Somehow, I have earned the devotion of an ageing black Lab

The routine is this: I turn up on the Eve, play with the children, often literally, with some kind of board game that they have, inexplicably, become attached to.

I then go to bed on the sofa in front of a glowing fireplace, and wake up early on Christmas morning to start cooking the lunch.

This year ’s highlight was seeing the dogs or, to be accurate, one of them.

I trod on his paw by mistake and, mortified, left the cooking to apologise to him.

At night , he lies down by the sofa with me, until his bones ache, and he goes to his own bed a few feet away.

Maybe he remembers my voice from over the fence when his owner was still alive but no, he can't do, it was too long ago.

Argos, who recognised his owner, Odysseus , after 20 years away, died immediately afterwards.