In spring she started to walk me in the forest.
I fought almost every dog we met; she pulled me away and gladly laughed. She liked it when I was being afraid of. And I liked to protect her.
In summer we went to the river every day. She used to leave me at the bank and go swimming. Once I tore the lead and jumped into the water. The smart puppy that was traveling with us to our first puppy show, a born diver, always pulled his mistress out of the water. He was punished for that, because he didn’t let her swim. He was my friend, then he was sold and I never saw him again. My mistress had never punished me – on the contrary, she was telling everybody that I had helped her when she was drowning. She would also show the mark on her skin where I had scratched her. After that she became afraid of water and we swam together. I swam and she was holding my collar.
Also we used to go to the fields.
In autumn she said that we were moving, because it was necessary. And we moved. The Zubenkos didn’t come for a visit on holidays any more and we didn’t walk in the forest but there appeared a new person – a self-satisfied man with a moustache, who smelled of a disgustingly sweet eau-de-Cologne. He started to live with us. She said that I should get used to him and that I had got a new master.
But she was wrong. I had a new enemy.
…It happened in summer. She was cutting meat and I was waiting near the kitchen, when this man came. He said that the car was waiting, we had to go and I shouldn’t touch him with my watering mouth. Though I was very hungry, I didn’t touch the meat. I brought her the lead and she went downstairs without changing her dirty T-shirt. The engine of the car was coughing nastily, we went through the suburbs and my mistress was so sad. I knew these places well; they often held exhibitions in this suburban forest. But I had no idea where we were going. I fell asleep and woke up only when the car stopped near an old house with a shabby front door, the house near a big lake, the house I now live in. They were in a hurry and left at once. And I stayed here.
She must be missing me now. The man with a moustache never offers her his bones, even the ones that have no meat on them. And she will never breathe out smoke at his nose and laugh. Sometimes at nights she cries, but this man doesn’t know about that. Also she used to say that I was an apostle that had been sent to her in this imperfect world. My mistress talked in a strange way.
