When our neighbors John and Aussie Bronwyn announced that they were selling their property and moving away, CJ and I were mortified. More than anyone, those two have taught us how to live on 20 acres. How could they abandon us?
“I’m giving up,” I said. “‘Moon over Martinborough’ is never going to be a book.”
Ever since I’d started this blog I’d wanted to turn it into a book, but I was losing hope.
“Maybe you shouldn’t give up just yet,” Uncle Oscar replied.
“I count just four chickens,” CJ says. “There should be five.”
We start looking around. There’s no doubt about it. One of our hens has disappeared.
“It’s Henrietta,” I say. “She’s gone.”
“There’s a sheep down in your paddock,” our neighbor Jim said over the phone. He’d been working along the fenceline when he saw the sheep. “It looks pretty sick,” he said.
I immediately called Hamish. The sheep belong to him.
Old Man Henry is our geriatric rooster. He is mangy and decrepit. The feathers on his head are just quill stubble. He’s half blind, bow-legged, and he pauses strangely after every step. On certain misty mornings, when the light is right, he looks as though he’s stepped out of some twisted chicken fancier’s version of Dawn of the Dead.
