She came at dusk, a shadow among shadows. The air greyed around her. Somehow she had become a grey dog; the sunlight-gold of her coat had seeped away with the daylight.
She didn’t look at him, though she must have known he was there. It was almost as though she thought that if she didn’t look at him directly, he couldn’t see her.
He waited till she’d slipped down the hill, then followed her. There was just enough light to see her track. He could smell where she’d been too — not just her doggy scent but the ripe fruit smell of cooked bat. The trail led upwards again, then stopped.
He peered into the growing darkness. There was a deeper slash of dark in the rock. A crevice.
She must be there. Hiding.
From him?
It was too late to see into the crevice now, to see if she was really there and why she was hiding.
Tomorrow, he thought, as he limped back up to the campfire, a red blaze throwing shadows into the night. I will find out her secret tomorrow.