I wrapped the dog in an overall and laid him in the trunk before driving away. It wasnt until we drew up outside Mrs. Donovans house that she began to weep silently. I sat there without speaking until she had finished. Then she wiped her eyes and turned to me.
Do you think he suffered at all?
Im certain he didnt. It was all so quick-he wouldnt have known a thing about it.
She tried to smile. Poor little Rex. I dont know what Im going to do without him. Weve traveled a few miles together, you know.
Yes, you have. He had a wonderful life, Mrs. Donovan. And let me give you a bit of adviceyou must get another dog. Youd be lost without one.
She shook her head. No, I couldnt. That little dog meant too much to me. I couldnt let another take his place.
Well, I know thats how you feel just now, but I wish youd think about it. I dont want to seem callousI tell everybody this when they lose an animal and I know its good advice.
Mr. Herriot, Ill never have another one. She shook her head again, very decisively. Rex was my faithful friend for many years and I just want to remember him. Hes the last dog Ill ever have.
I often saw Mrs. Donovan around town after this and I was glad to see she was still as active as ever, though she looked strangely incomplete without the little dog on its lead. But it must have been over a month before I had the chance to speak to her.
It was on the afternoon that Inspector Halliday of the RSPCA rang me.
Mr. Herriot, he said, Id like you to come and see an animal with me. A dog, and its pretty grim. A dreadful case of neglect. He gave me the name of a row of old brick cottages down by the river and said hed meet me there.
Halliday was waiting for me, smart and businesslike in his dark uniform, as I pulled up in the back lane behind the houses. He was a big blond man with cheerful blue eyes, but he didnt smile as he came over to the car.
Hes in here, he said, and led the way toward one of the doors in the long, crumbling wall. A few curious people were hanging around, andwitha feeling of inevitability I recognized a gnomelike brown face. Trust Mrs. Donovan, I thought, to be among those present at a time like this.
We went through the door into the long garden. I had found that even the lowliest dwellings in Darrowby had long strips of land at the back as though the builders had taken it for granted that the country people who were going to live in them would want a bit of land for vegetable and fruit growing, even stock keeping in a small way. You usually found a pig there, a few hens, often pretty beds of flowers.
But this garden was a wilderness. A chilling air of desolation hung over the few gnarled apple and plum trees standing among a tangle of rank grass as though the place had been forsaken by all living creatures.
Halliday went over to a ramshackle wooden shed with peeling paint and a rusted corrugated iron roof. He produced a key, unlocked the padlock and dragged the door partly open. There was no window and it wasnt easy to identify the jumble inside; broken gardening
tools, an ancient mangle, rows of flowerpots and partly used paint tins. And right at the back, a dog sitting quietly.
I didnt notice him immediately because of the gloom and because the smell in the shed started me coughing, but as I drew closer I saw that he was a big animal, sitting very upright, his collar secured by a chain to a ring in the wall. I had seen some thin dogs but this advanced emaciation reminded me of my textbooks on anatomy; nowhere else did the bones of pelvis, face, and rib cage stand out with such horrifying clarity. A deep, smoothed-out hollow in the earth floor showed where he had lain, moved about, in fact lived for a very long time.
The sight of the animal had a stupefying effect on me; I only half took in the rest of the scenethe filthy shreds of sacking scattered nearby, the bowl of scummy water.
There were sores all over his body, but his hindquarters were the worst. The coat, which seemed to be a dull yellow, was matted and caked with dirt.
The Inspector spoke again. I dont think hes ever been out of here. Hes only a young dogabout a year oldbut I understand hes been in this shed since he was an eight-week-old pup. Somebody out in the lane heard a cry or hed never have been found.
I felt a tightening of the throat and a sudden nausea which wasnt due to the smell. It was the thought of this patient animal sitting starved and forgotten in the darkness and filth for a year. I looked again at the dog and saw in his eyes only a calm trust. Some dogs would have barked their heads off and soon been discovered, some would have become terrified and vicious, but this was one of the totally undemanding kind, the kind which had complete faith in people and accepted all their actions without complaint. Just an occasional whimper perhaps as he sat interminably in the empty blackness which had been his world and at times wondered what it was all about.
Well, Inspector, I hope youre going to throw the book at whoevers responsible, I said.