From An Island In New Hampshire

By Banah Isaac Wright’s Hollow, New Hampshire

April 21, 2023

Ready And The Snake

As they grew, Ready and Abel’s coats changed from straight, easy to groom, black and white to a kind of hair I’d never seen before. Nightmare hair. The straight stuff started to disappear, replaced by two layers of curly, Abel’s silky, Ready’s rough. The colors came in marbled, although not on the white paws, ruffs, faces or tippy tails, just everywhere that used to be black. Now, they had Sheepdog hair, and that’s what you would think they were, at first glance. Long, gray and white marbled hair, with every single recessive trait the Dog Book could name. Red streaks, black streaks: “Most objectionable.” Waves and curls: “Most undesirable.” I’ll say, because you really could not brush it out. It kinked. They’d come in plastered with mud from the boggy fern bed, or dripping wet from the brook, or with one ear stuck over an eye with spiny burdocks, or twigs twisted at the ankles, or in their armpits, so to speak. I never took them to a groomer’s; it would have cost a fortune, daily. I had good grooming tools, but it was the scissors that did most of the work, till by Summer’s end, you would have thought they’d been shaved, anyway. They had the long Sheepdog hair over their eyes, black button noses, and sweeping Golden Retriever plumy tails. People would meet them and say, “They’re beautiful!” (on a good hair day) and then, “What are they?”

They both walked like Sheepdogs, a mincing, careful gait. It was when they ran that the different breeds really showed up. Abel had the long Retriever legs. When he took off, he stretched, speed gliding over rough ground while barely touching it. Ready was shorter, a little powerhouse of joy. When she ran, she sprang. Up!-and galloping, boing, boing, boing, a look of uncontainable glee all over her face.

But Abel could usually catch her. He could outwit her, too. He’d get a toy, and never let her grab it, although he might tease her off the couch with one, mainly so he could steal her seat. He’d rock back and forth, “Grrrr!” and “Rrrrrf!” and she’d leap from her nice cuddle spot next to me-and he’d usurp it, the rascal.

The path down to the brook is in a broad area, a great place to run. In the days of the New Hampshire hill farms, it was part of a pasture. There’s still bits of fence and a stone wall. Now, it’s shaded with old hemlock trees, and floored with low-growing evergreen yew bushes, horsetail, wild ginger, wildflowers in the Spring.

We went down that way one Summer’s day. They were careening around as usual, gliding and boinging, when I looked up. Abel was trying to catch Ready, and he couldn’t. The reason why was hanging out of her mouth. A garter snake, limp with fear and trepidation, had been nabbed off the earth by my little tracker. The joy of the hunt was in her eyes; I could see them for a change, because she was moving so fast the hair whipped back, and they were shining with dog laughter. She’d stop a second, toss her prize in the air, catch it deftly, whip it around and spring into the air again just as Abel was about to pounce. She wasn’t letting him anywhere near this! The snake was terrorized; if it had had a voice, it would have been saying, “Aaaaaaaah!” Abie couldn’t understand it; he’d always been able to nail her before. But there’s a big difference between a plastic toy and a real, live snake. Her blood was up and racing, along with her springing, galloping feet.

I watched this circus for about twenty minutes. She never tired, Abel never gave up. I thought the snake might be dead from fright, or at least in a coma. So, at last I said, looking straight at the goddess of the hunt, “Do you want to go in the house and get a cookie?”

She stopped. She dropped the snake. It did not move. They both turned to go, headed for the house. As I passed the snake, who was only about a foot long, I poked it with a stick. Nothing twitched. I took note of the spot, and went to go give the wild things their cookies.

Next day, I went back, but the snake was gone. If snakes were storytellers, imagine what it would have told its grandchildren.