The two dogs disappeared the same afternoon.
Fiona, our youngest, had a sweet fantasy that they had decided, last time they were visiting, to meet for some girl time. They arranged a date and a meeting place, half way between Beechworth and Brunswick. But Fifi only made it to the end of our street before being picked up by a kindly stranger and deposited in the Lost Dogs’ Home. Nutmeg lolloped all the way to Benalla as arranged, and was still waiting at the side of the road, wondering when her buddy was going to turn up.
We had less than 24 hours of anxiety for our nuggety little Jack Russell. On the dot of nine the morning after she went missing, I had a call from the Lost Dogs’ Home saying they had Fifi safe and well and could I come and get her please. She and I wandered home over busy Racecourse Road in a daze of relief to be together again. Just one day in a dogless house was enough for me. Every part of my night and morning ritual had reminded me she was missing.
Nutmeg’s story was longer and a lot more dramatic. A skinny, tan kelpie-heeler cross, she is only two, and one of those bouncy dogs that can run all day. She ran into the State Forest next to our daughter Tess’ place, as she did from time to time, and didn’t come back.
For several unhappy days, Tess and her Will combed the thick bush behind their property outside Beechworth. It was needle in haystack stuff. The country up there is full of mine shafts and snakes waking up cranky from their long winter sleep. There is probably bait for feral dogs.
Neville, their older dog, was morose and bewildered. Tess and Will were losing hope. I had never seen them so subdued.
Late at night, five full days after Nutmeg’s disappearance, Tess was outside and heard a dog bark in a direction they were planning to search the following day. They raced out with head torches, thrashed around calling, calling. Well after midnight I was woken by Tess, almost incoherent with joy, saying they had found her, in pitch dark, down the bottom of a mineshaft, alive and apparently in one piece.
There had recently been heavy rain; water, pooled at the bottom of the hole, had kept her alive. Tess stayed shaft-side while Will raced home to get dog food and a bucket and rope to lower it down. Also Nutmeg’s bed and blanket, so that she could rest for the first time in five days.
The sides of the shaft were smooth and vertical. In the morning, the SES came with their orange jump suits and their six and a half metre ladder that was only just long enough. They gathered her up in a sling and a pair of burly arms and brought her gently gently into the light and life and her owners’ tearful embrace.
What do dogs think about when they are alone down a hole in the cold for five famished days and miserable nights? Doubtless they would fret, but I’m guessing, hoping, they wouldn’t be as desperately fearful as a human being. At some level, do they prepare themselves for death? And what shape does that experience take in her mind now that she has been home for a few days and is once more well fed and full of bounce? Is there a dark shadow there that still gives her nightmares?
I prayed a lot those few days. For solace for our kids and courage for Nutmeg, wherever she was. Not so much for her to be found, not really, because I don’t believe it works that way. If it did, we would all just pray like crazy for everything bad happening – the miners trapped in Chile and the abused kids and the wars and the excesses that bleed our world towards the edge of oblivion.
Life is full of small heartaches and big tragedies. There isn’t some magical intervention for some and not for others. Our small drama this week happened to end well. In both households – city and country – we look at our dear, faithful, funny hounds with even more affection than usual. And are grateful for the things in life that, against the odds, have a happy ending.