Franck found himself alone with the animal again. The dog was standing upright, tense and almost stationary, watching Franck uncomprehendingly, or perhaps selfishly waiting for him to offer him another slice. He knew there was plenty of ham on the table and didn’t understand why Franck wasn’t giving him any more of it. Looking Franck straight in the eye, he took a step backwards, staring at him aggressively as if he wanted to say something, and then he barked three times, ferocious barks that rang out across the landscape, three loud outbursts like gunshots before the most complete silence. Franck gazed out over countryside that was suddenly muted. It was as if all the unseen animals – that hawk, those jays and cicadas; the wild boar, deer, rabbits and thrushes – as if all potential quarry were breathing a unanimous sigh of relief, celebrating the fact that one more human was opting out of the Great Chain of Being to rejoin the society of repenters seeking absolution. That must be how animals see things: every human being who stops eating meat is hoping to exonerate themselves from the evil they have done to their fellow creatures. Becoming vegetarian was a way for humans to keep themselves to themselves and survive without animals. In the silence, Franck thought he could detect universal approval from the wildlife around him, from all the animals that were observing him and had thought he was about to have a change of heart and rejoin them in the cycle of death. Humans and dogs had separated when they stopped eating the same food. Before dog food and biscuits, they used to eat the same flesh, the same meat. Humans would eat the chicken breast and thighs and dogs would finish the carcass; humans would cook the game and dogs would eat the offal. Now, humans and dogs eat completely different things.

The dog was still tensed, fixing Franck with a harsh stare. But instead of looking away, Franck held the animal’s gaze. He quickly sensed the dog was close to yowling or barking as he clenched his jaw and drew back his lower lip, to the point that Franck feared he might bite or attack him. In the eyes of the wolf dog he saw the kind of carnivorous frenzy that makes wolves fight over the corpse of the wild boar they have just killed, that voraciousness of wolves, which will bite and rip each other apart, even as they are destroying the body of their prey. Franck reached out and dropped three slices of ham on the ground for Alpha and the dog calmed down. He lay down to lick them thoroughly, before swallowing them one by one.