The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time

  And then he went away and I watched the rest of University Challenge.

  And the next week Father told Mother she had to move out of the house, but she couldn't because she didn't have any money to pay rent for a flat. And I asked if Father would be arrested and go to prison for killing Wellington because we could live in the house if he was in prison. But Mother said the police would only arrest Father if Mrs. Shears did what is called pressing charges, which is telling the police you want them to arrest someone for a crime, because the police don't arrest people for little crimes unless you ask them and Mother said that killing a dog was only a little crime.

  But then everything was OK because Mother got a job on the till in a garden center and the doctor gave her pills to take every morning to stop her from feeling sad, except that sometimes they made her dizzy and she fell over if she stood up too fast. So we moved into a room in a big house that was made of red bricks. And the bed was in the same room as the kitchen and I didn't like it because it was small and the corridor was painted brown and there was a toilet and a bathroom that other people used and Mother had to clean it before I used it or I wouldn't use it and sometimes I wet myself because other people were in the bathroom. And the corridor outside the room smelled like gravy and the bleach they use to clean the toilets at school. And inside the room it smelled like socks and pine air freshener.

  And I didn't like waiting to find out about my maths A level. And whenever I thought about the future I couldn't see anything clearly in my head and that made a panic start. So Siobhan said I shouldn't think about the future. She said, “Just think about today. Think about things that have happened. Especially about good things that have happened.”

  And one of the good things was that Mother bought me a wooden puzzle which looked like this

  And you had to detach the top part of the puzzle from the bottom part, and it was really difficult.

  And another good thing was that I helped Mother paint her room White with a Hint of Wheat, except I got paint in my hair and she wanted to wash it out by rubbing shampoo on my head when I was in the bath, but I wouldn't let her, so there was paint in my hair for 5 days and then I cut it out with a pair of scissors.

  But there were more bad things than good things.

  And one of them was that Mother didn't get back from work till 5:30 p.m. so I had to go to Father's house between 3:49 p.m. and 5:30 p.m., because I wasn't allowed to be on my own and Mother said I didn't have a choice, so I pushed the bed against the door in case Father tried to come in. And sometimes he tried to talk to me through the door, but I didn't answer him. And sometimes I heard him sitting on the floor outside the door quietly for a long time.

  And another bad thing was that Toby died because he was 2 years and 7 months old, which is very old for a rat, and I said I wanted to bury him, but Mother didn't have a garden, so I buried him in a big plastic pot of earth like a pot you put a plant in. And I said I wanted another rat but Mother said I couldn't have one because the room was too small.

  And I solved the puzzle because I worked out that there were two bolts inside the puzzle and they were tunnels with metal rods in them like this

  And you had to hold the puzzle so that both rods slid to the end of their tunnels and they weren't crossing the intersection between the two pieces of the puzzle and then you could pull them apart.

  And Mother picked me up from Father's house one day after she had finished work and Father said, “Christopher, can I have a talk with you?”

  And I said, “No.”

  And Mother said, “It's OK. I'll be here.”

  And I said, “I don't want to talk to Father.”

  And Father said, “I'll do you a deal.” And he was holding the kitchen timer, which is a big plastic tomato sliced through the middle, and he twisted it and it started ticking. And he said, “Five minutes, OK? That's all. Then you can go.”

  So I sat on the sofa and he sat on the armchair and Mother was in the hallway and Father said, “Christopher, look . . . Things can't go on like this. I don't know about you, but this . . . this just hurts too much. You being in the house but refusing to talk to me . . . You have to learn to trust me . . . And I don't care how long it takes . . . If it's a minute one day and two minutes the next and three minutes the next and it takes years I don't care. Because this is important. This is more important than anything else.”

  And then he tore a little strip of skin away from the side of the thumbnail on his left hand.

  And then he said, “Let's call it . . . let's call it a project. A project we have to do together. You have to spend more time with me. And I . . . I have to show you that you can trust me. And it will be difficult at first because . . . because it's a difficult project. But it will get better. I promise.”

  Then he rubbed the sides of his forehead with his fingertips, and he said, “You don't have to say anything, not right now. You just have to think about it. And, um . . . I've got you a present. To show you that I really mean what I say. And to say sorry. And because . . . well, you'll see what I mean.”

  Then he got out of the armchair and he walked over to the kitchen door and opened it and there was a big cardboard box on the floor and there was a blanket in it and he bent down and put his hands inside the box and he took a little sandy-colored dog out.

  Then he came back through and gave me the dog. And he said, “He's two months old. And he's a golden retriever.”

  And the dog sat in my lap and I stroked it.

  And no one said anything for a while.

  Then Father said, “Christopher, I would never, ever do anything to hurt you.”

  Then no one said anything.

  Then Mother came into the room and said, “You won't be able to take him away with you, I'm afraid. The bed-sit's too small. But your father's going to look after him here. And you can come and take him out for walks whenever you want.”

  And I said, “Does he have a name?”

  And Father said, “No. You can decide what to call him.”

  And the dog chewed my finger.

  And then it was 5 minutes and the tomato alarm went. So Mother and I drove back to her room.

  And the next week there was a lightning storm and the lightning hit a big tree in the park near Father's house and knocked it down and men came and cut the branches up with chain saws and carried the logs away on a lorry, and all that was left was a big black pointed stump made of carbonized wood.

  And I got the results of my maths A level and I got an A grade, which is the best result, and it made me feel like this

  And I called the dog Sandy. And Father bought him a collar and a lead and I was allowed to take him for walks to the shop and back. And I played with him with a rubber bone.

  And Mother got flu and I had to spend three days with Father and stay in his house. But it was OK because Sandy slept on my bed so he would bark if anyone came into the room during the night. And Father made a vegetable patch in the garden and I helped him. And we planted carrots and peas and spinach and I'm going to pick them and eat them when they're ready.

  And I went to a bookshop with Mother and I bought a book called Further Maths for A Level and Father told Mrs. Gascoyne that I was going to take A-level further maths next year and she said “OK.”

  And I am going to pass it and get an A grade. And in two years' time I am going to take A-level physics and get an A grade.

  And then, when I've done that, I am going to go to university in another town. And it doesn't have to be in London because I don't like London and there are universities in lots of places and not all of them are in big cities. And I can live in a flat with a garden and a proper toilet. And I can take Sandy and my books and my computer.

  And then I will get a First Class Honors degree and I will become a scientist.

  And I know I can do this because I went to London on my own, and because I solved the mystery of Who Killed Wellington? and I found my mother and I was brave and I wrote a book and that means I ca
n do anything.

  APPENDIX

  QUESTION

  Prove the following result:

  A triangle with sides that can be written in the form n2 + 1, n2 - 1 and 2n (where n > 1) is right-angled.

  Show, by means of a counterexample, that the converse is false.

  ANSWER

  First we must determine which is the longest side of a triangle with sides that can be written in the form n2 + 1, n2 - 1 and 2n (where n > 1)

  n2 + 1 - 2n = (n - 1)2

  and if n > 1 then (n - 1)2 > 0

  therefore n2 + 1 - 2n > 0

  therefore n2 + 1 > 2n

  Similarly (n2 + 1) - (n2 - 1) = 2

  therefore n2 + 1 > n2 - 1

  This means that n2 + 1 is the longest side of a triangle with sides that can be written in the form n2 + 1, n2 - 1 and 2n (where n > 1).

  This can also be shown by means of the following graph (but this doesn't prove anything):

  According to Pythagoras's theorem, if the sum of the squares of the two shorter sides equals the square of the hypotenuse, then the triangle is right-angled. Therefore to prove that the triangle is right-angled we need to show that this is the case.

  The sum of the squares of the shorter two sides is (n2 - 1)2 + (2n)2

  (n2 - 1)2 + (2n)2 = n4 - 2n2 + 1 + 4n2 = n4 + 2n2 + 1

  The square of the hypotenuse is (n2 + 1)2

  (n2 + 1)2 = n4 + 2n2 + 1

  Therefore the sum of the squares of the shorter two sides is equal to the square of the hypotenuse and the triangle is right-angled.

  And the converse of “A triangle with sides that can be written in the form n2 + 1, n2 - 1 and 2n (where n > 1) is right-angled” is “A triangle that is right-angled has sides whose lengths can be written in the form n2 + 1, n2 - 1 and 2n (where n > 1).”

  And a counterexample means finding a triangle which is right-angled but whose sides cannot be written in the form n2 + 1,

  n2 - 1 and 2n (where n > 1).

  So let the hypotenuse of the right-angled triangle ABC be AB.

  and let AB = 65

  and let BC = 60

  Then CA = √ (AB2 - BC2)

  = √ (652 - 602) = √ (4225 - 3600) = √ 625 = 25

  Let AB = n2 + 1 = 65

  then n = √ (65 - 1) = √ 64 = 8

  therefore (n2 - 1) = 64 - 1 = 63 ≠ BC = 60 ≠ CA = 25

  and 2n = 16 ≠ BC = 60 ≠ CA = 25

  Therefore the triangle ABC is right-angled but it does not have sides which can be written in the form n2 + 1, n2 - 1 and 2n (where n > 1). QED

  1I found this in a book when Mother took me into the library in town in 1996.

  Return to text.

  2This is not a metaphor, it is a simile, which means that it really did look like there were two very small mice hiding in his nostrils, and if you make a picture in your head of a man with two very small mice hiding in his nostrils, you will know what the police inspector looked like. And a simile is not a lie, unless it is a bad simile.

  Return to text.

  3But I wouldn't have Shreddies and tea because they are both brown.

  Return to text.

  4Once I didn't talk to anyone for 5 weeks.

  Return to text.

  5When I was 6 Mother used to get me to drink strawberry-flavored slimming meals out of a measuring jug and we would have competitions to see how fast I could drink a quarter of a liter.

  Return to text.

  6People say that you always have to tell the truth. But they do not mean this because you are not allowed to tell old people that they are old and you are not allowed to tell people if they smell funny or if a grown-up has made a fart. And you are not allowed to say “I don't like you” unless that person has been horrible to you.

  Return to text.

  7Stupid things are things like emptying a jar of peanut butter onto the table in the kitchen and making it level with a knife so it covers all the table right to the edges, or burning things on the gas stove to see what happened to them, like my shoes or silver foil or sugar.

  Return to text.

  8I only did this once by borrowing the keys when she went into town on the bus, and I hadn't driven a car before and I was 8 years old and 5 months so I drove it into the wall, and the car isn't there anymore because Mother is dead.

  Return to text.

  9It is permitted to move the chairs and the table in the kitchen because that is different, but it makes me feel dizzy and sick if someone has moved the sofa and the chairs around in the living room or the dining room. Mother used to do this when she did the hoovering, so I made a special plan of where all the furniture was meant to be and did measurements and I put everything back in its proper place afterward and then I felt better. But since Mother died Father hasn't done any hoovering, so that is OK. And Mrs. Shears did the hoovering once but I did groaning and she shouted at Father and she never did it again.

  Return to text.

  12This is really true because I asked Siobhan what people thought about when they looked at things, and this is what she said.

  Return to text.

  FIRST VINTAGE BOOKS EDITION, JUNE 2008

  All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Vintage Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto. Originally published in hardcover in the United States by Pantheon Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, in 2007.

  Vintage and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Underground logo, fabric designs, and line diagrams are reproduced with the kind permission of Transport for London. Kuoni advertisement reproduced with the kind permission of Kuoni Travel Ltd. A-level maths question reproduced with the kind permission of Oxford Cambridge and RSA Examinations (OCR). Every effort has been made to trace other copyright holders, and the publishers will be happy to correct mistakes or omissions in future editions.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Haddon, Mark.

  The curious incident of the dog in the night-time : a novel / Mark Haddon.—1st ed.

  p. cm.

  Despite his overwhelming fear of interacting with people, Christopher, a mathematically gifted, autistic fifteen-year-old boy, decides to investigate the murder of a neighbor’s dog and uncovers secret information about his mother.

  [1. Autism—Fiction. 2. Savants (Savant syndrome)—Fiction. 3. England—Fiction.] I. Title.

  PZ7.H1165 Cu 2003

  [Fic]—dc21 2002031355

  Copyright © 2002 by Mark Haddon

  www.vintagebooks.com

  eISBN: 978-1-4000-7907-0

  v3.0_r1