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- Story Listed as: Fiction For Teens
- Theme: Family & Friends
- Subject: Pets / Animal Friends
- Published: 01/30/2016
Golden and Silver on the Moor.
Born 1941, M, from Whitby, United KingdomGolden And Silver On the Moor.
Golden's Dad had worked, and still did, in heavy industry. He had been recruited there as an apprentice from a neighbouring rural area. Golden's Mum came from Teesside and after they had met at Glastonbury they determined eventually to live away from the complexities of the urban areas and find a place in the country.
The move meant that Dad had to travel an extra hour in the morning and the same at night. Travelling conditions could often be very difficult during the ice of winter.
Mum had to give up her job in teaching until they were established in their new home then she would try to be a supply teacher during term time to help pay the soon endless bills associated with their new home Fairy Moor Farm
Ben and sister Golden were walking down the empty lane together with Silver their collie running free, ears cocked, thinking it must be her birthday. She is every bit as happy as her companions are. The birds are not hungry enough yet to have stripped the red berries from the mountain ash trees. The berries remain even now that the first frosts have removed most of the leaves. Brambles are mixed in among the dead brown bracken lining the hedges. They eventually enter the farmyard of Mr Weatherglass and Silver runs off with Mr Weatherglass's dog, Prince. Mr Weatherglass comes out of a throbbing milking parlour and spots them.
"You must be Ben --- Oh and you must be Golden of course."
"Hello, Mr Weatherglass. Pleased to meet you."
"Dad said we could come to help you bring the sheep down."
"Well in that case I'd better get a move on, hadn't I?"
Mrs Weatherglass shouts from the farm kitchen - "Come on bairns I'll get you a cup of tea and a biscuit."
They all go into the large dark kitchen with flag stone floors where a black cast iron cooking range is pushing out vast waves of heat. The dazzling orange rays light the stones where the fire door is ajar.
"It'll be a bit fresh on the tops today, says Mrs Weatherglass, "so I've made you some sandwiches and a flask to keep you going."
"Do you think you'll like it up here after being all that time down in town?" asks Mr Weatherglass, " there's no cinemas or discos here you know."
"We think it's brilliant -- there's so much - open airiness and we can roam about all over on our own."
"Our dog Silver can't believe her luck and she's only walked as far as here up to now."
"I hope you still feel like that in a couple of weeks when we're blocked off with snow."
Ben - (laughing) - "-- and we can't get to school."
They all laugh, finish their cups of tea and biscuits and set off.
They leave the farm and follow the sheep tracks, through the heather, up the hill onto the open moor top.
"What I want you to do is go along that track to the right and I'll go to the left. You can round up any sheep you see and then the paths come back together, just near the forestry that you can see in the distance. We'll meet again there and bring all the sheep back. We should be just within sight of each other all the way. Does that sound all right?"
"Yes that's fine," says Ben.
"Don't worry if you find sheep and your dog won't fetch them. As long as you spot where they are then I'll pick them up with Prince on the way back."
They each go their own way and Ben and Golden and Silver start to collect a few sheep feeling like old experienced moor enders. They walk across the open moorland to the trees of the forestry, passing ancient Tumuli on the way. Even with zero training Silver is instinctively bringing the sheep along with them in some sort of fashion. Of course Ben and Golden are giving what they believe are the correct whistles and shouts. Every now and then a grouse explodes out of the heather beneath their feet and streaks away making a cackling, crack, cracking cry. The suddenness and close flapping of wings makes them jump. They re-meet Mr Weatherglass who has by now quite a large flock of sheep with him.
"You've done very well, do you think that you've got them all?" said Mr Weatherglass.
"Yes, I'm sure there's no more that we could see," said Golden.
"Let's have some grub then. You've saved me a lot of work and time."
They sit down on some gritstone boulders, unwrap the sandwiches and pour from the flasks. Scraps are thrown to the two dogs.
Mr Weatherglass, burping - "That's better - my old legs are aching - I don't think I could have managed so well without you two. Now that the difficult bit is over all we have to do is get these sheep back to the farm. It's all downhill from here as they say."
They set out again. After some time Golden spots something in a small dip away to the right. She runs off the path, legs lifting high at each step to clear the heather tops.
"Just look at that - what on earth has happened to them?"
Two dead sheep are lying there not too far from the side of the track. Their savaged bodies lying at unnatural angles about ten metres apart. Round about sad tufts of wool are littered about.
Mr Weatherglass inspects the find - "It looks as if a stray dog, or dogs, might have had them."
"But the dog that did it must belong to someone round here." said Ben, shaking his head.
"Well, not necessarily, sometimes, it's sad to say, people bring animals they don't want out here and turn them out onto the moor. Then they just turn wild and eventually have to kill to survive."
"I think that's terrible," said Golden her forehead furrowed with concern.
"I'll come back and bury them when I've picked up a spade."
They press on slowly gathering the meandering blackface sheep down the moor side sheep tracks to the Weatherglass farm.
Mr Weatherglass had been born at Hare Slack seventy years ago. He had worked and lived on this single farm ever since. When his father died he carried on working and living just as he had before. The only difference was that he eventually moved into the big bedroom at the front of the house. It had been his father's. This had a special attraction in that the chimneybreast from the cast iron cooking range in the kitchen below went through the wall of the room on its way to the roof and chimneys above. The fire was always on so the bedroom wall was always warm from the smoke from the fire passing through. In winter this was as good as having central heating.
Mrs Weatherglass had lived on a farm nearer the village and she was well used to her role. Like Mr Weatherglass her parents had done exactly the same as she was doing now for time immemorial.
Making enough to survive on from moor farms had always been difficult and most were dwindling down to be eventually sold. They had no children so that fate would come to Hare Slack too. Mr and Mrs Weatherglass never talked about that. For the present they carried quietly onwards bolstered by sheep subsidies from the government. It was as if nothing would ever change or come to an end.
That night Golden was tossing and turning with troubled thoughts from the daytime. All at once they disappear, just like a bubble bursting. What replaces them is mysterious and it starts with the first soft chime of the old Grandfather clock downstairs. She feels that something is happening outside. Something frightening. Something that she must not miss. She looks out of the window. Nothing unusual in the moonlit yard between the house and the Blacksmiths Forge. The feeling becomes stronger and magnetic. She tip toes down to the kitchen, slides back the lock and walks quietly out into the yard. She looks back up to her bedroom window and in doing so thinks she sees some movement up at the chimney pots. Silhouetted against the bluey blackness of the starlight heavens her eyes become accustomed to low light and clearly now she can see something moving. Not stiff and jerky but fluid and silent.
Something was approaching at an incredible speed. Golden could feel a pressure wave wash over her face. Then it was there, alongside the chimneystack. A blue feint glowing jellyfish shape. It was glowing dimly against the inky black sky. From a round nodule on the top down to the bottom rim she could see panels of discharges of light. These discharges were in horizontal bands and flowed soundlessly with a steady rhythm. Golden could not determine the size of the apparition because of the faint quality of light. As though it was on the very limits of her perception. The chimney pots were silhouetted against it. A blue tentacle slowly extended from the main body and touched each of the six pots. Then it seemed to drop something into three of the pots. There was a build-up of fizz and the blue jellyfish thing shot off into the sky rapidly getting smaller and smaller until Golden couldn't see it at all. Then all was quiet.
She went back into the house and felt a cold shiver all over. She looked back one more time. The square of the chimneystack was still silhouetted against the silvery moonlight of the night sky. There were still chimney pots on it. It was no good waking Ben. He would never 'believe'. Neither would her Mum and Dad. Anyway they had enough on their plate for now. So instead she slipped back under the covers still feeling cold. No sheep worries now. Had it all just been a dream? She pulled the sheet right over her head in an effort to hide from the entire world and extra-terrestrials. She tried hard to join in to some other nice, sweet dream and leave this one behind.
The next morning at Fairy Moor it was breakfast. Silver is at the back door wanting to go out. Ben opens the door for her then shuts it behind her.
"The dogs I have seen since we came here have all been nice," said Golden. Trying as hard as she could to get her mind away from the night before and the blue jellyfish thing. Wishing too that she could find a way to share her secret. Maybe better to just try and forget it.
"Yes, I can't think I've seen any that would have killed a sheep," said Ben.
"But sometimes, when two dogs get together and away from their owners they go wild and then even a nice dog can sometimes do things that it would never do on its own." said Dad.
"Yes OK, I can believe that, but what would one or two dogs be doing right up there on the high moor, miles from anywhere?" said Ben.
"Well, that's a puzzle that maybe we won't be able to answer."
The knocking noise of horse hooves is heard from the yard followed by a knock on the door.
"I wonder who that can be?" says Dad. "We haven't been here long enough to have any visitors."
"I'm Colonel Orchis - Master of Hounds and the Estate Manager." He announced it as though he were God himself.
"There's been some savaging of sheep about here and until we find the culprit you'd better keep your dog under control."
"But we do-----"
Col. Orchis interrupts - "Then why is it running down the road on its own?"
"Oh crikey she must be going to see Prince at Mr Weatherglass's." said Ben. "She's new to the country and thinks it all belongs to her."
"I'm sorry Colonel, believe it or not we've just been talking about the dangers of not keeping a dog under control." said Dad.
"Then I suggest you should practise what you preach! Good Day."
He turns and leaves without any further ado.
Mother is angry- "Who on earth does he think he is? The big old bully."
"All right, calm down. But everything he said was correct. You two had better get along to Mr Weatherglass's and bring Silver back."
Ben and Golden go straight away back down the lane to Mr Weatherglass's farmyard and find Silver playing vigorously with Prince. Mr Weatherglass is in the yard.
"I can guess what you've come for. I've had a visit from a certain local Colonel."
"He's really big headed," says Golden still a little annoyed.
"But in this case he's right, and unfortunately he's now going to suspect Prince as well as Silver."
"Surely not."
"Oh yes, I'm afraid so. I know how the man works."
Ben - "I think we'd better walk back along the beck with Silver - that way we'll not bump into the Colonel."
They set off down the fields and pass close to some sheep on the way. Silver takes no notice of them.
"Look at her, she would never bite anything, let alone a sheep." says Ben.
At the beck Golden sees a swell of ripple in the shallows, two large fish cruise away to hide under the bank.
"Look at that, they must be sea trout."
Silver splashes into the beck, keen to catch the movement. She has no chance of that but does succeed in scaring away all the fish in the vicinity.
"We haven't a hope of seeing any more with the dog running loose." says Ben.
"Oh, dog you are a problem today."
……………………………….
Although Silver could not speak she understood body language clearly. This was because the words were always associated with a body language all of its own. Silver's thoughts were always in the form of pictures in her brain. As a puppy she could vaguely remember a picture of her mother in a small hay strewn stable. The bottom of the door was worn away by age and a succession of dogs chewing at it to try and get out. She could manage to stick her nose out and see the marvels of the sunshine in the stackyard and the occasional tractor chugging past. Then one morning the farmer came over with another kind looking man. They were showing definite interest in her stable. She yapped as much as she could and tried her best to smile. The door was opened; the kind man picked her up. She was ecstatic. All she wanted was some small attention. She wriggled and tried her hardest to say, "Oh, yes, please take me home"
She tried so hard and was so excited that she wet herself with joy. The kind man laughed and she went home with him. He had a pup girl and a pup boy at home that were just like him and they bonded together immediately. Life consisted of a lot of restrictions for a few weeks in the town house. Every day was punctuated with a marvellous burst of fun in the local park. The sights and smells of many other dogs and people were everywhere.
Then, joy of joy, the whole family climbed into a transit van and left the town behind forever. When they arrived at Fairy Moor Farm Silver knew that she too had arrived at her home. She found that the freedom and space was as exciting to her as it was to her pup brother and pup sister. There was one thing further than that; she now felt that she was a fully-fledged member of the family. Nothing would ever take her away from them.
They headed up the pasture field to Fairy Moor and Silver decided there would be nothing she would like more than to roll in something really foul smelling. To this end she managed to find an infested cow pat that was just the job.
"Mum will go bananas if Silver goes in the house like that," says Ben.
Back in the yard they get a hose pipe out and wash the bedraggled dog down then dry her with an old towel.
Silver understands and looks seriously sad. They go into the house.
"In your basket dog. You've been nothing but trouble today.”
Silver may have been in trouble today but in the days to come she was really going to earn her position as an important family member.
Golden and Silver on the Moor.(Ossie Durrans)
Golden And Silver On the Moor.
Golden's Dad had worked, and still did, in heavy industry. He had been recruited there as an apprentice from a neighbouring rural area. Golden's Mum came from Teesside and after they had met at Glastonbury they determined eventually to live away from the complexities of the urban areas and find a place in the country.
The move meant that Dad had to travel an extra hour in the morning and the same at night. Travelling conditions could often be very difficult during the ice of winter.
Mum had to give up her job in teaching until they were established in their new home then she would try to be a supply teacher during term time to help pay the soon endless bills associated with their new home Fairy Moor Farm
Ben and sister Golden were walking down the empty lane together with Silver their collie running free, ears cocked, thinking it must be her birthday. She is every bit as happy as her companions are. The birds are not hungry enough yet to have stripped the red berries from the mountain ash trees. The berries remain even now that the first frosts have removed most of the leaves. Brambles are mixed in among the dead brown bracken lining the hedges. They eventually enter the farmyard of Mr Weatherglass and Silver runs off with Mr Weatherglass's dog, Prince. Mr Weatherglass comes out of a throbbing milking parlour and spots them.
"You must be Ben --- Oh and you must be Golden of course."
"Hello, Mr Weatherglass. Pleased to meet you."
"Dad said we could come to help you bring the sheep down."
"Well in that case I'd better get a move on, hadn't I?"
Mrs Weatherglass shouts from the farm kitchen - "Come on bairns I'll get you a cup of tea and a biscuit."
They all go into the large dark kitchen with flag stone floors where a black cast iron cooking range is pushing out vast waves of heat. The dazzling orange rays light the stones where the fire door is ajar.
"It'll be a bit fresh on the tops today, says Mrs Weatherglass, "so I've made you some sandwiches and a flask to keep you going."
"Do you think you'll like it up here after being all that time down in town?" asks Mr Weatherglass, " there's no cinemas or discos here you know."
"We think it's brilliant -- there's so much - open airiness and we can roam about all over on our own."
"Our dog Silver can't believe her luck and she's only walked as far as here up to now."
"I hope you still feel like that in a couple of weeks when we're blocked off with snow."
Ben - (laughing) - "-- and we can't get to school."
They all laugh, finish their cups of tea and biscuits and set off.
They leave the farm and follow the sheep tracks, through the heather, up the hill onto the open moor top.
"What I want you to do is go along that track to the right and I'll go to the left. You can round up any sheep you see and then the paths come back together, just near the forestry that you can see in the distance. We'll meet again there and bring all the sheep back. We should be just within sight of each other all the way. Does that sound all right?"
"Yes that's fine," says Ben.
"Don't worry if you find sheep and your dog won't fetch them. As long as you spot where they are then I'll pick them up with Prince on the way back."
They each go their own way and Ben and Golden and Silver start to collect a few sheep feeling like old experienced moor enders. They walk across the open moorland to the trees of the forestry, passing ancient Tumuli on the way. Even with zero training Silver is instinctively bringing the sheep along with them in some sort of fashion. Of course Ben and Golden are giving what they believe are the correct whistles and shouts. Every now and then a grouse explodes out of the heather beneath their feet and streaks away making a cackling, crack, cracking cry. The suddenness and close flapping of wings makes them jump. They re-meet Mr Weatherglass who has by now quite a large flock of sheep with him.
"You've done very well, do you think that you've got them all?" said Mr Weatherglass.
"Yes, I'm sure there's no more that we could see," said Golden.
"Let's have some grub then. You've saved me a lot of work and time."
They sit down on some gritstone boulders, unwrap the sandwiches and pour from the flasks. Scraps are thrown to the two dogs.
Mr Weatherglass, burping - "That's better - my old legs are aching - I don't think I could have managed so well without you two. Now that the difficult bit is over all we have to do is get these sheep back to the farm. It's all downhill from here as they say."
They set out again. After some time Golden spots something in a small dip away to the right. She runs off the path, legs lifting high at each step to clear the heather tops.
"Just look at that - what on earth has happened to them?"
Two dead sheep are lying there not too far from the side of the track. Their savaged bodies lying at unnatural angles about ten metres apart. Round about sad tufts of wool are littered about.
Mr Weatherglass inspects the find - "It looks as if a stray dog, or dogs, might have had them."
"But the dog that did it must belong to someone round here." said Ben, shaking his head.
"Well, not necessarily, sometimes, it's sad to say, people bring animals they don't want out here and turn them out onto the moor. Then they just turn wild and eventually have to kill to survive."
"I think that's terrible," said Golden her forehead furrowed with concern.
"I'll come back and bury them when I've picked up a spade."
They press on slowly gathering the meandering blackface sheep down the moor side sheep tracks to the Weatherglass farm.
Mr Weatherglass had been born at Hare Slack seventy years ago. He had worked and lived on this single farm ever since. When his father died he carried on working and living just as he had before. The only difference was that he eventually moved into the big bedroom at the front of the house. It had been his father's. This had a special attraction in that the chimneybreast from the cast iron cooking range in the kitchen below went through the wall of the room on its way to the roof and chimneys above. The fire was always on so the bedroom wall was always warm from the smoke from the fire passing through. In winter this was as good as having central heating.
Mrs Weatherglass had lived on a farm nearer the village and she was well used to her role. Like Mr Weatherglass her parents had done exactly the same as she was doing now for time immemorial.
Making enough to survive on from moor farms had always been difficult and most were dwindling down to be eventually sold. They had no children so that fate would come to Hare Slack too. Mr and Mrs Weatherglass never talked about that. For the present they carried quietly onwards bolstered by sheep subsidies from the government. It was as if nothing would ever change or come to an end.
That night Golden was tossing and turning with troubled thoughts from the daytime. All at once they disappear, just like a bubble bursting. What replaces them is mysterious and it starts with the first soft chime of the old Grandfather clock downstairs. She feels that something is happening outside. Something frightening. Something that she must not miss. She looks out of the window. Nothing unusual in the moonlit yard between the house and the Blacksmiths Forge. The feeling becomes stronger and magnetic. She tip toes down to the kitchen, slides back the lock and walks quietly out into the yard. She looks back up to her bedroom window and in doing so thinks she sees some movement up at the chimney pots. Silhouetted against the bluey blackness of the starlight heavens her eyes become accustomed to low light and clearly now she can see something moving. Not stiff and jerky but fluid and silent.
Something was approaching at an incredible speed. Golden could feel a pressure wave wash over her face. Then it was there, alongside the chimneystack. A blue feint glowing jellyfish shape. It was glowing dimly against the inky black sky. From a round nodule on the top down to the bottom rim she could see panels of discharges of light. These discharges were in horizontal bands and flowed soundlessly with a steady rhythm. Golden could not determine the size of the apparition because of the faint quality of light. As though it was on the very limits of her perception. The chimney pots were silhouetted against it. A blue tentacle slowly extended from the main body and touched each of the six pots. Then it seemed to drop something into three of the pots. There was a build-up of fizz and the blue jellyfish thing shot off into the sky rapidly getting smaller and smaller until Golden couldn't see it at all. Then all was quiet.
She went back into the house and felt a cold shiver all over. She looked back one more time. The square of the chimneystack was still silhouetted against the silvery moonlight of the night sky. There were still chimney pots on it. It was no good waking Ben. He would never 'believe'. Neither would her Mum and Dad. Anyway they had enough on their plate for now. So instead she slipped back under the covers still feeling cold. No sheep worries now. Had it all just been a dream? She pulled the sheet right over her head in an effort to hide from the entire world and extra-terrestrials. She tried hard to join in to some other nice, sweet dream and leave this one behind.
The next morning at Fairy Moor it was breakfast. Silver is at the back door wanting to go out. Ben opens the door for her then shuts it behind her.
"The dogs I have seen since we came here have all been nice," said Golden. Trying as hard as she could to get her mind away from the night before and the blue jellyfish thing. Wishing too that she could find a way to share her secret. Maybe better to just try and forget it.
"Yes, I can't think I've seen any that would have killed a sheep," said Ben.
"But sometimes, when two dogs get together and away from their owners they go wild and then even a nice dog can sometimes do things that it would never do on its own." said Dad.
"Yes OK, I can believe that, but what would one or two dogs be doing right up there on the high moor, miles from anywhere?" said Ben.
"Well, that's a puzzle that maybe we won't be able to answer."
The knocking noise of horse hooves is heard from the yard followed by a knock on the door.
"I wonder who that can be?" says Dad. "We haven't been here long enough to have any visitors."
"I'm Colonel Orchis - Master of Hounds and the Estate Manager." He announced it as though he were God himself.
"There's been some savaging of sheep about here and until we find the culprit you'd better keep your dog under control."
"But we do-----"
Col. Orchis interrupts - "Then why is it running down the road on its own?"
"Oh crikey she must be going to see Prince at Mr Weatherglass's." said Ben. "She's new to the country and thinks it all belongs to her."
"I'm sorry Colonel, believe it or not we've just been talking about the dangers of not keeping a dog under control." said Dad.
"Then I suggest you should practise what you preach! Good Day."
He turns and leaves without any further ado.
Mother is angry- "Who on earth does he think he is? The big old bully."
"All right, calm down. But everything he said was correct. You two had better get along to Mr Weatherglass's and bring Silver back."
Ben and Golden go straight away back down the lane to Mr Weatherglass's farmyard and find Silver playing vigorously with Prince. Mr Weatherglass is in the yard.
"I can guess what you've come for. I've had a visit from a certain local Colonel."
"He's really big headed," says Golden still a little annoyed.
"But in this case he's right, and unfortunately he's now going to suspect Prince as well as Silver."
"Surely not."
"Oh yes, I'm afraid so. I know how the man works."
Ben - "I think we'd better walk back along the beck with Silver - that way we'll not bump into the Colonel."
They set off down the fields and pass close to some sheep on the way. Silver takes no notice of them.
"Look at her, she would never bite anything, let alone a sheep." says Ben.
At the beck Golden sees a swell of ripple in the shallows, two large fish cruise away to hide under the bank.
"Look at that, they must be sea trout."
Silver splashes into the beck, keen to catch the movement. She has no chance of that but does succeed in scaring away all the fish in the vicinity.
"We haven't a hope of seeing any more with the dog running loose." says Ben.
"Oh, dog you are a problem today."
……………………………….
Although Silver could not speak she understood body language clearly. This was because the words were always associated with a body language all of its own. Silver's thoughts were always in the form of pictures in her brain. As a puppy she could vaguely remember a picture of her mother in a small hay strewn stable. The bottom of the door was worn away by age and a succession of dogs chewing at it to try and get out. She could manage to stick her nose out and see the marvels of the sunshine in the stackyard and the occasional tractor chugging past. Then one morning the farmer came over with another kind looking man. They were showing definite interest in her stable. She yapped as much as she could and tried her best to smile. The door was opened; the kind man picked her up. She was ecstatic. All she wanted was some small attention. She wriggled and tried her hardest to say, "Oh, yes, please take me home"
She tried so hard and was so excited that she wet herself with joy. The kind man laughed and she went home with him. He had a pup girl and a pup boy at home that were just like him and they bonded together immediately. Life consisted of a lot of restrictions for a few weeks in the town house. Every day was punctuated with a marvellous burst of fun in the local park. The sights and smells of many other dogs and people were everywhere.
Then, joy of joy, the whole family climbed into a transit van and left the town behind forever. When they arrived at Fairy Moor Farm Silver knew that she too had arrived at her home. She found that the freedom and space was as exciting to her as it was to her pup brother and pup sister. There was one thing further than that; she now felt that she was a fully-fledged member of the family. Nothing would ever take her away from them.
They headed up the pasture field to Fairy Moor and Silver decided there would be nothing she would like more than to roll in something really foul smelling. To this end she managed to find an infested cow pat that was just the job.
"Mum will go bananas if Silver goes in the house like that," says Ben.
Back in the yard they get a hose pipe out and wash the bedraggled dog down then dry her with an old towel.
Silver understands and looks seriously sad. They go into the house.
"In your basket dog. You've been nothing but trouble today.”
Silver may have been in trouble today but in the days to come she was really going to earn her position as an important family member.
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