Golden hour on the downs, and the light, in a quiet spell between winter storms, is pouring through a slow eyeblink of lowering cloud over Wiltshire. Quartering low in front of me, a short-eared owl glides, filled and fringed with silver, then gold; its long paddle wings flick upwards, cream-barred with brown. It pivots on a wingtip, folds itself up, lands, misses its target and looks straight at me with goth-eyed surprise. The round plate of its face is bracketed by twin white, moonish crescents; its lantern eyes, a kohl-rimmed challenge. It raises, then lowers, its “ear” tufts, and continues hunting. Sitting on a damp, grassy anthill, I put my hand out to my side, seeking warm fur. Something is missing.
The sweetest, happiest, most biddable soul has left us: our beloved dog Kite was put down, just before her 12th birthday – a last kindness we owed her. Dad picked her out of a new year, mother/daughter double litter of 22 unplanned puppies – the product of a happy “farm accident” between the shepherd’s collie and the gamekeeper’s labradors.
She was with us in almost all we did and had a great “work ethic” and discipline. A hare could bolt from under her nose, and she’d stop and look the other way.
I miss her terribly, this most tireless of soul companions: her brown, bright, clever eyes, her salt-and-pepper paws, the kite-frame cross on her chest, and the smell of her paws: they have inspired many a writing workshop I’ve led (what do they smell of? Grass and galloping, kite-flying on the headland, wild thyme, winter fires). She taught herself to stop, lie down and wait if I raised my binoculars. We’ve watched many an owl like this.
The short-eared owl turns into the light and is gone as the lid of cloud closes. Another winter storm is due and a late flock of linnets parachutes into the sanctuary of the gorse. As I reach the lane, there is the clicking of claws behind me. I spin round to see the rolled cigarillos of dry hornbeam leaves, chasing at my heels.
