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Tagalong, the talking Pekingese

By MARGUERITE QUANTAINE
Published June 10, 2007

Every January I christen a new calendar by highlighting the 8th of March in memory of our miniature copper-tinged Pekingese. He'd been thrust into the arms of my friend one gusting, sleety night by a battered woman we barely knew who hastened backward, shrieking that her husband had beaten her, and now vowed to kill her dog.

Lily buttoned the puppy inside her coat to ward off quit-claim and cold, later presenting him to me as having followed her home.

"Uh-huh. He just tagged along after you, " I supposed, before learning the dire details.

"How utterly desperate that woman was, " she said with a sigh.

"Dear little Earth angel, " I whispered and kissed. An ouch like onions in my eyes. "You'll be our Tagalong."

We shared a fast affinity, Tag and I. Lily could feed, bathe and walk him, but most of his time was spent moored to me.

Besides being irresistible, three particulars made him precious. First, he'd been born on Lily's birthday, ensuring endearment. Second, he adored me. Enough said. Third, he could talk.

Yes. Talk. And, I could understand him. Perfectly. And whatever he said came into my head. And whatever came into my head came out of my mouth as what he wanted known, done or felt. A kind of oratory by osmosis.

As word spread, we gained a following, albeit essentially esoteric. Visitors were ever eager to hear Tag talk. Most were mesmerized. A few were dubious. But only skeptics dismissed us as a slick trick.

Initially, even Lily vacillated, since I never struggled to decipher the dog's din. The warble of his words would emerge clear from my mouth, almost simultaneously.

Then one wee morning hour as the wind whipped and thunder menaced, Tag began to whine, chant and drone, mouth waggling, head bobbing, paws pawing.

"What's happening?" Lily hollered, preferring the coziness under the covers to dealing with predawn disasters.

"He says the upstairs porch is leaking. Rain's coming through the sunroom ceiling downstairs."

"Dogwash, " she said, dismissively. But Tag persisted.

So, Lily donned a robe and snarled her way down the stairs, words burning blue behind her. Defiantly, she flung open the French doors to the sunroom where - sure enough - water showered the floor.

"Now, " she conceded as we mopped up the mess. "I'm a believer."

Tag's primary requests centered on the mundane: meal preferences, walking routes, water refills. He'd warn us of impending storms and unexpected visitors, strays needing assistance and strangers in the neighborhood.

But his forte was in caring for me.

Years earlier, I'd been hit by a drunken driver. It left me with chronic disabilities, the worst being a brain blow that oddly augmented my faculties. These new, intense sensitivities to smell, sound, taste and touch often triggered agonizing seizures.

Tag could foretell an attack. In hastening me to lie down, he'd cover my forehead with his chin, creating a tranquility that somehow tempered the spasm's fury. As if a godsend.

In the spring of 1990, Tag turned 13. That's particularly old for a Peke. He had heart problems, arthritic flare-ups, and gradually lost his eyesight and hearing. Still, Tag assured us the meds prescribed kept him comfortable.

I began chauffeuring him around the neighborhood in my bike basket so he could whisker the breeze, savoring fragrances of friends. He'd have me stop to study clouds, observe birds or chat with cats and passersby; intuiting those who harbored treats.

One late October afternoon as we lounged beneath the backyard oaks, Tag inched up from where he reigned on my lap to tender my attention by gently placing his paw on my lips before softly caroling.

Lily asked, "What?"

"He says he loves us. But he has to go now. He says, don't fret. He'll be back. Tomorrow."

The pale pink tip of his tiny tongue tasted my face one final time before he died. And in that instant, I damn near did, too.

Make no mistake. My love for animals is immeasurable. They're my dear friends, with each loss scarring a part of my heart. But losing Tagalong crushed it.

The next night, as I crouched in a corner of our upstairs porch, sobbing and swearing that I'd never go through such soul-wrenching sorrow again, the screech of brakes and doors slamming brought me to my feet in time to see two miscreants drag an old and crippled Irish setter from their car, dumping it in our drainage ditch.

Instinctively, I rushed to him. So ruthlessly betrayed. We named him Blue. He'd be our comrade for three more years, when aiding abandoned animals became our sacred-something to do, forevermore.

All this was ruminating in my mind when I got a sweet feeling just before the phone rang this morning.

"You might not remember me, " the voice quavered, "but I was the woman whose Pekingese you rescued, once." A crony from our distant past had traced us and coaxed her to call.

"Did anyone ever rescue you?" I'd wondered for 30 years.

"It took that dog to get me to go, " she confessed. Wounded. Still. "But I never looked back. Except for feeling grateful to you."

I had to ask. "How did you know he'd be safe with us?"

"You'll probably think I'm crazy." She hesitated. "He told me."

I just glowed.

Marguerite Quantaine is an essayist living in Florida.

[Last modified June 9, 2007, 18:46:19]