promising to visit her the next day, and expressed his condolences.

Angela told me that she lit a candle and read a prayer for the repose of a devoted loving soul.

“And for myself, too,” she added softly. Миссис Джиаматти не сомневалась в том, что им с Trixie суждено встретиться, и отец Джозеф был с ней вполне согласен.

Back on Wallnut Street, Mrs. Giamatti struggled out of the car and, leaning on my arm, walked slowly into the lobby. Heа кивнула соседу, вызвала лифт, тяжело ступая прошла по коридору, вставила ключ в дверной замок и замерла. But, after some hesitation, she opened the door.

Heа повесила жакет на плечики и пошла в кухню, чтобы согреть чаю. Finally, the water boiled, Mrs. Giamatti sank into her favorite chair, upholstered in green fabric. Heа выглядела спокойной и собранной, но донельзя измученной. Looking around, she glanced at the dog bed.

Sometimes the death of a dog becomes a real grief for people. Some are ashamed to mourn the animal too openly and prefer to keep their emotions in check. Obviously, Mrs. Giamatti belonged to this category.

Many of those who had to endure the death of a beloved dog admit that after weeks or even months they subconsciously expect to see her in her usual place; наверное, и миссис Джиаматти будет некоторое время заново переживать свою потерю каждый раз, когда опустит глаза и не увидит рядом Trixie.

Heа сказала, что не будет торопиться и выбросит подстилку только через несколько дней. Then she will throw away the food, leash and toys. And then he will gather his courage and call his daughters, and there - come what may.

Epilogue
Back in Dogville
Last September, my Border Collies Homer and Devon participated in the Shepherd Dog Trials at the Scottish and Irish Cultural Festival. These were hot days for my good friend Carolyn Wilkie, who worked as an instructor and also trained my dogs. On her farm, Strawberry Ridge, work began at dawn, when Carolyn led her flock out to pasture. Then, with the help of dogs, she stuffed half a dozen sheep and parts of a collapsible fence into a pickup truck, so that later at the fair they could build a corral out of them.

The fully equipped car looked fantastic: hedge stakes were sticking out of the body, hay sacks were around Sheep were crowded, there were water containers and containers for transporting dogs, tied with ropes for safety.

The payment promised to Carolyn by the organizers of the festival was purely symbolic: a few hundred dollars for two days of hard work from dawn to dusk, and on one of these days it was real hell, and the whole next it was raining. However, Carolyn was not embarrassed by all this. Heа принимала любые предложения и разъезжала с выступлениями по всему восточному побережью, она считала, что подобные мероприятия позволяют с самой выгодной стороны продемонстрировать публике древнее искусство пастуха и способности пастушьей собаки.

I could not but recognize such a noble goal and from time to time joined Carolyn. With the help of a microphone - it must be admitted that sometimes the technique did work - I commented on her actions, while Carolyn - wearing the ancestral sign of the McWilkey clan, a scarf, kilt, beret and introducing herself to the audience - led her dogs and sheep. But my dogs also had the opportunity to demonstrate their talents.

These fairs, usually in the form of assemblies of unprofitable performances, were wildly popular, especially with parents with small children who were desperate to find any reasonable weekend entertainment. It seemed that these events convey to us the spirit of a living ethnic culture; in our homogenized world, they did not allow people to forget their roots.

As usual, the main element of such Irish and Scottish fairs were all kinds of musicians with bagpipes and horns, ensembles of folk instruments and flutists; several pavilions were opened selling ceramics and carved canes, as well as tents where you can treat yourself to meat pie and fish and chips; the real business, represented by hot dogs and pizza, modestly huddled in the back alleys.

However, the performance of the shepherds has always been an outstanding event. Border collies were bred in Ireland and Scotland a hundred years ago specifically to gather sheep into a flock and drive them out of the barn to pastures open to all winds, and then drive them home again. Now they showed off their skills in small parks or school playgrounds. That Saturday we gave three performances, with at least five hundred people in attendance. Having made their way to the best places, the audience arranged folding chairs, setting up cameras and camcorders, telling children and acquaintances that they watched a program about shepherds on the Discovery Channel, and how interesting it would be to see this spectacle live.

Each performance lasted about half an hour. Radiant Carolyn, delighted at every opportunity to display her ancient art, released the sheep and sent a dog to drive them a few hundred yards up the grassy hill, and then sent a second to collect the sheep and lead them back to the paddock.

Dave - the leader and a native Scot - was the main and well-deserved protagonist in this performance; he obeyed Carolyn's every command, voice or whistle. And I explained to the audience what was going on.

Зрелище, состоявшее из достаточно примитивных трюков, производило на публику неизгладимое impression. An excited whisper swept through the crowd as the audience was struck by the ease with which Carolyn controlled the dogs, ordering them to turn left or right, turn around or lie down on the ground, as if holding a remote control in her hands. The dogs acted harmoniously and with lightning speed; sheep, creating the necessary atmosphere, bleated and tried to grab more grass.

“God,” one of the women standing next to me whispered, “and for nine years I can’t get my dog ​​to simply obey the “sit” command.

After the end of field hockey or the weavers' competition, the audience dispersed without stopping. But Carolyn was surrounded by a wall of spectators. Heи единодушно восхищались ее собаками и сожалели о том, что им самим не посчастливилось работать с такими умными животными. Those in the audience who had seen Border Collies and other herding dogs at work before, whether in Europe or one of the Western states, unanimously assured that they would never forget this spectacle. That was great. It seems that the public perceived Carolyn's dogs, and mine at the same time, as something supernatural.

Given the vast arsenal of entertainment available to most American families, it is strange that the work of dogs chasing sheep across the lawn is such an exciting spectacle. However, perhaps this is not surprising. Probably, people were bribed by the opportunity to see something unusual, to plunge into the times when a man and a dog literally could not do without each other, being connected to each other not only by emotions, but also by joint work.

I think that the words of one of the spectators can be cited as an answer to this question: “Looking at them, for some reason I thought about why we need dogs, where they came from and how long ago they began to help people.”

Whatever it is, watching the sheep run up and down the hillside, stopping to graze, and Carolyn blowing the whistle and commanding "Come" or "Forward" and the dogs obediently herding the herd, the crowd gasped and groaned so unanimously, as if a moon rover was driving along the slopes.

My dogs also basked in the glory. Almost every spectator tried to stroke them or call them by name. Homer received admiration, but behaved indifferently - he was only interested in sheep. He мог целыми днями сидеть у загона, не сводя с них глаз, с нетерпением дожидаясь своей очереди поработать. Devon, as usual, was nervous and did not leave me a single step.

When it was time for the third and final performance, we were all a little tired, including the dogs. Although it was early autumn, the sun was still noticeably hot, it was stuffy. Homer sat patiently by the fence, waiting for the time to get down to business.

A small band of pipers—their music was the signal for our start—passed by a huge man carrying what looked like a telegraph pole on his shoulders. (Later it turned out that this was the telegraph pole).

While I was preparing the microphone, a small yellow van showed up in the driveway. He медленно пробрался сквозь толпу и остановился за моим грузовиком. Two middle-aged women in jeans and sneakers jumped out of the cab and opened the side doors.

A group of children from a boarding school for handicapped children got out of the van.

Among them were several seriously disabled people, the rest suffered from mental retardation, three moved in wheelchairs. The group moved towards us.

One of the children, the one sitting in the chair, rode right up to us. I soon learned that his name was Joey and he was twelve years old. He заметил Девона и начал выкрикивать что-то невнятное. "Dog, dog!" - at least that's how it seemed to me. The boy didn't look scared, more excited. His round face was framed by blond hair, he wore a worn brown baseball cap, blue sneakers and jeans, and a T-shirt with picture of Mickey Mouse. In his hands, he tightly squeezed a plush toy and made an incredible noise.

The teacher, who was rolling his chair, tried to calm the boy, but he continued to scream, not taking his eyes off my dog. Devon stood next to me, a few meters away from the child, and he gradually became