Doglands (7 page)

Then one day in the park Gerry bent down and took Furgul off the leash.

For a moment Furgul couldn’t believe it. A great joy surged through his heart. His muscles felt like they would burst into roaring flames. His head went dizzy with excitement. His tail flapped so hard he felt like he might fly. He took a big breath and coiled back on his hind legs.

“Steady on! Steady on!” warned Kinnear. “Just follow me and do what I do.”

With the biggest effort of self-control that Furgul had ever made, he uncoiled his legs and lowered his tail and panted with the strain of standing still. Then he pottered around after the bulldog. He found some good smells in the bushes. He ate some tasty grass. He even dared to take a few small bounds, and had a very satisfying dump—in private, behind a shrub, where the Grown-Ups couldn’t put it in a bag. It was better than being on the leash, true, but he still felt like he had chains on his ankles. His legs were five times longer than Kinnear’s, and soon, without even knowing it, he had left the bulldog behind. He pushed his snout through the bushes and looked across the park. Suddenly his heart started pounding in his chest like thunder.

In the distance he spotted a little white poodley dog. It was prancing around with his master and yapping in a little yappy voice. Something exploded in Furgul’s brain, and he took off out of the bushes at astounding speed. The wild joy of running pumped through his blood. His jaws gaped wide as he filled his lungs with air. He didn’t know what he would do when he got there, but he wanted to hunt the little yapping poodley to the ends of the earth. He didn’t want to hurt the little poodley, not for a second. He just wanted to see how fast the little feller could run.

Far behind he heard Gerry and Harriet screaming in terror.

“RUUU-PERRRT!!!”

But Furgul just couldn’t stop. He knew he should. He just couldn’t.

As he got closer the poodley’s master snatched the little dog off the ground and held him tight in his arms and trembled with fright. The master’s face went almost as white as the poodley’s snowy fur. Furgul was puzzled. What was the problem? What was there to be frightened of? Why were all the Grown-Ups losing it? Furgul wasn’t.

Just before he reached the poodley, he saw in the distance—another dog. A big, fierce dog—a German shepherd female, with a coat as black as the sky on a moonless night. She’d seen Furgul. And unlike everyone else in the park, she wasn’t scared.

Great!
thought Furgul.
I bet she’s up for a scrap
.

He swerved toward the shepherd, circling around the
poodley’s master, who fell over flat on his back with a cry of fear. The distant shrieks of “RUUU-PERRRT!!!” grew hysterical. But to Furgul’s delight—as a dark shiver of excitement ran down his spine—the German shepherd broke away from her mistress and charged across the park toward him like a bolt of black lightning.

Faster and faster she came.

Closer and closer.

Furgul had never seen such a magnificent dog. Except maybe Keeva. But Keeva was his mother, so that didn’t really count. And the shepherd was a lot bigger and a lot more dangerous, which tickled Furgul’s fancy.

The two charging dogs came head to head. The shepherd coiled her haunches to spring and Furgul whizzed around her in a tight circle. The shepherd wasn’t quite fast enough to catch him, and Furgul charged her in the haunches with his shoulder. The shepherd rolled over and growled—with amazing white teeth—and reared up on her hind legs, eager to fight. Furgul could have run more circles round her, but he realized he was faster so he decided to give her a chance. He reared and barked too, and they met in midair and boxed and nipped and tumbled. They parted and bowed to each other—their heads dipping deep between their forelegs, their eyes meeting across the arena—to show that it was just a game.

“No blood?” barked the shepherd.

“No blood,” Furgul agreed.

Then they fell on each other, wrestling and pawing and
growling and snapping like fury. But it was clear to each of them that they weren’t angry growls or killer bites. They didn’t go for the throat, and they drew no blood. Furgul dodged away and let the shepherd chase him, then he circled about and chased her, then they fell to wrestling again, rolling around, one on top of the other on the grass, snorting and growling with pleasure.

Then the Grown-Ups arrived in a puffing, sweating, fearful gang.

Harriet and Gerry were out of breath, and the man with the little poodley was red in the face. The woman who was the mistress of the German shepherd was in tears. There was a very great deal of shrieking and hullabaloo.

“Rupert!”

“Samantha!”

“Rupert!”

“Samantha!”

Furgul and the German shepherd broke apart and grinned at each other.

“I suppose we should give it a rest,” said the shepherd, “before they all burst into tears.”

Furgul laughed. He thought the German shepherd was outstanding. He definitely wanted to hang out with her more often. Every day, if he could. Maybe even every hour.

“Samantha isn’t your real name, is it?” he asked.

“No way,” said the shepherd. “You can call me Dervla.”

“Wow!” said Furgul.

“I’m hoping you’re not really called Rupert,” said Dervla.

“Make it Furgul.”

“Well, it’s an improvement,” said Dervla.

“Can we do this again?” asked Furgul. “Like, tomorrow? Or maybe this afternoon? I could even jump the fence this evening, after dark.”

“I’d love to,” said Dervla, “but it might not be as easy as you think.”

Furgul choked as his leash was clipped back on and his collar tightened round his throat. He struggled until his tongue went blue as Gerry hauled him backward. But it was no use. Dervla’s mistress clipped her leash on her too. The two new friends reared up on their hind legs as the masters dragged them apart.

“Rupert!”

“Samantha!”

“Rupert!”

“Samantha!”

The worst of it was that Furgul knew that the masters thought they were doing the right thing. They thought they were stopping a fight. They couldn’t see beyond their own fear—their own fear of not being perfect dog owners, with perfect dogs. They couldn’t see what was obvious—that Furgul and Dervla were soul mates.

The Grown-Ups stopped shrieking and settled down to a lot of “Moan, moan, moan!” and “Tut, tut, tut!” and “Heel, heel, heel.” The poodley man put his little dog down. He was
much more shaken and upset than his poodley dog was.

“Whine, whine, whine!” bleated the poodley man.

“Sorry, sorry, sorry!” groveled Gerry. “Terribly sorry.”

Harriet glared at Gerry. Furgul knew that, later, there would be ranting.

The little poodley dog yapped, “That looked great, can I join in?”

“Grow about two feet taller and we’ll think about it,” said Dervla.

Dervla and Furgul laughed at the poor yapping poodley. Perhaps it was unkind, but it was funny. Furgul realized that he and Dervla were friends.

He had never made a real friend before.

It was the best feeling in the world.

“Hey, Dervla,” said Furgul, “have you ever been to the Doglands?”

“No,” said Dervla. “Where are they?”

“I don’t know,” said Furgul. “But dogs like us could find them—if we tried.”

“Let’s do it,” said Dervla. “Next time we meet.”

“There are no Doglands,” said Kinnear. “And there won’t be a next time either. You mark my words.”

Dervla gave Kinnear a real growl. The growl was so threatening that even Furgul’s blood ran cold. Kinnear fled to hide behind Harriet’s legs. He stood there shaking.

“Who’s the bag of marrowbone jelly?” asked Dervla.

“That’s Kinnear,” said Furgul. “He’s all right, really.”

“Thanks,” said Kinnear. “But that girl is what you call a bad influence.”

“Hey, fatty,” growled Dervla. “If you want to know what ‘bad influence’ looks like, just come over here.”

But, as usual, Kinnear knew exactly what he was talking about.

There was no next time.

Harriet and Gerry went straight from the park to their favorite pet store and bought Furgul the most hated of all contraptions—a plastic muzzle.

They strapped it over his snout and then looked pleased with themselves. After that Furgul had to wear the muzzle every time they took him out. They never let him off the leash again. And whenever Furgul saw Dervla across the park and barked her name—and heard her bark back—Gerry and Harriet turned around and walked him the other way.

One day Furgul and Kinnear snoozed in their baskets while the Grown-Ups were out at work. In his best dreams Furgul dreamed about Dervla. In the bad ones—like the one he had today—he dreamed about Dedbone’s Hole. He dreamed about his mother, Keeva, who was still there, living in a crate. Furgul saw her, huddled all alone, crying in the night as she thought about her pups. The pups that had been torn from her and sent away to die.

When Furgul woke up, he felt sick inside. He was ashamed of himself.

In the cavern under Dogsnout Mountain he had sworn that when he was grown up, he’d set Keeva free. Well, now he was grown up—and what had he done about it? Nothing. He just lay here in this basket feeling sorry for himself, getting more and more like Kinnear—more and more tame, and more and more afraid—and less and less like Argal, his father. Keeva had named him “the brave,” but Furgul wasn’t brave at all.

“I’m a coward,” he muttered to himself.

“What’s that?” said Kinnear, waking from his nap.

“Nothing.”

“Cheer up, mate,” said Kinnear. “Look on the bright side. Everything you have to put up with—even the muzzle—is worth it in the end because you get this warm bed to sleep in, lots of love and affection—well, more than you probably deserve—and a bowl of fine food twice a day.”

“Those little brown pellets that look like stale cat dung and taste even worse?”

“No, no, no,” said Kinnear. “Chuck Chumley’s Extra Meaty Dog Feed is designed by scientists. It’s the perfectly balanced diet—all the protein, nutrition and vitamins we need for a shiny coat, a waggy tail, sweet breath—”

“And a belly that scrapes on the ground.”

Kinnear ignored this insult. “It’s over four percent real chicken, you know. Plus another ten percent meat and animal derivatives!”

“Yes,” said Furgul. “Beaks, feathers and butt holes. I need something I can get my teeth into. The taste of blood. The
crunch of bone. Something to make me feel like a dog. Living like this makes me feel like—”

He stopped. It made him feel like he should have stayed in the river and drowned. But he didn’t say so. He felt bad. He felt confused. He didn’t know what to do.

Kinnear stuck his pug nose in the air. “I’ve never tasted blood in my life and I’m proud of it.”

Furgul wondered what Kinnear’s blood would taste like. He licked his lips.

“I know what you’re thinking,” said Kinnear, “but I won’t fight you. I don’t believe in fighting. It’s antisocial. It isn’t safe. And it’s against the rules.”

“Even in play?”

“Accidents do happen,” said Kinnear. “Better to be safe than sorry. And as you know, fighting upsets our masters.”

“Then why don’t they get a parrot?”

“I’m a pure pedigree bulldog,” said Kinnear, puffing out his chest with pride. “The masters have got the certificate to prove it. We bulldogs used to kill bulls. Imagine that. Real bulls, with horns, the kind who hate red rags. We used to be fast and feisty and bold. But those days are gone. Over the generations the breeders have bred all our aggression out of us. We don’t need to fight anymore to prove that we’re dogs. We get along with all other dog breeds—and even with parrots and cats and rabbits and sheep. And we certainly wouldn’t mess with a bull. We’re not wild, we’re tame. We’re docile. We’re obedient. We’re correct. We’re the perfect family pet.”

Furgul scratched himself. He felt more miserable than ever. “I try to be docile, I try to be obedient, I try to be not wild. I even try to be correct. And I’m still not a good pet. I’m just a failure.”

“Don’t say that,” said Kinnear. “You didn’t have my advantages in life. You haven’t got the right—erm—background. You haven’t got my breeding.”

“I know,” said Furgul. “I’m not pure.”

“But even the likes of you can learn the rules of a good pet—if you work hard at it.”

“The problem is,” said Furgul, “I don’t want to be a pet at all, not even a good one.”

“Then what do you want?”

“I want to be free. I want to find the Doglands. I want to go back to Dedbone’s Hole and set my mother free.”

Kinnear didn’t say anything. He just looked at Furgul with pity.

Furgul said, “And I’ve failed at all that too.”

After this conversation Furgul kept hearing the Grown-Ups use the word “vet” at the same time they used his human name, “Rupert.”

“VET, blah, blah, RUPERT,” they muttered. “RUPERT, blah, blah, VET.”

This made Furgul nervous. He became even more nervous when Harriet—wearing rubber gloves and a paper mask that covered her mouth and nostrils—trapped Furgul in the
kitchen and ran her fingers over his balls. Furgul didn’t like it and snapped at her hand. When Harriet had gone away, Furgul asked Kinnear what was going on.

“Ah, you’ve reached that time of life,” Kinnear explained. “In fact you’ve got away with it longer than most. All pet dogs have to face it sooner or later, but it’s not as bad as it sounds. And once it’s done you’ll appreciate the benefits.”

“The benefits of what?” asked Furgul.

“Well,” said Kinnear, “it stops you from torturing yourself about girls, which, believe me, is a greater blessing than you can imagine. It results in less aggression, which—if I may say so—is just what you need, my boy. And—listen to this—it produces a ninety percent reduction in the tendency of dogs to roam. All your restlessness—all these feelings of failure that you’ve been having—will just disappear. In short, it will make you happy.”

Kinnear was never more pleased with himself than when he was showing off the breadth of his general knowledge. His cheeks wobbled with pride.

“It
can
cause an unfortunate gain in weight—which is why your rude comments about my belly are so unfair. But, on the whole, the effects are positive for everyone concerned.”