The start of Chapter two from the upcoming Caradoc.
Chapter Two: The Cold of the Night.
Jake was asleep that evening almost as soon
as his young head hit the pillow, the combination of hard work and fresh cold
air had now mixed with a full belly of warm Rabbit stew and potatoes and the
lad was soon in the land of dreams. This in itself was a blessing for the new
day would teach the young Jake much about the harsh realities of caring for livestock in
such a harsh environment.
It seemed like poor Jake had barely closed his eyes
in fact when he heard the call from downstairs the following morning, it woke the lad with a start,
“Jake! C’mon boy your breakfast is ready!”
With that Jake leapt out of bed as he knew
his father would bring the slipper up if he had to ask twice. Arriving
downstairs Jake sensed something was not quite as it should be, he couldn’t
explain it but the whole house seemed different, a strange frightening feeling
came over him as he entered the kitchen, “Dad?” said Jake in a shallow almost
feeble tone, “you alright?” he asked, Sam just sat at the table with his fresh
buttered toast and told Jake to do the same as he softly spoke,
“Look Jake, we have had quite a bit more
snow than we were expecting, in fact a lot more, you had better take a look out
through the kitchen door, but don’t worry about it we will sort it out in a
minute”
Jake
spun round in his chair and the sight he was greeted with took his breath away
for a few seconds and a chill ran down his spine, for outside was no longer
there, all Jake could see was snow against the windows and no dawn
sky, no farm yard, just a wall of white as if the God’s had arrived in the
middle of the night, taken the world away and left a blank canvas. The boy was
horrified; he turned to his father for an explanation or at least a word or two
of comfort,
“Aye I know son, it was a lot worse than we
ever expected, seems we have to try and dig ourselves
out this morning never mind the ewes…”
With that Sam turned and poured hot water
from the stove to make the tea, trying not to worry his lad too much about the
issues the family and the livestock now found themselves in.
“Can we get out Dad?” the most obvious
question a seven year old would ask in such a situation,
“Oh of course son, when we open the door it
will stay where it is as its compacted, but we may have a problem with where
the snow goes at first, I will go upstairs in a moment and see how far it is
off the bedroom window, it may be as easy to start digging from outside”
“You can lower me down Dad I will dig it
for you, I can do it!” said Jake now brightening up to the fact that there was
at least an outside left after all!
“We better hadn’t Jake, if it’s very soft
snow it may swallow you up, I will jump down and dig for a while, you just be
ready at the door when I shout you”.
With that the big man rose from his chair,
he had huge leather bracers that crossed over his back that he flipped off when
washing himself or sat at the table eating, he also used them to belt Jake if needed, as he stood he flicked them over
his shoulders and reached for his thick jacket, his tweed like shirt collar had
seen much better days, Jake watched as he got himself ready to do battle with
whatever he found outside, despite it
never being the ‘done’ thing to tell him, Jake loved his father very much, he
felt safe with him and always respected his way of working with animals and the
local people, he was a big man not just in build but also in character.
Sam reached for his trilby style hat, a
move that was guaranteed to always be followed by a huge rattle of legs from
under the kitchen table as the dogs rushed to be the first to get outside, but
this morning was different, there was no noise. The dogs had been tied up last
night as they were being such a nuisance in the barn, a point that both Jake
and Sam were now all too aware of and the worry, if it was there, was as yet unspoken.
Sam climbed the stairs of the old farmhouse
and stood on the landing, he looked out of the window there for a better view
of where the snow was thickest and which window would be the best to climb out
of. In the end Sam entered Jakes bedroom and swung open the window to see how
far the snow was away from the ledge, he climbed up and threw his shovel on to
the snow drift about 6 ft. below him, before he jumped Sam looked out in to the
yard as his eyes were now acclimatised to the darkness of the early dawn, it
was a sight that would stick with Sam a lifetime, the farm was under the
thickest drifts of snow he had seen in his 40 odd years of being on the hill
side, his farm was almost unrecognisable, like a wilderness, a wasteland, as if
frozen in time and seemingly devoid of life, it frightened the big man but he
was never going to let that fact be known, least of all to a young seven year
old patiently waiting in the kitchen below.
Leaping from the bedroom window was a very
surreal moment for Sam, but thankfully the snow had frozen on the surface, he
didn’t drop right through it so he started to dig feverishly to the door below,
the light from the kitchen was lighting the snow up giving off a strange
unearthly glow it seemed almost a comfort amongst the ever present peril of the
huge drift. It wasn’t long before Sam had reached the door, an overjoyed Jake
opened it to let his dad take the last few steps into the house, Jake
immediately ran to get his hat and coat, his boots were already on, he had
jumped into those the moment his Dad had left the table!
“Grab my hand son,” Sam said in a strong
voice,
“We
will go and get those dogs loose, they will sure to want their bloody breakfast
by now”
With that Jake grabbed his father’s hand
and the two walked up the steep drift that had lent itself against the house
overnight like some monster consuming its prey slowly but ever so surely.
Once away from the drift the snow was down
to about four feet deep and less in places, still very deep but something the
two had seen before on this barren hillside farm, so they both began to feel a
little better about the situation, as they walked across the unlit farmyard
they both glanced back at the farm house almost at the same time, it looked so
tiny covered in a thick snow drift,
“Hell Jake, it must have been a bit rough
out here last night, let’s hope the sheep have got in somewhere out of sight”
Sam commented.
As the two walked through the deep snow in
the farm yard they waited to hear the barking and rattling of chains that would
follow the moment either one of their two voices was heard, but there was
nothing, it was strange by its absence; Sam instinctively knew something wasn’t
right.
“Strange we haven’t heard the two dogs Dad”
said Jake in a quiet voice,
“Aaahh it is lad, they are probably asleep
on the straw, lazy buggers” he quipped trying to reassure Jake.
But that reassurance was as ill-timed as it
was misplaced, for as the two men rounded the corner of the barn they could see
nothing of where the two dogs had been tied up overnight.
Without a word the two ran to where the
small outbuilding had been and under which the dogs were tied up and started to
dig through the mounds of snow that had enveloped the small building, but alas
it was all too clear that it was a vain hope, the sheer weight of overnight
snow had gathered on the old rickety shed and collapsed it on top of the two
dog’s with a crushing weight that no
animal could hope to ever survive, both dogs lay stiff and frozen under
the debris, huddled together side by side, they died as they had lived, always
together, there was nothing either of the two men could do.
“Damn it!” Sam said as he dug deeper
eventually pulling the two dogs from their frozen grave,
“This is going to make the day a damn sight
harder, no bloody dogs!” The big man
muttered, trying to separate the grief of losing two of his best friends and
remembering his boy was stood next to him, “get a sack from by the barn lad we
will bury them later when we get back from bringing the ewes in, we can’t mess
with it now”.
Jake did as he was told, he looked at the
two dogs as his Dad pulled the sack up and put them in one by one, it was the
first time Jake had seen an animal he loved dead, he was used to seeing sheep
and cattle dead in the fields, he had grown up with seeing that, but the 8 and
9 year old dog’s had been there before even he had and the boy struggled to
hold the tears back.
“Never mind piping your eye Jake, they are
just bloody sheepdogs, we will get two more, these two were bloody useless
anyway” Sam spoke in a matter of fact
way, while trying very hard not to show the sorrow that overwhelmed the big man
at losing two damn good sheepdogs and even worse a couple of good friends.
“Right, let’s feed the ewes in the barn
first me lad” Sam said almost as soon as the top of the sack was tied, “then we
have a bit of work to do to fetch those other sheep in now we haven’t any dogs
to do the legwork for us”
Jake was still trying to take it all in
while having a secret cry as he went along the pens with fresh dry hay
in bundles feeding expectant and now very noisy sheep, Jake seeing the two
dog’s in that way was a harsh reality call for such a youngster but he was born to the land so he learned to adjust, it’s the only way the families survived on
these hillsides and death was very much a part of life.
Sam was busy saddling the old mare as Jake
finished feeding the sheep in the barn, luckily the stable block was on the
other side of the yard so the entrance to it was almost devoid of snow, a
strange phenomenon considering less than six feet away from the door the snow
was almost three to four feet deep. Sam led the mare out and jumped on her
back, he rode over to Jake and stretched out his huge fatherly hand towards the young
lad, Jake grabbed it at once and Sam immediately swung the boy like a
rag doll on to the back of the mare’s saddle, with that he dug his heels into
the animal and they rode out of the yard in search of the ewes that were by now
desperate for a warm dry barn and fresh hay.
