The dog leapt up, already hungry for action, but what exactly? Strangely, dogs always know that they should look in the direction the finger is pointing. Alpha located the hare to the west; he stood still, not moving, nose in the air, trying to work out where he was. He stayed like this, tense as a loaded weapon ready to go off; they exchanged a quick glance, and then Franck simply said, ‘Get it!’ The dog immediately bolted off in the direction of the hare, and the hare, which sensed the predator coming at it from far away, bolted in turn and scampered off towards the woods. Hares can run twice as fast as dogs, but dogs never give up, even if it means running ten times as far on an absurdly steep slope. Franck regretted his decision, especially when he saw Alpha race to the end of the field, not even stopping at the bushes but noisily ploughing straight through them. He tore through the box trees and brambles at the edge of the woods, which plunged down steeply about fifty metres later, turning into a cliff that overhung the old village of Orcières. Franck was angry with himself for having set the two animals off on this fatal course. He couldn’t believe how crazy the dog was, launching himself at full speed down the slope through the undergrowth, with the rock face at the end, at risk of tumbling the whole way down the rock. Yet he was fascinated by his irrepressible energy. What would the dog bring him back this time? A bumblebee? A cone from a cypress tree? Or the hare?