Читать книгу Sorry Time - Anthony Maguire - Страница 5

WILD DOGS roam much of inland Australia. Hunting in packs, they prey on both native wildlife and farm animals. Every now and then, humans are on the menu.

A lot of the wild dogs are dingoes, descendants of the canines that crossed the land bridge into Gondwanaland from the Andaman Islands with their human masters 50,000 years ago or more. Others are descended from dog breeds introduced into Australia over the past two centuries. Both the native dingoes and their feral cousins are equally hated by farmers because they kill sheep and other stock, sometimes just for sport. Conservationists are more divided on the issue, giving the tick of approval to the dingo because it’s ‘native’ while feral dogs are regarded as unholy slayers of bilbies, wallabies and other native wildlife.

To prevent wild dogs wreaking havoc in the prime sheep grazing land of Australia’s southern and eastern states, the world’s longest fence has been constructed. Called the Wild Dog Fence, it runs for 5600 kilometres, from the middle of the Great Australian Bight in South Australia, up through the central desert all the way to the rural hinterland of Brisbane in the north east. Most of the dog fence is 180 centimetre tall wire mesh. In South Australia, parts of it are made of multi-strand electrified wire.

The desert country where Chaseling and his companions now stood watching a dozen pairs of red eyes appear in the gloom and, as they got closer, attach themselves to shadowy, four-legged forms, was hundreds of kilometres north of the fence. This was Dog Central. Wild dogs formed part of the landscape.

The pack consisted of an assortment of skinny mongrels led by a yellow-eyed male that had the sharp, almost triangular face of a dingo combined with the long, lean body of a greyhound. His short fur was a dirty tea-brown, with darker brown stripes running down the ribcage. His tail was thin, almost rat-like.

Until now, this pack had always steered well clear of human beings. But times had been tough of late. The last decent meal – the remains of an emu – had been consumed over a week ago. And while the dogs’ eyes told them that the four figures in front of them were humans, this was overridden by their olfactory senses as the irresistible aroma of freshly-killed kangaroo wafted through the air. Clarrie, his shoulders still wet with essence of roo, was plat du jour.

Growling from deep within his throat, Yellow Eyes slowly advanced on Clarrie, teeth bared, a tendril of drool hanging from the wolfish mouth. The dog’s ears were pressed against the sides of his head. Down the centre of his back, a line of Mohawk-like hackles was rising. The rest of the pack had come to a halt, watching from the gloom as their leader moved in for the kill.

Clarrie stood solidly, his hands loosely at his sides while the animal approached. He said something in Pitjantjatjara. Noelie, who had scooped up Davie from the ground, gave a terse reply and passed the child to Chaseling. ‘Gotta get a weapon.’ He darted off to the edge of the road.

Holding Davie in his arms, Chaseling could feel him trembling like a leaf. He heard Noelie stepping into the scrub. And he saw how the pack leader was now just a couple of metres away from Clarrie.

With a guttural snarl, Yellow Eyes reared backwards on his haunches, then launched himself up at Clarrie, who deftly moved aside with the grace of a matador sidestepping a bull. As the animal hurtled through the air, the powerful jaws snapped shut with a percussive sound like a steel trap. The dog landed deftly on his back legs, bunched up his body for the next attack and sprang at Clarrie again. Clarrie held his ground and kicked out at Yellow Eyes, his bare foot managing to avoid the dog’s slavering jaws and slam into its sternum. There was a muffled thump and high-pitched yelp. Yellow Eyes fell backwards and made an awkward landing.

The child in Chaseling’s arms was rigid with fear. The other dogs were on the move, running around in an ever-tightening circle. Chaseling could smell their foetid odour, hear their excited panting. From the edge of the road, there was the sound of dry wood being broken. Out in the gloom, Chaseling saw a cowboy-hatted form snapping off the side growth of a stout, metre-long piece of mulga branch.

But now one of the dogs circling Chaseling and the child came rushing at them. A kelpie-like black dog with a white patch standing out starkly on its face, it charged towards Chaseling’s legs. He lifted his foot to kick at it and the attacker lost its nerve at the last second, veering off course. Then another animal growled a challenge. It was a bull terrier cross, a barrel-chested bitch with piggy little eyes set into a big, bony head, atop which fluttered the remains of a pair of ears tattered from countless fights. From her low-slung stomach dangled half a dozen ugly nipples.

Pig Eyes had short legs, but when hunting prey, used her low centre of gravity to deadly advantage, turning herself into a canine battering ram that could knock animals off their feet.

Jaws wide open and long tongue lolling from her mouth, Pig Eyes came charging towards Chaseling’s legs. Davie gave a shriek of terror and started wriggling in Chaseling’s arms. As Pig Eyes attacked, Chaseling lifted his foot and kicked out, thankful that he was wearing sturdy, elastic-sided Redback work boots. The bitch’s jaws clamped around the toe of his right boot with bruising force. He thought, Maybe I should have spent a bit more and got the steel-capped Redbacks.

Pig Eyes hauled backwards while furiously snarling and shaking her head from side to side, throwing off a spray of saliva. Chaseling pulled back his leg, frantically trying to break away as he maintained precarious balance on one foot and held on tight to little Davie, whose struggles had become so violent he was almost sending the pair of them toppling to the ground – where, Chaseling had no doubt whatsoever, they would quickly become dog food. This thought spurred him to a more spirited level of engagement in the tug of war he was having with Pig Eyes over ownership of his elastic-sided boot.

He kicked out, then pulled his foot back towards him. The vise-like grip on his foot was finally released as his boot came loose in the mouth of his attacker and Pig Eyes ran to the edge of the road, her jaws clamped around the prize.

The boot was rich with the aroma of the blood and brain matter that had splattered onto it when Chaseling put the roo out of its misery. Pig Eyes was convinced it was edible. She opened her jaws and let it drop to the ground, where she pinned it down with one of her front paws and started tearing at it with her teeth, letting loose a series of snarls that warned the other dogs to stay well away.

Meanwhile Clarrie was still under attack from the pack leader. The yellow-eyed dog had just been repelled with another kick but now the lithe body was compressed like a coiled spring, ready to relaunch itself at him.

It was then that Noelie appeared alongside brandishing the thick mulga branch. THWACK! The sound of the makeshift club coming down on Yellow Eyes’ skull sounded like a ball being hit by a cricket bat. The dog gave a yelp, louder and shriller than before, and this time the cry had a note of fear and capitulation. Yellow Eyes slunk off, body hunched and cowed, tail tucked between his legs. At the same time, the other dogs began melting away into the scrub. All of them except Pig Eyes, who for several seconds remained just a short distance away trying to devour Chaseling’s Redback. But now she released the boot from her jaws. She stepped forward, lowered her haunches and anointed the boot with a squirt of urine. Then she ran off towards the other dogs.

Seconds later there were snarls and howls so bloodcurdling you might imagine them coming from Cerberus, the multi-headed guard dog at the gates of the underworld.

Wild dog packs often turn to cannibalism to survive. Usually they go for the smallest and weakest member of the clan. But this time it was the pack leader. Having let the tribe down, he’d toppled from the top of the pecking order to the bottom. A snarling Pig Eyes rushed at him, large, bony head lowered and the little eyes glittering evilly as she used her head, and the heavy body attached to it, to knock the leader’s legs out from beneath him. Yellow Eyes fell to the dirt, growling a furious challenge. But he was now at a fatal disadvantage because, after hitting the ground, he’d rolled onto his back, the pale fur on his stomach standing out in the gloom. Chaseling saw Pig Eyes lunge forward and bite into the exposed belly. Yellow Eyes gave a howl of agony as Pig Eyes jerked her head backwards, pulling out a shiny length of intestine.

Frantically windmilling his legs, Yellow Eyes tried to get back on his feet. But now the other dogs moved in, clamping their jaws around their victim’s legs. Chaseling could hear the crunching of bones as they pulled in opposite directions, trying to tear the limbs off their former Top Dog.

Now Pig Eyes lunged forward again, ripping into Yellow Eyes’ abdomen and hauling out something dark and glistening that Chaseling thought was a piece of liver, although it was difficult to tell for sure in the dim light.

Pig Eyes let the prize fall to the ground, placing a paw over it. Raising her bloodied snout to the sky, she let loose a loud, commanding bark that told the others, ‘It’s party time fellas, tuck in!’ And that’s what the pack did.

Seemingly oblivious to the humans watching from less than ten metres away, the pack went into a feeding frenzy. Chaseling could hear wet snuffling noises as dogs pushed forward and ripped the rest of the yellow-eyed dog’s innards out while others gnawed and pulled at legs.

Yellow Eyes gave a final, agonised cry, a dreadful ululation that seemed to go on for ever. Then, once he’d fallen silent, there was a rising chorus of growls and yelps as animals fought for prime pieces of flesh and viscera.

Chaseling and his companions had remained frozen with shock as the grisly spectacle unfolded in the moonlight. The boy in Chaseling’s arms was whimpering with terror, his body shaking violently. Clarrie took his son from Chaseling’s arms. The boy burst into tears.

Clarrie rocked Davie from side to side and spoke some comforting words in Pitjantjatjara. Then, looking over the child’s heaving shoulders at Chaseling, his teeth flashed in the moonlight as he said, ‘Welcome to central Australia, Kumina.’

The three men laughed. Chaseling could hear a note of near-hysteria in his own laughter. He retrieved his boot from the edge of the track, where Pig Eyes had taken it before attacking Yellow Eyes. Standing on one leg, he slipped the Redback onto his foot. There were deep teeth imprints in the toe of the boot and it was wet, slimy and rank-smelling.

They briskly walked away towards the distant lights, Clarrie carrying his son and old Noelie holding the mulga club across his chest like a soldier patrolling with his gun. Soon the sounds of the feasting dogs began to fade and Chaseling could hear the chirping of crickets and the whisper of a breeze sweeping across the plain.