The Old Hunter has barked for the last time at his nemesis, the fearesome hedgehogs of the Night Planted Orchard.
This has been his place and his passing seems to have made the rest of our time here an epitaph, no more. So we will take his ashes to some secret dark waters known only to us. We'll scatter him there under the mountains. When our time comes, we will go there too and we'll all swim together, chasing sticks forever.
The Old Hunter is now very old indeed. Once, long ago, we saw him lying on an old sofa bed in the conservatory. We didn't have the heart to throw him off, but when he saw us, he got down of his own accord. He never tried to climb in the furniture after that unless we told him to. Or, very rarely, when he knew we were out. When he turned ten, which was a few years ago now, we let him sleep on one of the sofas in the lounge. In the last few weeks he's taken to the old sofa bed in the conservatory again, to doze in the spring warmth.
Orion is setting for the summer, I notice. How time passes. The Universe makes its strange, slow circles and I would like it to stop, just for a few days.
Alas, dear reader, I made Shellkopf and Oddamore 2016 up. But welcome to the Night Planted Orchard.
We have rearranged the furniture and brought out the mood-lights as the evenings darken. We have blocked off all the draughts to save on the fuel bills and scattered fleeces and blankets to warm ourselves. The ancient hunter has is own fleece as he grumbles and shuffles on the sofa. It's his sofa now, a concession for his tenth birthday. He needs the comfort for his old bones. But he will stir soon, because the pheasants will start calling. How very dare a noisy pheasant invade his territory. It has been a curious year, now creeping into autumn. Forty degrees of heat and months of drought. The vegetables failed in spectacular fashion, but the fruit trees had fed from some deep secret source. It is a bumper year for apples. All but one of the trees have decided that this is an 'on' year although there are curious remnants of that long drought. The Minnesota Wealthy are tiny, an entire harvest fills a small basket. Though tiny as crabapples they are ripe and full of flavour, almost reminiscent of almonds. Now there are whispers of frost and so this afternoon we harvested the quinces in perfect time. They had become yellow and deeply scented and ready for the basket. They are not timid. They are huge, the size of a big bramley. Lady Snoutingdingle estimates thirty kilos, I say twenty. We shall see. After that, only the medlars and the sloes remain, snoozing for the frost. The ancient hunter? He is snuffling for the door so that he can go and bark at the pheasants. The foxes too, for the foxes creep closer to the edge of his domain, month by month.
Lady Snoutingdingle works like a beast tending the Night Planted Orchard all summer long, planting herbs and vegetables, guarding the fruit and keeping an eye on the ancient hunter's wanderings. Though of late, he has demonstrated exhaustion on her behalf most of the time. Now, in early October, we have picked the quinces and a lull comes in the work. She dusts off the sewing machine and works off the long exhaustion, with an equally exhausting winter of crafting.
Velvet Snoutingdingle