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Bramble Jelly

Jeanette is making bramble jelly. She is trying to listen to the Morning Story on Radio 4 while she goes about her task. Jeanette’s brow is furrowed as she weighs the deep purple fruit and tips the berries into the heavy jelly pan that belonged to her mother and is now dented and scarred with use and her teeth bite her bottom lip. Carefully, she chops up two green apples, coring and slicing them and adding them to the pan with precise and efficient movements though her temples throb slightly. The radio continues a moving tale of survival, several sentences of which are missed as a lorry thunders by Jeanette’s front door. She strains to hear.
Into a glass measuring jug, she runs cold water, holding it so that the meniscus is level with her eye. When she is satisfied as to amount, she adds it to the pan and turns on the gas. She picks at the dark red stain under her nails and waits for the fruit to warm. The rich sweet smell of the fruit fills her kitchen, lingering on surfaces and curtains so that the scent will still be there long after the jam is made. Several cars drive by and again the radio is drowned out.
Jeanette is making another lot of her prize winning bramble jelly and she fears it could be her last. Jeanette is famed among the local WRIs for her bramble jelly and she has won prizes for it at shows in the area. Sometimes she is coerced into giving a talk about making jelly and about brambles but she does not like public speaking and never gives away her recipe entirely. Heavily made up ladies with red nails and wearing wide brimmed hats strain to hear her quiet voice as she speaks of the uses of brambles in times past. Of how Nicholas Culpeper, in his Complete Herbal of 1653, recommended bramble leaves boiled in lye for the treatment of itch and sores of the head and for dyeing the hair black. Of how, even today, bramble leaves are an effective remedy for diarrhoea and for sore throats and mouth ulcers.
Jeannette lowers the gas to simmer as the brambles heat and fall apart in the ruby liquid. She will let it cook until the fruit is soft and then she will mash it to a pulp of shimmering rubescence.
Jeanette also knows much of the folklore surrounding brambles. ‘Sitting under a bramble bush was supposed to cure rheumatism, boils and blackheads, while the arch formed by a rooting shoot was regarded as magical and children were passed through it to protect them from various disorders,’ she will say to her audience. Apart from the ladies in hats, there are usually several farmers’ wives, recognisable from their thrown together outfits, ruddy cheeks and lingering smell of the milking parlour. Neither group will ever make bramble jelly, the ladies because of the scrambling and scratching among the plants necessary to pick the fruit and the farmers’ wives because of their chronic shortage of time. But they like to hear her speak of the processes involved and after, sample her jelly on home-made scones.
But this could be the last autumn that she gathers the fruit. She has her own special patch, the situation of which she has divulged to nobody. She found it many years ago when she was newly wed and went for long, time-consuming walks away from the house. Her husband came with her once, just the once, shortly before he left her. He did not like picking brambles though he always ladled the jam generously on to his toast. She had to persuade him to help her that time, leading him on through the dense undergrowth to her patch.
Over the years, the brambles and nettles have grown thicker and denser, twining and intertwining into an almost impenetrable mass. Since her husband left, she has come alone every year to pick the fruit and to tend what she considers to be her own piece of ground. It is deep in a stretch of woodland, near to the river but far enough away from the main paths. It is a struggle to get through to it, but Jeanette has gradually trodden a narrow way through.
At the height of the brief brambling season in September, Jeanette can pick three or more pounds in an hour. She holds her bowl under the fruit and the ripe ones simply fall into it. Towards the end of September, the fruits are smaller and then she will also pick some red ones to provide the pectin the jelly needs, instead of using the green apples. But she always leaves enough berries to ripen and seed and fall to the ground and grow new plants and she spreads out the long branches and pins them down into the earth to root. In this way, the bramble patch has grown from what was those many years ago, a relatively small patch, into what it is today, covering the entire banking and spreading across the original paths.
‘I never pick the fruit after September 29th, Michaelmas,’ she says in her talks. ‘It was believed that after that date, the devil spat and urinated on the berries.’
Another huge lorry rattles past shaking her windows. Certainly, the new bypass will leave her house and those in the rest of the village, in peace. She and her neighbours will be able to walk safely along the road, will be able to reverse their cars out without fear of being hit, will be able to hear the punch lines of jokes in the comedy shows on TV. Yes, the bypass will bring many benefits to Jeanette and her neighbours. But the bypass is going straight through her bramble patch.
Jeanette sets a large bowl on her kitchen counter just under the shelving. She has a system whereby she can suspend her jelly bag from a wooden spoon inserted in the handles of her cupboard doors. She ladles the dark plum-coloured pulp into the jelly bag and the first of the blood red juice drips through into the bowl. She will let it sit there all night until every last drop is drained.
‘Brambles will grow anywhere,’ Jeanette will tell her audience, ‘in many different kinds of soil but they benefit from some feeding, a bit of blood and bone suits them fine.’ Over the years, she has almost become an expert on rubus fruticosus, the wild bramble. ‘They grow in all kinds of soil and in full sun or shade. They do like a moist soil, hence they grow well here…’ A slight murmur of laughter.
Jeanette does not sleep well that night, her tossing and turning punctuated by the occasional traffic sounds and by the steady drip of the crimson juice. For picking the berries, she wears an old jacket her husband once bought her and which she has never liked. Although it has been washed many times, it still carries a reddish brown tinge which will not fade. Her hands tingle from the numerous nettle stings she receives as she plunges her hands into the deepest niches where the best black clumps are to be found. She does not mind the pain of the stings and scratches, she is used to them and feels that they are only what is due to her.
The bypass worries her. There are public meetings but Jeanette does not stand up to speak out against it. Instead, she murmurs in the ears of the made up ladies and to the farmers’ wives as they pull on battered coats before rushing off to the next milking. The ladies talk amongst themselves, shaking their heads over the disturbance of it all and of course over Jeanette, shame she never remarried. She was quite young when he left suddenly. Nobody had ever heard from him again. Australia, some thought he’d gone to, or was it New Zealand? Looked such a happy couple too but you never can tell what goes on in a marriage.
Jeanette can. She never missed him, though she played the part of the deserted wife well. She felt such relief after he was gone that she sometimes had to remind herself to look down-hearted and sad. But she never felt tempted to repeat the experience.
Jeanette has spoken to many people about her fears for the woodland. She presses small jars of jelly, taken from her cupboards where they lie like necklaces of garnets, into the hands of councillors, planners, her MP, her MSP, even her MEP. She talks quietly and they nod their heads and take her jam and are reminded of her as they spread it on their toast and scones.
The next morning after breakfast, Jeanette carefully removes the bowl full of ruby red juice. ‘Never squeeze the jelly bag,’ she always tells her audience. ‘That way the jelly becomes cloudy.’ When she first made bramble jelly she would pound the mush in the jelly bag with a heavy meat tenderiser her husband gave her the first Christmas they were married. But now she knows better and the meat tenderiser lies unused in a kitchen drawer, still stained and dark from the juice of the berries of long ago. She has scrubbed it often, but the stains never totally fade.
She measures the liquid in her jug and pours it into the pan. Sugar is weighed and added and the pan left to come to a rolling boil. She warms the sterile jars in the oven ready for the hot jam. A saucer sits in the fridge, cooling, to test for setting point. This is the crucial part. Nothing must go wrong or Jeanette be distracted. She watches the jam froth and bubble, pink and purple, its sweetness filling the air and her mouth salivates.
The phone rings. But Jeanette cannot answer it. The jam cannot be left. She might miss the setting point and all will be lost. The answer phone switches on but a convoy of trucks rumble by and she cannot hear the speaker. Never mind. When she is finished, she will deal with it.
She tests a little of the jam on the cold saucer but it is not yet ready. Patiently she waits, testing every few minutes until at last, a skin wrinkles under her spoon. Quickly she switches off the gas and brings out her jars. The pink scum is removed and the jam stirred. She pours the hot red juice into the jars, filling them almost to the top. When the last spoonful is emptied from the pan, she tops each jar with a wax disc and sets them aside to cool. She likes the look of them. It appears to be a good making, this one, this last one perhaps.
Jeanette washes her hands of the stickiness and goes to the phone. It is one of her farmers’ wives. The voice is excited as well it might be, as it has in it the hope for a better future. The council are buying their land for the bypass. It will not now go through the woodland and the bramble patch. It is to be preserved as a site of environmental importance due to its untouched nature. The council will ensure it stays that way.
Jeanette stretches the cellophane circles over the jars and fastens them with an elastic band. Carefully she writes out the labels. Bramble jelly and the date. A last rub and then she lines the jars up in the cupboard along with the rest. They glow like beads of arterial blood. She switches on the radio to some music. Classic FM is playing the Waltz of the Flowers. She hums along and is happy.
Jeanette’s bramble patch will remain undisturbed. And so will the quiet tenor of her life. Let her husband rest there in his shallow, unmarked grave. Blood and bone give nutrients to her brambles. For once, he’d done some good.

The Lark At Break Of Day

War was not pleasant. It was sweaty, dirty, and boring. Not like working in a bank at all.
Grant had finally taken the oath as a Police Reservist and now he was on Active Duty
with a fair chance of being shot at or blown up. Or dying of boredom. You could actually die
of boredom. Johan said so. One second of inattention at the wrong time could kill you stone
dead.
The most tedious job of all was the early morning sweep of the dirt runway outside
base camp. Just after sunup Grant’s five-man stick of Reservists lined up across the width of
the runway and walked its entire length as the early sun gained strength, looking for signs of
disturbance of the red stony soil. Mines were cheap and easy to lay.
Cristos was lead man. He always took the most dangerous forward position on patrol
and Johan took the rear, ready to assume command if Cristos was scribbled—killed—in an
ambush.
On the third day, Jocko suddenly yelled “Cristos”, and they all froze, eyes sweeping
the nearby bush and rifle barrels traversing, hunting a target.
“What have you found?” Johan asked.
“Nothing,” said Cristos at last. “Just a lark’s nest. No disturbed earth. No mine.” He
trotted back to his position at the edge of the runway. “Walk on.”
“Bloody stupid place to build a nest,” said Jocko. “Why did she choose the middle of
a runway?”
“Because it’s bare,” Cristos explained. “The mother bird can see a snake coming.”
“But there’s planes landing half a dozen times a day. Any one of them could smash
the nest and eggs or kill the chicks.”
“She doesn’t know about aircraft, or war, or even wheels. But she hopes she can save
them from snakes.”
“Is that why she runs away from the nest when we get close? Trying to lure us away?”
Cristos grinned and nodded. Grant took a quick look at the nest. It was dead centre of
the runway, just a small scruffy bundle of grasses with fine soft feathers lining the inside.
Four eggs, mottled green and brown. With a dozen takeoffs and landings every day they were
doomed. It was merely a matter of time.
Later that morning they moved with another stick to a fly camp twenty miles out. Fly camps
were more dangerous than base, usually just a bulldozed earth embankment with two big tents
in the middle, one for each stick. And enough room for a Hyena or a lorry to park overnight.
As their truck left base camp Cristos said, “Put one up the spout, lads, and make sure
the safety is on.”
The lorry was an Isuzu five-tonne mineproofed with two layers of sandbags on the
bed. The men sat on the sandbags facing outwards, back-to-back, each braced against the man
behind him with their boots against the side wall, rifle barrels resting lightly on the wall.
Cristos sat up front with the driver, both of them protected by sandbags under the seats,
armour plate under their legs, and a piece of conveyor belt wrapped around the rear window
of the cab. The crude mineproofing worked, they’d been told. Nobody talked about the
possibility of a double mine, one on top of another, which would certainly kill some of them.
And nobody mentioned the Soviet jumping mines. They were certain death.
“Tune in, my sons. Stay alert, stay alive,” warned Johan as the truck accelerated along
the road. Their rifle barrels, four on each side, rose and fell gently with each variation of the
grassy verge, like a ship’s broadside. Grant was aware of low-level adrenaline singing in his
veins.
The lorry dropped them off one by one at half-mile intervals along a stretch of road
being carved out of the bush, and the outgoing reservists clambered in to take their places.
Grant was second last man, and Johan last. Grant was suddenly all alone with his rifle, the
only man on foot within a one mile stretch. The only easy target.
The machines—the dozers, belly-dump loaders and scrapers roared along on their
self-important business, the racket meaning that there was no way he could hear danger. It
was all down to the Mark One Eyeball.
To the east was a deep monsoon ditch, then a thin screen of trees in front of a tall wire
mesh fence. Beyond that was the border minefield. On the other side of a second fence over
there was Mozambique.
He walked along the road and checked the other direction, west. Beyond the monsoon
ditch was fairly thick bush and some open patches with the occasional Baobab tree standing
like a lonely scarecrow. The other trees avoided them, adding to their mystique as “Devil
Trees”. There was no wind. It was burning hot with the sun nearly overhead and he was
thankful for his kepi-style bush hat. Grant was very aware of just how little training he’d
received—a grand total of two afternoons on the rifle range, and two days’ intensive anti-
ambush drill. He hoped that was enough.
The day ground on, hour after hour in the searing African sun and the red African
dust. He kept moving, changing direction constantly, walking far enough each way to see and
wave to Johan at one end of his beat, and to “Ben” Gunn at the other. As the shadows finally lengthened
Grant watched a huge belly-dump loader thundering towards him. He stepped to the edge of the monsoon
ditch and raised his hand in salute. The African driver grinned and pointed to his watch as the machine roared
past and enveloped him in its dust cloud.
Five o’clock at last. The drivers could make those monsters fly when it was time to
finish for the day and head for the overnight laager and safety. The rig rumbled off round the
curve, the engine noise dying swiftly as the thick bush blanketed sound. The dust settled in
yet another layer coating the leaves of the grass and bushes by the roadside.
He walked back and forth and waited for Johan. Last man of the stick, furthest from
safety, Johan was big, solid and confident. Grant watched the bush, looking for movement,
the glint of sun on metal, angular shadows, anything unnatural. His rifle felt warm and heavy
and comforting. But there was only an hour till sundown and the fleeting tropical twilight, a
good time for the enemy to hit, with all night to escape the follow-up team and their trackers.
As his ears cleared and natural sounds filtered through, Grant heard a rustling in the
grass ahead. The new grass on the far side of the road moved. A bush rat or a snake. He
scuffed his heels and the rustling stopped immediately. A snake, then, feeling vibrations. As
he drew abreast he saw it, motionless but unafraid, simply waiting for him to move on.
Egyptian cobra. Very nasty.
Johan appeared round the far bend. He was walking steadily, rifle held low, casual but
alert. A hornbill swooped across the road between them and flew over the wire-mesh fence
into the minefield beyond.
“Everything quiet?” asked Johan softly as he approached.
“Yes. Cobra over there.” Grant pointed. “You?”
“Same here. Very quiet.” The grey eyes were slitted against the low sun slanting
through the sparse foliage of the mopani trees. Flies sat on his shoulder blades drinking
sweat. Portuguese Budgies. They didn’t bite.
“You lead,” Johan said. “Take the east side. I’ll be at least ten yards behind you.” He
was taking the more dangerous position for himself. “Stay tuned,” he said. “Watch and
listen.”
Grant nodded. The back of his neck chilled suddenly as the hairs rose. According to
Johan that was good. It meant the adrenaline was flowing, stringing nerves taut, ready for fast
action.
The small sounds of the forest registered now, leaves rustling to a vagrant breeze,
voles scratching among the tree roots, the faint buzzing of the tiny stingless mopani bees
around his eyes and nose.
He’d once asked Johan, “How will I know what to do in an emergency”?
The older man had smiled. “The brain has millions of years of experience behind it.
Nie worry nie. Keep the nerves twanging and that ancient relic of a reptile brain just above
your spinal chord will do the rest automatically”.
Grant hoped that was true.
The road, raw and crude, stretched ahead in a gentle curve with the low sun striking
flashes from broken quartz and mica. The ditches were becoming grassed over already. A
tiny chink of pebbles told him that Johan was still there, guarding his back. A batteleur eagle
sailed silently overhead.
The road straightened and a lonely figure a quarter of a mile away waved an arm.
“Ben” Gunn, waiting for them. Grant waved back.
A natural clearing in the bush opened up to his right, about eighty yards across, with a
huge old Baobab tree dead centre. The road had been curved to avoid the sacred devil tree. A
good place for an ambush.
A Go-Away bird called suddenly to warn of intruders and his spine crawled. Johan
hissed, “Stay tuned.”
Something moved at the very edge of his peripheral vision and a thump came from the
monsoon ditch to his right. Not a loud noise, but out of place.
He found himself flat on his belly in the left-hand ditch, rifle aimed across the road
with the safety off already and his finger taking up first pressure on the trigger and the barrel
tracking, looking for a target. He couldn’t remember getting there, or thinking, or diving for
cover. Johan was right. Reptile brain was very good at its job.
Nothing moved.
The far ditch exploded in a cracking bang, sharp and shockingly loud. Grenade. He
cringed as something whimpered over his head to slice into the leaves behind.
Pebbles rained down all around him and a thick cloud of dust hung in the air but the
adrenaline was sizzling through him now as he ducked into the ditch and scuttled along a
good twenty yards.
A couple of AKs on full automatic opened up, a crackling roar, from the far edge of
the clearing onto the spot where he had dived for cover. The bullets tore up the road and
thumped into the trees beyond, with the occasional terrifying howl of a miss-shapen ricochet.
He slid the rifle barrel up onto the road surface. He lined up roughly on the sound of
the guns and pulled the trigger, the butt jarring into his shoulder and the barrel jumping off-
target. He settled it and fired again, and again, remembering now to squeeze the trigger,
swinging the barrel to pump rounds into the fringe of bush, aiming low into the grasses. The
sharp smell of cordite made his nostrils twitch. Aphrodisiac for men, the training corporal had
called it. Where was Johan?
He ducked back into the ditch as the enemy shifted their aim to his position and he
crouched there listening to bullets snapping overhead. He hadn’t heard Johan return fire.
The firing stopped abruptly as the enemy realised there was no target.
He had to move. They had this section of ditch in their sights now, waiting for him to
reappear. In the silence he heard his ear singing from the concussion of his own shots.
Always the left ear, he thought inconsequently, why not ever the right? He ran doubled over,
back the way he’d come. They wouldn’t expect that—he hoped.
What the hell had happened to Johan? Ben would be on his way to help, and he
prayed there wasn’t another ambush set for just that.
He pulled off the magazine and squinted into it. Nearly empty. He fished out a fresh
magazine and snapped it home. Sweat dripped from his nose and fell on the wooden forestock
where it spread and instantly evaporated. His head was clear and thinking was easy and fast.
Time itself had slowed down—Johan was right again. Reptile brain was working overtime
trying to stay alive. With the minefield at its back it had decided the only way to survive was
to fight.
He lunged up to the edge of the road and fired, steadily, raking the rim of the clearing
low down, the rifle butt thudding solidly into his shoulder. His cartridge cases flew off to his
right and tinkled musically on the road surface. A shadow moved between the trees and he
swung and fired, knew he had missed but the man went down anyway. A gun opened up with
a wild burst that brought bits of leaf and twig showering down on him. The air crackled
overhead with enemy rounds. He shifted his sights and fired at the dust blown off the grasses
by the enemy’s muzzle blast.
Then from deep in the bush to his right front came the more solid measured bang of
the heavier FN rounds. Johan was in action, taking them in the flank. He heaved a sigh of
relief and slid backwards.
The FN sounded again, slow unhurried shots, deeper than the enemy AKs with their
lighter charge.
Firing stopped.
He moved to a new position and crouched, listening.
Nothing.
The whole world had gone quiet.
Boots pounded on the road. Ben was coming, swerving into the ditch and staying low,
red in the face and streaming sweat, determined to be in the action. Away in the distance he
glimpsed the Hyena swaying dangerously round the far bend and heading towards them.
At last he heard Johan call his name.
“You all right, Johan?”
“Ja, man. I’m fine. I’m coming out of the bush to your right. Hold your fire.” He
stepped out of the trees, jogged through the monsoon ditch, and strolled towards them,
apparently unconcerned. “It’s all over,” he called. “They’ve pulled out.”
The Hyena crunched to a halt on the roadway above him and rocked on its springs,
ridiculous with its high mine-proofed body. The tinny sound of the radio demanded
information about the contact; Sunray, back in base camp, fretting over his microphone.
Grant carefully set the safety catch, laid down his rifle, and sat on the edge of the road
with his feet in the ditch, staring at the minefield. Johan pulled out cigarettes and offered them
round. Grant refused, then changed his mind. He’d stopped a couple of years ago, but the
tremors were starting in his legs and he needed the nicotine hit. He sucked in smoke as the
shakes began.
Johan had told him about that, too. Shock. Coming down from an adrenaline high.
You could get hooked on adrenaline. Some men did.
Grant wiped cold sweat from his forehead. Not for him. Once was enough.
Early next morning the follow-up team with their tracker and dog flew in by helicopter, went
straight to the ambush site and set off through the bush. Then Grant’s stick was back to the
grind of road patrol, hour upon hour of walking and watching and baking slowly in the dust
and heat. And, incredibly, it became boring again.
After seven days in fly camp they rotated back to base.
Every morning they lined up at one end of the runway, spread out across its width, and
walked to the far end. The nest was still on the runway, untouched. Each morning they
checked on the progress of the eggs and the chicks. It was a welcome distraction from the
war.
“I still think it’s a bloody stupid place to build a nest,” said Jocko.
The morning they were due to return home, one chick was missing from the nest.
“Bloody snake,” said Ben Gunn. “Bastard got the poor wee chick.”
“No,” said Johan. He pointed at some marks in the red dust. “There’s the snake’s
track. It heads for the nest, then veers off that way. And there’s the marks of the mother bird’s
wings as she drags herself pathetically just ahead of the snake. And there,” he flicked the end
of his cigarette a few yards further on, “Is where she takes off, leaving the snake mad as hell,
and hungry, and confused.”
“So one chick has left the nest already, the mother is successful, and the snake has to
find something else to eat,” said Cristos. “AWA. Africa Wins Again.
He waved them into line. “Walk on.”
“Tune in, my sons” said Johan. “There’s still a war on. Watch and listen.”

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The Sighting

There had been talk, lots of it. The same conversation echoed through bars, shops and offices. News of the sighting travelled through the little town ofMiddlestoneand on to the surrounding cities. Reporters flocked to the town to interview the locals, and a stream of rubbernecking tourists flooded in to see if what they had heard was in fact true.
Middlestone was the local farming community; the place where those from the outlying farms came to out of necessity. If you weren’t in of need groceries or didn’t have sheep or cattle to trade, then Middlestone was a town you simply passed through on your way to somewhere else.
Since the sightings however, it had become a town of destination.
Middlestone’s two hotels had, for years, been making ends meet on the strength of increased trade on market days. But now they were experiencing market day levels of turn-over seven days a week, and would have welcomed having twice as many rooms at weekends. The town’s bars were the same.
All the time the undercurrent of conversation remained unchanged. Al didn’t mind the talk. He didn’t believe it, but he went along with it. If people wanted to flood through his doors on what he believed to be a wave of myth and hearsay then he’d happily sell them a pair of night vision binoculars, a powerful spot light and the occasional rifle or shotgun.
Shotguns were Al’s usual line of business. He sold them to farmers to keep the rabbits down and to warn the occasional poacher. The sightings however had moved his market towards the more lucrative image-conscious weekend shooter. Those men who during the week traded in stocks, shares and property deals and who at weekends retreated to the country in pursuit of its pursuits.
Al was more than willing to keep the story going, and to supply the city dwellers with guns, ammunition and camouflage gear, together with the all important night vision equipment, as long as they had the money. He had even started to supply a small selection of night vision video recorders for those who bought all the gear but who, at the end of the day, only wanted to look.
He never mentioned the sightings, he never needed to. The big men with big guns only had one thing on their mind and that was to bag themselves a big cat. They were more than happy to let anyone and everyone in earshot know their intentions, as they peeled hundred dollar bills from their wallets.
Al’s response was always the same, with a dry twist, he’d say, ‘If you do shoot it, bring it here and we’ll stuff it for you,’ before adding, ‘we’re doing a two for one deal at the moment.’ This comment sometimes got a laugh but more often went unnoticed, which in itself raised a smile with Al, which likewise went unnoticed.
The sightings had been rare. Whatever it was, it was black, and often described by the media as ‘panther like’. It was usually seen around dusk, moving through the woodland that stretched towards the hills that rose to the north of Middlestone.
Footprints had been found, but they never seemed to lead anywhere and invariably petered out after only a few yards. There had been a dead carcass found - a fox with its throat ripped out. People said it was the panther, and that it would return to collect its kill. They set up a watch but the only carrions that returned were the crows and hawks who didn’t want to catch its own quarry.
No one had actually come face to face with it, a fact often dismissed. None of the sightings had been reported by any of the farmers, neither had there been any reports of sheep being mauled or killed, just the fox, which, quite frankly, could have been the result of a territorial dog fight with another of its kind. These of course were only local observations and to discuss them openly would probably dampen the market from which everyone was benefitting. So, no-one mentioned it and everyone knew someone who’d seen it.
The weather forecast for the weekend was good. The temperature was starting to drop, and with a full moon and the prospect of a clear night, the weekenders had taken the opportunity to head to the country one last time before the winter snow arrived.
Trade had been brisk at Al’s gun shop and, along with the usual array of hunting paraphernalia, he had sold two 12 gauge shotguns along with a pro-hunter rifle which he was pretty sure had been bought for the name rather than anything else. Business was business and, as he kept reminding himself, it paid the rent.
‘Well I guess it’s now or never,’ said the tall thick set man regaled in his shooting outfit. ‘If we don’t see it today then I guess we’ll have to leave it till spring.’ He picked up the boxes of cartridges that lay on the counter, smiled and turned to leave.
‘Remember,’ Al called after him, ‘if you do manage to hit it...’
‘I know I’ve got to bring it you for your two for one deal... I haven’t forgotten,’ he laughed, opened the door and stepped out in the chilly afternoon sun.
Al smiled, looked at the clock and started to tidy the shop away for the day.
The weather forecasters got it right; it was a clear night. With the moon well into its ascent, Al climbed into his old beat up Vitara. Turning the key, the engine fired and Al took one last look towards the shop, checking that the internal security lights had come on. Happy, he pulled away leaving the shop, the town and its stories, to recede in his rear view mirror.
The daylight had faded as he pulled off the road and onto the single dirt track that led towards the old woodman’s cottage he called home. He always walked the last half mile – it was his daily exercise and he enjoyed the freedom and the solitude.
The rough strewn track gently rose before him, and the trees cast moonlit shadows across his path. He breathed in the cool evening air laden with the ever present scent of pine. His footsteps made little sound upon the pine needle cushion on which he walked. An early evening owl hooted and then fell silent leaving just the sound of a car on the road below, which before long disappeared into the night.
The silence broke to the sound of men; talking, laughing and opening cans of drink with a distinctive click and fizz, which sounded so alien to the natural world that surrounded them.
Al recognised his last customer of the day. His laugh was unmistakeable. Their voices weren’t muffled and Al could hear the excitement in their voices as they talked of the glories associated with bagging the panther on the last day of the season.
Al’s fingers encircled around a stone from the track and he hurled it high up into the trees away to his left. The sound of rock snapping dry twigs and the muffled clump of its landing broke into the consciousness and conversation of the, “would be hunters”. Al smiled and watched as the group reached as for their night vision binoculars, their guns and the boxes of ammunition he had sold them. Together they took their first steps in pursuit of their quarry.
Hushed voices discussed where and how far away the sound had come from. The mist of their conversation hung in the air. The clicking of guns being broken open to receive their shot travelled up the hillside towards Al. He gathered a second stone and released it with similar force into the trees. Twigs cracked breaking the silence of the evening air and raising a whispered chorus of ‘Over there’ from the group below. The sound of closing guns filled the air as tension surrounded the group as they peered into the darkness. A shadow moved, a finger pointed as whispers continued and then fell silent once again.
It was something or nothing but the hairs on their necks stood up, adrenalin pumping at the thought of being so close to that which had eluded them for the so long. The silence and the dark enveloped them before being extinguished by the piercing beam of the spot torch as it scanned the trunks of the trees causing them to dance with their shadows as the beam travelled passed. Nothing.
Al kept low and watched. He snapped a stick bringing the group to attention and the beam in his direction. It passed over him leaving him in a pool of shadow, safe, hidden and protected. The arching beam of cream light swept through the wood going nowhere and revealing nothing.
Al, crouching behind a fallen log, took in the near silence of the night-time wood. He felt safe and alive for this was his home. He knew the men below would get fed up or frustrated at their lack of success. Al decided to sit and wait and watch.
There was a crack of wood, a snap of closing guns, and two discs of green reflected in the moonlight. Al saw them. The shooters saw them. There was a flash of red and blue, sparks of yellow raced through the trees. There was a scream. A body fell and then there was no more talk of sightings.