In this excerpt Nop has been stolen and abused, and is crowded in the back of a van with other dogs destined to be sold to a laboratory for experimentation. Feeling totally abandoned by man, his former protector turned tormentor, Nop expresses his feelings to a fellow captive.
In my opinion, no writer has ever better conveyed the bond between humans and dogs more eloquently than has Mr. McCaig in this novel, especially the awe-inspiring devotion and intelligence of the wonderful Border Collie.
Nop hadn't lost his balance but his balance point had shifted, throwing everything out of proportion, and he no longer new what to do.
Whispers, stirrings in the bone, hints.
In the far reaches of Nop's brain there were memory traces from the old times: before dogs had names, when shepherds were rough and their dogs rougher, when the dogs lay outside stone hovels half buried in snow and God help the luckless intruder who stumbled upon them.
He heard whispers in his blood.
Further back before the Romans came to the island: back when dogs ran free.
"Long ago, " Nop said, "we made a covenant with man. We were the first animal to make covenant and brought him the cows, sheep, horses: all the others. We hunted his meat, guarded his flocks, his home and his children. On our bellies we went into narrow dens after creatures with sharp teeth. We have hunted foxes and wolves and bears and lions because he wished it. At his behest we have killed our own kind. We will die for him. Free dogs made covenant with man: we made him master."
" We made no food covenant," Nop went on. "We are not woolies that would die without shepherds to ten them. Free dogs hunt their own meat. We only asked that the master keep us in his wonderful eyes. But masters no longer keep us. They have forgotten the old time when they were alone and terrified on the darkening plain. They have forgotten their first ally against the night. Oh, they are so foolish! Like young puppies turned loose with stock, they rush here and there, exciting themselves for no reason but excitement itself. Like puppies, they are hurtful one moment, forgetful the next. They do not keep us in their eyes. They do not trouble to see us."
