But he was just a dog, right?

I stroked my dear friend’s head as the medications flowed into his vein, setting his mind at ease and putting his great, sweet heart to rest.

I thought I’d wept my last tears long ago, but when Pepper’s chest stopped rising and falling, I turned away and sobbed.

Pepper was my dog, a cross of an Australian shepherd with a border collie in an attempt to create a super herding canine.

As it turned out, he had no herding instinct whatsoever. And now, lymphoma had eaten his innards, and atrophy had robbed him of the ability to walk.

Nineteen years old, he’d gone deaf too.

But when he was in his prime, he could run more swiftly than I, hear more keenly, see more clearly and — of this I am certain — love more purely and freely.

And almost until the end, he had the ability to make me laugh out loud.

Pepper was the latest of a string of canines with whom the Caseys have shared our home and our lives.

First was Skipper, a coal-black sprite of a terrier who once reduced an obedience trainer to stammering — in German, yet — after he’d untied her shoes.

There was Ling, a chow chow mix with a heart of oak and a head of the same material, a triumph of courage over caution that once sent her charging at the business end of a skunk.

Beren was of completely mixed parentage, although German shepherd was back there somewhere, who was my companion during the six months I was unemployed.

He’d patiently wait while I ate breakfast. When I poured my coffee, he’d trot into the bedroom-turned-office where I answered advertisements and made cold calls.

If I didn’t join him in a minute or two, he’d poke his head around the door as if to tell me I was goofing off.

Taffy was unquestionably the cutest of our critters, a Pomeranian cross who would walk on two legs nearly as well as on four.

We let all our dogs develop their own personality, and each one rewarded us with unique, endearing traits.

Pepper, though, was especially special.

We found him at an animal shelter in Corpus Christi, Texas, that kept its dogs in kennels, half of each was roofed, half open to the elements.

When we approached Pepper indoors, he ran outside. When we approached him outside, he ran indoors. Something or someone, we realized, had traumatized this animal.

But when my daughter knelt alone at the chain-link fence, Pepper went to her and nuzzled her hand.

The dog had chosen his person.

Over the years, my daughter’s brain disorder worsened and she opted to leave our home to live on the streets.

That left Pepper and me with the same hole in our hearts, and we bonded.

Through tougher times than I care to remember, he gave me limitless love, often sleeping beside me or watching as I practiced sitting meditation.

Pepper’s day started when we both went outside to get the paper and ended when he stretched out at the foot of our bed.

At the veterinarian’s office, as he passed, I wondered again at that gossamer veil that separates life from death. It’s much too thin to see or feel, and a spirit crosses it suddenly and silently.

For those left behind, though, it’s as hard as a wall of cold-forged steel.

Some people would have me think that dogs have no souls. I’d ask them from whence springs such unstinting love and good humor.

As for me, I don’t know if I will enter an afterlife but I know what I’ll do if I find myself there.

I’ll whistle for Skipper, Ling, Beren, Taffy and Pepper. If they run to me, tails wagging, eyes shining, jumping up to lick my chin, I’ll know I’ve made it into heaven.

But if there are no dogs in this otherworldly place, I’ll know that I’m in hell.