Published on September 10, 2003

Today, starting about an hour after first light, I dug a grave by the lilac bush and buried our dog. Working the root-bound soil with a spade and pick helped convince me I was doing a good turn for a dog who, true to his breed, was loyal and gentle with a touch of independence that would prompt him to go down the road and hang out at the neighbors’ whenever parties at our house grew too loud and rambunctious.

A purebred golden retriever, he came to us early in the nineties when he was around three years old. He came with the name of Harvey that we kept, adding variations — the most common being, Harvey-Doggie — as time went by. He was a good dog. He barked whenever someone drove into the yard, and he buried the mice the cat killed in the house. He liked tissues and bread. I dug his grave with moist eyes and a troubled mind: Had I done the right thing for him in his final hour of need?

The thought of putting him down hit me almost as soon as I got home from vacation. Harvey was neither eating his food nor drinking any water. Leif, who had been housesitting for us, told me the dog had been acting poorly the last couple of days. He certainly looked bad. He was gaunt, unsteady on his legs, and his eyes had that faraway, glazed look that Leif aptly described as a death head. The first day back, I put a blanket on him when I found him shivering while lying on the lawn. That’s when I realized he was dying and probably suffering.

Downtown late Saturday morning I ran into B.C.W. — an old high school pal who had become Harvey’s guardian when a couple he knew decided to part and go their separate ways. Unable to agree over who should get the dog — the son of Adirondack Charlie and Tia Maria XVIII — they had given him to B.C.W. with the understanding he would find Harvey a new home.

“I’m pretty sure he’s dying,” I said. “He is nearly 13 years old and he’s got a couple tumors.”

“Why don’t you take him over to the vet and have him put to sleep,” he suggested.

“I’m not sure I want to do that,” I said.

“Well, give it some thought,” he replied. “It might be the best thing.”

Back home I related the conversation to Leif, Rocky’s son. “I don’t know,” I said. “I’m not sure who that solution is intended to help most, me or the dog.”

Throughout the day his condition continued to deteriorate. He appeared to prefer to stay outside, and I took that as a sign he might be preparing to die. I was surprised when he scratched on the door early in the evening asking to be let in. I put a blanket over him, scratched behind his ear as he lay motionless on the floor. His breathing was soft but steady. Dying at home seemed to be the best way to go. I only began to have doubts later when he fell trying to climb the stairs to our bedroom, where he most always spent the night. A pistol shot might be the most compassionate thing I could do for him. Early Sunday morning I heard his nails clicking against the floor as he walked to the door and waited to be let out. I obliged, but when I got up a few hours later, there was no sign of him. He wasn’t lying in front of the door, like he usually did. Perhaps he had gone searching for a final resting place. It’s a dignified death, I told myself. Let him go and give him time.

“I believe Harvey has gone into the woods to die,” I wrote in a note to Rocky, telling her I was going to camp and have breakfast with the boys of fall, the guys I spend deer season with every year.

I left home feeling comfortable with the direction things were going. I wanted Harvey to die at his own pace, if it were at all possible. It’s not that I’m opposed toward killing an animal who is suffering. Years ago we killed a young doe who had been gut shot by hunters unknown to us. We were in camp when we got the word about the shooting from my cousin, who was coming off the mountain. He had seen the wounded doe after coming upon a blood trail. Three of four of us left camp that day. It’s a good thing there were so many of us as it turned out to be a gruesome task, even though everyone involved likes venison. The doe headed for the stream when we jumped her out of her bed. We caught up to her as she made it to the water just below the falls. It didn’t take long to dress her off and hide the carcass. She was a small deer, couldn’t have gone more than a 100 pounds.

“She was such a poor little thing,” said Pete, who a few days afterwards began referring to the stretch of water as “Doe Kill Falls.”

As in the case of the wounded deer, Harvey’s death instinct led him to running water, the stream where I gathered water the first winter I lived in Newark. It was late in the afternoon when I found him after briefly searching a piece of woods I knew he liked to travel. Only I wasn’t prepared for what I found. He was lying in the stream, head up and still alive. It was a wrenching sight that brought me to my knees. I lifted him out of the water and laid him on the bank. Maybe it was only my imagination seared by grief, but for a moment I thought he recognized me. I walked back to the house focusing on my father’s pistol that is stuck away in my desk drawer. No matter. When I returned to the stream, I was pulling a sled that I use to haul provisions into camp. I loaded Harvey onto the sled and dragged him back to the woodshed, staying on the grass whenever possible, and covered him with a blanket. When Rocky got home from work, we carried dog and sled into the house and laid them by a cold stove.

“I couldn’t shoot him and I couldn’t leave him there,” I told her.

“It’s good that you’re going to be home tomorrow,” she said, thinking that Harvey wouldn’t be left to die alone.

“Yeah,” I said flatly. The prospect of living with a dying dog another day left me feeling about as heavy as lead. Maybe I should get some help. Someone from town who could shoot straight and make a clean job of it. But another factor intervened.

About ten o’clock that evening I saw Harvey raise his head. After finishing the piece I was reading in the paper, I went over to scratch that spot behind his ear. Lying head down, he was warm but limp. Death, swiftly and mercifully, had taken the matter out of my hands.

Paul Lefebvre

Note:  Paul Lefebvre writes "Yours from the Perimeter" every week for the print edition of the Chronicle.   He recently published a sampling of his columns titled Perimeter Check.  To read Howard Frank Mosher's review of the book click here.  To purchase a cop of Perimeter Check e-mail Mr. Lefebvre at paul(at)bartonchronicle(dot)com.