The day of the funeral arrived, and the funeral procession moved slowly toward the cemetery. Among those who came was the officer’s family, with whom he had not spoken for almost five years. They had flown in from far away that morning. His colleagues were already waiting for them at the coffin – fellow soldiers, officers in strict uniforms. And next to them, with his head down and a heavy look, walked a dog – a German shepherd named Max.
Max wasn’t just a pet. He was the dead officer’s partner, a service dog who went through dozens of operations with him. When the warehouse was robbed and the officer died under strange circumstances, Max was there. From that day on, he barely ate, didn’t play, just stared into space and whined.
Now he sat at the feet of the soldiers, right next to the coffin, strewn with bright flowers. People were quietly crying.
And suddenly Max stood up. His ears perked up, his nose pressed against the edge of the coffin. He sniffed the lid, then jerked back sharply, growled… and barked loudly. It was not an ordinary bark. People flinched. Several officers rushed to the dog, thinking that he had lost control of his emotions.
“Take him away,” whispered one of the women.
The dog rushed towards the coffin, squealing and scratching its paws on the wooden lid.
The commander standing next to him frowned. He knew this dog. Max never barked without a reason.
“Open the coffin,” he said decisively.
– What? Why? – the relatives protested.
— OPEN.
As the lid was slowly lifted,silence fell over the cemetery. For a second, everyone froze… and then a loud scream of horror was heard. Continued in the first comment 👇👇
The wrong person was in the coffin.
Not the same at all. A strange face, a strange shape, a strange body. It was someone else.
Max growled quietly, but with relief –it wasn’t his master
He was right. It later turned out that a fatal error had occurred in the morgue : the tags had been mixed up. The bodies of two men – the dead officer and the civilian – arrived almost simultaneously, and in the rush one was given out instead of the other.
The officer’s real body was found a day later in another hall. He was buried properly – and with honor.
Max was with him until the end.
