The Backup Dog

When old Pete died four years ago, I swore, as all dogmen do at such times, that I would never let myself get so desperately attached to an animal again. I made my oath as I dug his grave on a hillside overlooking our pond. That day I hoped that his spirit might linger near the cattails there and rejoin me when I sought the comfort and cleansing of cool water.
    I buried Pete in a wooden box so I wouldn’t have to shovel dirt onto the perfect white hair of his flanks or see that the orange patches on his shoulder and on each side of his face were the same color as wet, Carolina-foothill clay. That coffin of rough planks surely has rotted away by now, dust returned to dust.
    I buried Pete with his collar still around his neck. My name and his name are both on that collar. I buried my old dog in the rain, a fine day for burying, and I cried and cried until the clouds gave up in shame at their puny efforts. When I finished filling in Pete’s grave, only a little mist lingered over a scene of man and mud as I recited a poem by Rudyard Kipling. You probably know it, even if you think you’ve forgotten. It’s the one whose first verse closes by saying:
    “Brothers and Sisters, I bid you beware
    “Of giving your heart to a dog to tear.”
    With Pete gone, I was in a position at last to protect myself from the inevitable heartache that the poet spoke of so well. This time, I told myself, there would be no new puppy with years ahead of him to charm his way into my life and heart. I didn’t need that kind of trouble ever again. This time I knew better—and even if I didn’t, I already had another dog.
    I had Jake, a seven-year-old Brittany who had been with me all his life and had never shown signs of wanting to be anything more than ordinary. I had a dog that never had made an effort to invoke in me or any of the other humans he met a sentiment that was more than lukewarm. In Jake I already had just what I needed at the time: a bird dog that was just a dog and nothing more.
    Jake is Pete’s son, but if I didn’t know that, I would never guess it. Pete was a handsome animal, a classic Brittany with an intelligent appearance and orange patches on his shoulders, back and each side of his face. Jake was ugly even when he was a puppy. He had droopy eyes, a bald face and markings that made me think of a picture of a cow drawn by a child.
Ugly as he was, I never held Jake’s looks against him. It was his attitude, his work ethic and his personality that allowed me to remain indifferent to poor Jake for 71/2 years. Jake was more than content to just blend in, to never call attention to himself, to cruise in the shadow of his father, who always had demanded to be treated like a star.
    Pete was not perfect by any means, but he was determined and unafraid. He reminded me of an athlete who loved the big games, who thrived on the pressure of the last shot, the last at-bat. He hunted harder at the end of a long, cold day than he did at the beginning, and he never turned willingly back toward the truck even when his feet were sore and the shadows were growing long. When the day was over at last and he had been coaxed into leaving the field, Pete expected to ride in the cab with me.
    Jake served as Pete’s backup, a bench warmer I used to give the starter a break from time to time. Jake was a spare I kept around in the event that the first-stringer suffered an injury or illness. He hunted well enough when he was called upon, but he never made the big plays, the uncanny retrieves, the hard finds, the cutoffs of running birds. When he got tired, he came in and walked beside me. If the day were long or arduous, Jake often would lead the way out of the woods. For seven years Jake rode in a kennel in the back of the truck and did not complain.
    The first October without Pete was very hard. Jake and I left our Carolina home and traveled to Wisconsin and then North Dakota. It was an annual trip, but where in times past it had been a celebration of fall, that year it seemed a memorial service for a fallen comrade.
    Jake began the journey riding in the back, where he always had traveled. The seat beside me in the front was empty. Somewhere along the way I gave in to loneliness and let the backup dog into the cab. It was not the same—could never be the same—I knew. Pete had been a partner, sharing the view out the windows and changing his mood along with mine as traffic thickened and thinned and the radio moved from rock & roll to crying country. The old dog and I long had understood each other. Jake just slept on the seat.
    The hunting was good that year though. The grouse were thick in the North Woods, the weather cool and damp while we were there. The dog and I returned to camp each night satiated and tired. I noticed that Jake, who never had been asked to work hard before, seemed to be getting stronger. The alder thickets and swamps did not deter him as they had in other years. One afternoon he even dug a cripple out of a logjam beside a lake, exhibiting a determination he never had shown before.
    His newfound strength served him well when we moved farther west. In North Dakota we hunted along the border just below Saskatchewan, and although ringnecks have a toehold in that harsh country, they aren’t as plentiful or as easy to find as they are farther south. We didn’t kill a lot of birds, and Jake didn’t show the dogged desire that had made his old man a good pheasant dog, but he did learn that one point on a rooster is seldom enough. The trail/point, trail/point, trail/point game that is played in cattails, dry sloughs and plum thickets is seldom won by a soft dog. Jake lost often, a hoarse cackle far in front or a confused dog looking back over his shoulder signaling another rooster victory. But he won a few too, a few that I remember now—and a man camping by himself far from home needs only so much meat.
    I didn’t stay in North Dakota as long as I had in other years, didn’t hunt as hard either. Even after we returned to North Carolina, I didn’t go into the woods as often as I had in seasons past. Winter is a sentimental time. My heart was still sore, and the dark hollows of the southern Appalachians are a lonesome place. But there were days when I needed to remember. And there were moments as I came out of the field late in the afternoon with the sun sinking and the wind softening that I found myself looking at the tired dog ahead of me and thinking he looked a little bit like his old man.
    I’ve heard quite a few dogmen debate the question of which are the best years of a bird dog’s life. Some say a dog is all he will ever be at four or five. A few claim their charges peak as early as three. One callow fellow I met once said he “got rid of” his dogs after six seasons.
    Most or all of these men are probably better trainers than I am. Their dogs easily could be better than mine as well. Perhaps the biggest reason I disagree with them is that we have a different thought in mind when we speak of a dog’s best years.
    Jake was seven years old when his old man died. I couldn’t help but notice that his work that season was the best it had ever been. Four more winters have passed now, and each year Jake suits me better. We’ve hunted a variety of quail and at least three kinds of grouse. We’ve hunted chukar, Huns and pheasants. Jake has been a reliable dog, handled his birds and made his retrieves, and if he’s still a little lazy sometimes—well—he’s almost 12 and I can say that he’s earned that right.
    He would never win a field trial of any kind, of course. He’s slow and deliberate. There’s no flash to ol’ Jake, never has been. What he’s really good at these days is riding in the front of the truck and keeping me company during our travels. His stubby tail wags at the sound of my voice. My hand on his neck helps me remember his few highlights: the chukar retrieved from Hells Canyon Lake, the three ringneck roosters he herded a half-mile down a weedy Dakota ditch and pinned against a steep bank.
    The past four years have treated Jake well. It’s funny how a few extra pounds and some silver around the muzzle give dignity to an old dog that wasn’t blessed with natural good looks. Perhaps I’m thinking a little wishfully as I see him that way, hoping that others might be as benevolent in their opinion of another old man. Or perhaps the time we’ve spent together and the places we’ve been have clouded the eyes of at least one beholder. Jake is a friend of mine now.
    I still miss Pete and hope I always will. He was a special dog. The missing helps me remember all the good times we had.
I got a puppy last year too, a female setter whose sire is a wonderful grouse hunter. I don’t expect her to be another Pete; I know better than to hope for that. I also know that it won’t be too many years before she’ll be all I have, that I’ll be back on the hillside above the pond with damp eyes and a muddy shovel. I’ll recite a poem by Kipling as I stand over the grave of Jake, the backup dog I swore I would never become attached to. I’ll stammer a little, as the poet intended, when I come to the end of the third verse, the one that closes with these words:
    “Then you will find—it’s your own affair—
    “But . . . you’ve given your heart to a dog to tear.”

Tred Slough (aka Robert Holthouser) is a carpenter and freelance writer in Surry County, North Carolina. He is the author of the book A High, Lonesome Call, published by Countrysport Press. For more information, visit the SSM Store at www.shootingsportsman.com.