Its 4.30am and Im awake- not sure why yet - then I hear it again- the deep threatening growl coming from Her on the floor beside the bed. I slide out and gently pull back the blind so I can see out. Nothing, The old cat sitting on the path in bright moonlight and the dappled shadows from the two massive Plane trees . Once more I hear the deep warning growl from behind me .. then I see it -the shadow quietly sliding around under the black wattle at the top of the driveway and silently making its way to a nursery pen where a black araucana and her two baby marans are sleeping oblivious. I make my way in the dark into the corridor to the front door and silently unlock it with Her following me - she is out the door as soon as the gap is wide enough, leaping off the porch and landing halfway across the lawn emitting a half growl, half bark as she lands. Both Her and the shadow disappear and I can only hear them crashing through the roses at the front into the orchard and then through the West Australian salt bush that serves as a boundary fence. The neighbours Italian Greyhound and Jack Russell have now joined in the pursuit and I hear them chasing the shadow across the neighbours front block and through the heaps of bark chips and piles of logs from his tree lopping business. Then all is quiet. A few moments later She returns- hackles still up, nose down and sniffing , snuffling through the fallen leaves and grass. Still busy backtracking the scent in ever widening circles. She heads down the main drive, past the horse yards and I hear one snort, then back through the back block, around the pen that has five young pullets- I hear one give an immature warning cackle. With nose down still she circles over to the pen where the mother silkie is broody- ok -nothing has been- then across to the main pens all quiet- not even a duck quacking. Relaxed now- she heads back inside and by the time Ive shut and locked the doors she is lying by the bed with her head on her paws with her eyes shut- husband is still asleep .As I pass her she opens her eyes for a second and just for an instant in the dim light I see a glimpse of her soul in her eyes that are like the waters of the nearby Murray River. Its an old soul with ghosts of ancestors that lived on stations, herded sheep and slept by camp fires. Then she sighs and shuts her eyes and leaves me to wonder if the shadow has made it across the road and back to the salt plains around the lake from where it has come.
Posted on: Thu, 15 Jan 2015 00:30:04 +0000
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