by Matt Haig
‘Now as we’ve discussed before, tail-wagging is of fundamental importance in the preservation of Family well-being. After all, Prince, this is one of the few aspects of our communication system that humans are able to recognise.’
‘Right,’ I said, ready to digest more information.
‘And although humans don’t always realise it, the speed of our wag directly impacts on their own happiness. Our tails dictate the rhythm of Family life.’ His tail started to move from side to side in slow swooshes, then picked up speed progressively.
A red setter on the other side of the park was on her back, laughing at Henry’s display.
‘We wag slow,’ Henry explained, ‘and things calm. We wag fast, things speed up. Fast-wagging can be a very useful way of lifting the general mood, but once a state of Family harmony has been achieved, a moderate wag, accompanied by a casual stroll such as this is usually sufficient to maintain an atmosphere of general happiness. But remember you must, as always, strike a balance between being too obvious and not being noticed at all . . .’
Fast-wagging? Wasn’t that what I had been doing the day before, but to no avail? Weren’t there scenarios when wagging just wouldn’t work?
But these are now-doubts, not then-doubts.
As Henry went on to illustrate, in full detail, how and when to use the eleven main types of wag, I did not question him for one moment. If Henry said that wag-control was the key to orchestrating sustained Family happiness and security who was I to disagree? The Family would be happy, and there was nothing they could do about it. And the reason they would be happy was because I was finally getting there.
I was following the Pact.
I was learning from Henry.
I was now, in the truest sense, a Labrador.
It was unthinkable that this would not be enough, that the security of the Family depended on more.
It was only later when I realised exactly how much had to be done to protect my masters from outside danger.
And from themselves.
resistance
Nobody knows exactly where the Springer Uprising started. Or how. There are different stories, but it happened too quickly for anybody to be sure. Within no time at all, Springer spaniels could be found in almost every park in the country, spreading the word.
It was seven generations ago, Dog Year 20687, the time when the stability of human Families could no longer be taken for granted, when dogs had to start practising what they claimed to believe in. Duty. Obedience. Sacrificing themselves for their masters.
So when the Springers came along, telling everyone it was OK to slip leads and sniff for pleasure, most dogs were easily sold. After all, many were already starting to give up on humans, believing them to be a lost cause.
‘Bad dogs blame their masters.’ That was Henry’s verdict. ‘Dogs who held on to a belief in the Eternal Reward but failed to work towards it in their everyday life were inevitably going to be influenced by the Springers. After all, opting out feels a lot better than failure.’
Of course, the humans didn’t notice the Uprising, which made its impact twice as catastrophic. As far as they could see it, dogs were acting as they always had. Sticks were still being fetched. Lampposts were still being splashed. Crotches were still being sniffed.
Only there was no structure any more. No purpose. Instead of fetching a stick to please their master, they were doing so to please themselves. They no longer paid attention to the overall situation of the humans they were supposed to look after and no longer intervened when they were supposed to, or if they did it was by accident rather than design. They still enjoyed human attention, as they always had, but for its own sake rather than as a reward for their efforts.
But as I said, the humans didn’t notice. They attributed the breakdown in Family life to other factors. The end of community. A longer working day. The growing secularisation of Western society. Bad diet.
They couldn’t see the real problem. That the dogs had stopped caring. They didn’t realise how much more likely they were to survive as a happy Family if they chose a Labrador. They didn’t understand that the fate of human society rested in the paws of our species. Of course, there were some other dogs who still wanted to make a difference, but they were a dwindling minority. Most had opted to live for the moment rather than for their masters.
And that’s why the Labradors of that time decided upon the Pact, because of the worry that future generations wouldn’t stay so loyal, that they too would revolt. The Pact reinforced the principles all dogs had once adhered to - duty, obedience, protection - and emphasised the need to sacrifice the pursuit of earthly pleasures for the promise of our Eternal Reward.
Unlike the Springer Uprising, details of the Labrador Resistance are well remembered.
It started in a big park in the North of England. There were lots of Labradors - thousands, some say (although personally I always believed this to be an exaggeration), and they used to congregate every morning by a duck pond.
Oscar, a former guide dog, was their leader. Like many Labradors, he didn’t have a Family to look after. But he had devoted his life to various human masters, and the same principles applied. The Family, however, became the focus of Guru Oscar’s guidelines. It was revered as the most beautiful, albeit fragile, aspect of human existence, as well as the most beneficial environment for a dog to be part of.
To give up on humans is to give up on ourselves. That was the main theme.
Guru Oscar would sit every morning, and recite the Pact he had formulated, ignoring the heckling Springers and other doubters.
All the Labradors with Families to look after followed his advice to the letter and passed their knowledge of the Pact on to their own offspring and every member of our breed they came across.
Within two dog years most Labradors in the country had agreed to remain loyal, come what may, and to continue devoting their entire lives to the happiness and security of their human masters.
And that was how it remained. In every park, in every corner of this country, the old have been teaching the young the ways of the Pact.
Until now.
I must accept the truth for what it is. For better or worse, I have changed everything. Labradors will have to discover for themselves the true horror of what it means to keep Families safe.
pattern
One of the first things Labradors understand about human Families is that they depend on repetition. For a Family to survive, a daily pattern must be established and maintained.
A key part of this pattern was my twice-daily walk to the park with Adam. Every day he went at exactly the same times and did exactly the same things once he got there.
In the morning, he would sit on the bench and talk to Mick. In the evening, he would throw sticks for me to retrieve.
But now this pattern was starting to change. That morning, Adam had hardly spoken to Mick, and the following evening when we got to the park, I noticed that Adam was not in a playful mood. I went over to him with a stick in my mouth but he didn’t even take his hands out of his pockets. This was very strange. As I have explained, he normally gained considerable pleasure from throwing the stick as far and high into the air as he could.
Instead, he stayed rooted to the spot and spent the entire time staring at the new house overlooking the park. To be honest, this was not completely new behaviour. Ever since the builders started work on it, nearly one year earlier, his fascination had grown. At first it was nothing more than an occasional glance, a mild curiosity between throwing a stick. Now, however, it seemed to be a fixation.
While I tried to act unperturbed, jogging casually between flowerbeds, I kept an eye on him, trying my best to work out what was going through his mind. Then it became clearer. Light filled one of the upstairs windows and a shadow passed across the curtain. Someone had moved in.
Having circuited the park I jogged slowly back over to where Adam was standing. I panted heavily to try and catch his attention, but it wa
s only when I pressed my nose gently into his crotch that he slipped out of his trance.
‘No, boy, stop that,’ he said, before he clipped on my lead.
africa
Hal and Charlotte were in their bedrooms when we arrived back home. Kate was downstairs watching the news.
‘We missed that programme,’ she said, as she picked dog hair off the settee. ‘You know, the one we wanted to watch.’
‘Yes,’ said Adam. ‘What programme?’ He was standing in front of her, by the television, and although Kate didn’t notice he had again slipped into a slight trance.
‘The one about that woman, you know, who set up that hospital in Africa.’
‘Oh, yes, right.’ He rubbed his neck, keeping his gaze locked on some indeterminable spot on the settee. And then, from out of nowhere: ‘They’ve sold it.’
‘Sorry?’
‘The house on the park. They’ve sold it.’
It was only the television newsreader who remained genuinely untroubled by Adam’s behaviour now.
‘Uh-huh,’ said Kate, moving her head softly forward as if by doing this she would find the missing link within their conversation.
‘But it’s only been on the market a month and someone’s actually in there now. Living in it.’
‘Uh-huh.’
‘But that’s unbelievable.’
‘Darling, are you OK?’
He wasn’t listening. ‘I saw someone in the upstairs window. They must have moved in today, this morning.’
‘It’s what happens. People buy houses. They move in. It’s hardly a new concept.’
‘Yes, but that house. Have you seen it? It’s like the ugliest construction you’ve ever imagined. It’s got a double garage, for God’s sake.’
‘Well,’ she sighed. ‘It’s lucky we’re not moving in, isn’t it?’
He walked out of the room, taking his coat off as he did so. His voice carried on: ‘But I mean, honestly, would you ever think of moving there?’
‘Adam, why do you always go on about these massive great houses? Jealousy won’t get you anywhere.’
He laughed. ‘Jealousy! Kate, come on. You’d really want to move into a place like that?’
‘We wouldn’t be able to afford it.’
Adam, coatless, arrived back in the room, bringing jealousy-smells with him. ‘I mean hypothetically, if we had the money, if you had all the money in the world would you even think for one second about stepping through the door of that hideous, soulless, excuse for a home?’
‘No,’ she sighed, clearly hoping this was the quickest exit out of the conversation so she could catch the end of the news.
My tail tried to peace-broker the situation. To my satisfaction, Henry’s morning tutorial was a success. Immediately, the atmosphere calmed.
‘There, boy.’ Adam stroked my head, in apparent acknowledgement of my efforts. And then, to Kate: ‘I really wanted to watch that programme.’
‘Yes,’ she said, a soft smile twitching away at the corners of her mouth. ‘So did I.’
Adam sat himself down on the sofa beside her and I felt a warm glow at the portrait I had helped to create. Again, this was a break from the pattern but I couldn’t help but feel it was a welcome one. Adam and Kate, together on the settee, watching the weather forecast. Exhausted yes, but also smelling quietly content.
shoes
Later, Kate was pulling her face up in front of her bedroom mirror. She always did this. When she was on her own. Under the glare of the spot lamp, she’d place the tips of her fingers on her hairless face and stretch the skin up as far as it could go, forcing her eyes to retreat into hiding. Then, after a while, the hands would move up and around to the temples and push back in an attempt to make the creases of her forehead invisible.
She turned, noticed me. ‘Prince, how long have you been there?’
I wagged my response and tried to look sentimental. Kate smiled at me, she was tired, but she smiled. And the smile was beautiful, natural, for my eyes only. No one ever got this Kate smile, not even Adam. Every other smile in her collection was false, a disguise, but this was real.
You see, Kate and I, we had a special relationship.
She told me all her secrets. Everything she kept inside, hidden away from her species. Well, not everything.
Kate moved away from the mirror to shut the curtains, and then took off her shoes. In contrast to her usual routine, she left the shoes out on the green carpet and sat on the edge of the bed. The shoes had fallen in such a way, and at such a distance apart, that it was as if the real Kate was staring at an invisible, younger, more supple version of herself doing the splits.
The smile had gone from her face now as she sat on the bed, listening. Listening to Adam talking to Charlotte in her bedroom, telling her why she wasn’t allowed to go and see The Mad Dogz of War, his voice getting louder and louder, his breath getting shorter. The argument ended with the sound of Charlotte beating her hands onto her bed. Adam trod his way back to Kate.
‘Charlotte,’ he sighed. ‘She’s just impossible.’
‘She’s a teenager, teenagers are always impossible. We should know that by now.’
‘Hal. Was he really like that?’ Adam’s voice was hushed, although Hal was plugged into his headphones in his bedroom.
‘Well, he hasn’t been perfect, has he? And anyway, it’s always meant to be harder for the youngest. The second child is more impossible than the first, it’s a well-known fact.’
Adam crouched down, cracking his knees as he did so, and started stroking the top of my head.
‘What do you think, Prince? Have you got any parenting tips you can offer us?’ he asked.
But as usual they did not listen to me. In fact, unless I had actually stood up and spoken the words out of my mouth, I doubt they would have ever been able to understand me. Adam stared blankly into my eyes before turning to Kate.
‘I suppose I’d better take him down.’
The Labrador Pact: Prediction equals protection
To know the future of the Family, you must know the present.
Observe everything around you at all times. Every action, every word, every smell is significant. Consult your own understanding, your own sense of the probable, and act upon it. When humans notice our ability to predict, they will talk about psychic powers, or a sixth sense.
We are fortunate in their ignorance.
We must not be complacent, however. If we are to protect the Family, we need to ensure that our motives stay hidden and our actions remain subtle. This is fundamental not only to each individual mission but to the entire Labrador cause.
Let your senses guide you, and you will find that the future is under your nose.
saliva
‘Duty over all.’
‘Duty over all.’
Although I spoke to Henry every morning, we never neglected the formalities. For Henry, the Labrador Pact and the small rituals associated with it were everything. ‘Ignore the small things, and the big things are beyond control’ - that is what he used to say. And that morning in the park was probably the first time the small things and the big things started to come together - even though I didn’t realise it at the time.
It started straightforwardly enough. Adam and Mick made their way over to the bench to have their daily conversation while Henry and I headed to the far end of the park, past the large oak trees, for my morning lesson. I don’t really know why I always had to be tutored at such a distance from Adam, but Henry preferred it that way. ‘It helps preserve the secrecy of our mission.’ So that was that.
‘How have things been?’ Henry asked.
‘Good,’ I said. ‘Things seem to be getting better with the Family.’ I told him about my successful use 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 m
usic. ‘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.
