A PARTICULAR FRIENDSHIP

The working dogs were kept in a pen down near the machine shed. Three kelpies who lived their lives for sheep. Up in the house yards were two family pets – long-eared cockers that chased birds, chewed boots, and rollicked with the children in the dust. Occasionally one lot barked across the distance to the other, and if something at night set off one dog all others would follow, but otherwise they didn’t come into contact. And the children were forbidden to talk to the kelpies, the working dogs. No soft words, no playing around. The kelpies were to obey their pack leader, the farmer, and to keep their mind on work. If they get distracted by human feelings, he told his children, they’re never the same. No good as working dogs. You’ve got your pets – play with them. He sounds like a harsh man, and he was tough, but he loved his kids, and his wife made no strong complaints. Among his neighbours, he was considered reliable and generous. He was a good bloke.

It was a family of four. The twins – Emmy and Jason – were eight years old. Jason was named after the Argonauts and Emmy, who was really Emily, after Emily Brontë. Mother was a high-school English teacher, so nothing surprising in the choice of names. Mrs Harvard was only teaching one day a week, so she did a fair bit around the farm when the kids were at school.

The twins loved dogs. Sometimes they felt they were closer to dogs than any other living things, aside from each other. The friendship between the two of them was particular, and included Bluebell and Captain, the two cockers. In fact, the twins loved all animals, but from the earliest age they had imagined they were dogs – had played dogs, with dogs – and their room was full of dog books and dog pictures. The kelpies they loved from a distance, watching them; sometimes they sneaked over to scratch under chins through the chicken-wire pen, though they’d been told to keep away from them. Going out with their father to round up the sheep was especially good, because they could watch the dogs work. The kelpies obeyed the farmer’s every word or gesture, and when the twins scrambled into the front of the ute next to him, the kelpies would leap onto the traytop like lightning. They were fast, agile and excited. But ‘disciplined’.

Through the rear window, the twins watched the kelpies bark at everything passing, occasionally slobbering on the glass or yapping, which made them squeal with delight. Settle down, kids, Father would grump. Then they’d turn their attention to other things. They’d sniff the hessian and oil and oats and mud in the cabin. They’d play hand games, ask their father questions, and then, unable to contain themselves, swing their gaze back through the window, to see what the dogs were up to.

Father had not been away from the farm for more than a day since they were born. So when he had to go into hospital for a few days to have an operation, they found it particularly unsettling. Mother reassured them he’d be fine, and they could visit him. The city hospital was three hours’ drive. The small district hospital was only staffed by a few nurses, with the odd GP visit. So Mother was going to stay down in the city to be with Father, and the twins would be looked after by their aunt, who would take them down for a visit on Monday. The twins were confused and a little frightened, but they loved Auntie Jean, who would always let them do what they wanted.

The house seemed so empty, even though the cockers frolicked as if nothing were different. As long as the twins were around, they didn’t pine. On the Saturday morning, the twins went out of the house yard and straight down to the kelpies. They had been given the job of watering and feeding the working dogs, but were still under strict orders not to play or talk with them. The twins let themselves in to the pen and spent two hours before lunch romping with the dogs. They spent much of the time stroking the kelpies and telling them their real names.

Over lunch, Auntie Jean asked what they’d been doing. Not much, they said. Their aunt had spent the morning out on the back verandah, knitting. The dog pen was a long way from the house and couldn’t be seen from the back verandah. It’s a lovely time of year for being out in the fresh air, she said. Will you be knitting out there this afternoon, Auntie Jean? Probably, sweetie, knitting or reading. What are you going to get up to? Thought we’d take the cockers for a walk. The cockers were rarely let out of the house yard because it made them go loopy, but Auntie Jean didn’t know or didn’t remember or just didn’t say much other than, That’ll be nice for them.

So they took the crazy cockers leaping and yelping down to the dog pen. The kelpies shook with excitement and yapped at the playful cockers. The cockers trembled. Emmy opened the pen gate, and Jason herded the cockers in.

*

Their father spent much longer in hospital than expected. There were complications. The twins’ visit was delayed, because he couldn’t see anyone but Mother. When they were eventually taken down, he was propped up in bed with tubes coming out of him, and looked like a ghost. They were both a bit scared, but they let their mother nudge them towards the bed and they each leaned down in turn and kissed his cheek. When he spoke, his voice was very faint. They thought he sounded like an impostor and looked at each other carefully, with fright in their eyes. They saw he noticed, and they put their heads down, embarrassed. Nothing much else was said on that visit; mainly they played cards at a table in the corner, and their mother sat holding their hands, and their aunt knitted in a seat by the bed.

Driving back, Auntie Jean said, Your father will be home next week but you’ll have to be very good for him and not upset him with any of your goings-on. They wanted to say, We’ve been good, but thought better of it and just stared out of the window as the sun set and the white sheep in the yellow paddocks started to turn the light inside out. Soon the sheep were blanks in the darkness.

*

Father was unable to work for a few weeks, so the twins looked after the dogs and did all the chores they could around the place. A hired hand came in three days a week to look after bigger things, but that was mainly when the twins were at school. The hired hand brought his own dogs to work the sheep; Father wouldn’t let anyone else handle his kelpies. When Father finally left the house to look around, he walked kind of funny.

The first place he hobbled to was the dog pen. The dogs were overexcited, and he struck the wire when they leapt up. Down, boys, down! He had trouble working the gate latch because his coordination was a bit out, but eventually he managed – damned kids doing it up that way! – and the dogs ran straight past him, across the dirt all the way up to the house yard where they barked and rubbed against the fence, Bluebell and Captain on the other side doing the same. They sniffed and licked each other and the wire separating them, ignoring the farmer’s shouts.

*

When dogs go wrong it’s a kind of sickness, he told his wife, who was in tears. The farmer grimaced as he pulled his withered leg straight and pushed himself back into the chair. He couldn’t give them away. Damaged goods.

He didn’t shoot them. True, he had taken the Winchester from the cupboard and carried it out onto the verandah, but his wife’s screams had jolted him. She was yelling at him to stop. Not a way for a fellow to be treated when he’s been at death’s door.

So he poisoned them. Strychnine. He killed the kelpies. He killed Bluebell and Captain. He fed them baited meat and watched them die. Their death throes looked like a bizarre game, something the twins would play. It has to be said, his children were odd.

It took him hours to drag the corpses to the well that had gone dry during the Meckering Quake, and topple them over the stone rim. The stink would be strong, but eventually be lost in the smells of the farm. His wife pleaded with him not to tell the children. When the twins, home from school, rushed in calling, Where are the dogs? he just said, They’re gone. And keep away from the old well. The twins stared. They blinked very slowly. They trembled and clutched hands. They whimpered.