‘And why do you feel the need to resort to such aggressive behaviour? Shouldn’t you be devoting your time to looking after your master, rather than worrying about what other dogs do in the park?’ By now, Henry was clearly pushing his luck. An ominous growl could be heard coming from somewhere deep inside Lear’s expansive bulk. I took a few steps back away from the scene and started to sniff an almost scentless patch of grass. The distant voices of Adam and Mick, who were still apparently oblivious to our situation, were carried across on the morning breeze.
‘You don’t have a fucking clue, do you?’
‘No. I don’t. Which is why I asked.’
I sensed Lear look away from Henry and over towards me. Perhaps I would make for a tastier breakfast. ‘I mean,’ he said, ‘look at the two of you. Is this the sad fucking state this species has come to . . .?’ I looked over at Henry, perplexed. ‘. . . Look at you, you’re both fucking powerless to do anything. You think you can change things with a wag of a tail or a soppy-eyed stare? Don’t make me fucking laugh. I tell you, life is fucking tough. It’s dog eat dog out there. You’re either the prey or the predator, whichever way you choose to look at it. Humans don’t give a shit, either. In fact, they’re the ones taking our power away. They want the only ones with any sense of pride left to be muzzled. But, you see, my master’s different . . .’ He angled his massive head over to his owner, a pale-looking man with a beard standing a few paces behind. ‘He wouldn’t ever muzzle me because he understands . . .’
‘Lear,’ shouted his master, walking lopsidedly towards us. ‘Away.’
The Rottweiler snarled his farewells and dutifully trotted over to his master.
‘That was close,’ I said, when I had walked back over to Henry.
‘Not really,’ sniffed Henry. ‘Underneath all the talk, there seems to be sense of a morality. Not our morality, certainly, but a morality all the same. He seems to be quite unaffected by the Springers. And he’s not as much of a psychopath as he likes to make out.’
‘I wouldn’t be so sure.’ The voice wasn’t mine. It belonged to Joyce, a stray Irish wolfhound, who we often chatted to in the park. She emerged from one of the bushes to our left. ‘I see him all the time, fellas. He’s a flaming eejit, so he is.’
She stood in front of us, covered in leaves and dirt. Although her hair was even messier than usual, she still held an eccentric beauty. We respected Joyce, and valued her judgement. She knew things we could never know about this park and its many secrets. And unlike the other strays we often encountered she never attempted to make us feel small or belittle our Family concerns.
‘How come?’ I asked her.
‘OK, I’ll tell you. I’ll tell you about last week when he threatened to kill a little Yorkshire terrier. I mean, a terrier for dogs’ sake. About one hundredth of his size. He could have gobbled him up whole. I mean, what possible threat could a little scrap of a dog like that be to such a massive beast, fellas? Tell me. The poor terrier was, well, terrified if you can pardon the phrase. Yes, terrified.’
‘So what happened?’ I said, pissing abstractedly on the patch of ground where Rottweiler scent still lingered.
‘Well, nothing. But only because the Rottweiler’s master told him to back off. I tell you, if there’s ever an attack in this park, you know where to point your nose . . .’
‘Henry!’
‘Prince!’