Nipper, with love and hope

The Barraud children and the Powell children play together and at the the centre of their happy band is Nipper.

Nipper understands his family's movements. For example, when there is a general bustle and everyone starts to put their hats and coats on, he leaps onto the third step in the hallway. There, he catches their eye and smiles a doggy smile at the children until, finally, one of them calls out:

"Put Nipper's lead on, will you."

And someone else obliges. Clip! And they are ready to set off into the streets of Clifton. On Sundays the families go to church, which is not a place for dogs and, by way of explanation, someone calls out to Nipper:

"Church, Nipper."

And he sinks down onto the wooden step with a moan, watching everyone leave without him. Nipper, with his head between his paws.

"Are you all telling the truth?", he thinks.

Despite his dislike of religion, Nipper is a morally responsible dog. Above all he can't stand cigars. He doesn't like their smell and understands that they are a fire hazard. When Mark Barraud lets fall a match, Nipper dabs at it disapprovingly with one paw until a little trail of smoke signifies it is out.

And when, Francis lets his cigar butt drop, Nipper can't grind it out. It's too painful, so he stands over it and:

"Bark! Bark! Bark, bark, bark!"

- until someone takes notice and gets rid of the burning, stinking thing.

Nipper is brave, he has lost an eye in a fight with a rat. He can do party tricks too. The children line up a long row of biscuits and cakes and everyone is told which treat is theirs - including Nipper.

Later, at a word, Nipper is released and leaps towards his treat, flicking it up into the air and catching it with a flourish, to great applause.

But the terrier is not perfect: Sometimes he nips unsuspecting postmen, tradesmen and debt collectors in the calves. But more than anything, Nipper loves Mark Barraud. He might be playing ball with the children or hide and seek or being given a biscuit, but whatever he is doing and wherever he is, if he hears his master's whistle:

"Weeeeeeeeee!"

He drops everything and rushes off to Mark's side.

* * *

One day the whistling stops. Mark has gone. Unknown to Nipper, he has died of cancer of the lungs. The debt collectors call frequently, but Nipper doesn't have the heart to bite them in the calves anymore.

Now Francis, Mark's brother, can't pay the bills and he has to find new homes for his brother's children. He doesn't have enough money to support them. Their first happy childhood together is at an end. The Powell children lose their friends the Barrauds to orphanages and foster homes.

Later, when the house is, empty and silent, Mark's brother Francis comes in and sits down on Mark's chair with Nipper beside him.

With the hope of bringing Mark's memory back for a moment, Francis gets up to put a recording cylinder Mark and he had made together, into a borrowed gramaphone.

Nipper perks up and barks in amazement.

"Mark is back! Where?"

Nipper comes over to the to the trumpet and looks into it with love and hope. Shall everything shall be as it was? Will there be Mark, cakes and biscuits, the children, the family and fun.

No, there shan't.

But later on, perhaps in Kingston-upon-Thames, Francis paints Nipper as he remembers him, looking into the gramophone with love and hope. He takes the picture to a record company to sell it. And they think that it is just perfect for them.

They think it is so perfect, in fact, that they name their company after the picture of Nipper listening for Mark: They call their company: "His Master's Voice" (HMV). They even give Francis a job and for the rest of his working life Francis paints pictures of Nipper listening to Mark for HMV.


Based on the memories of Rosie Hall (Powell), my great grandmother, one of the children who played with Nipper.