Dingo: The Dog Who Conquered a Continent (11 page)

He had only meant to doze then leave in the pre-dawn light. But yesterday's walk — and the relief of finding humans — had tired him more than he'd thought.

The sunlight on his face woke him. He sat up suddenly and looked around, alarmed.

Where were the younger dogs? Had they wandered near the camp? Maybe they were already dog meat …

He scrambled to his feet, then saw them sitting on the rock, comfortably surveying the world below. If they'd hunted earlier there was no sign of it. And if they had, he realised with relief, no one had seen them.

He heard voices in the distance, further away than last night's camp.

Good, he thought. No one was coming this way.

He needed time — time to get back to his own camp, time to think about how he could make the strangers see the dogs as friends, not food, to show them how good a partnership between dogs and humans could be. To see him not as some magician who could talk to animals, or even as an enemy who'd come sneaking by to steal a woman, but as exactly what he was —
a young man who had lost his own people and was prepared to take on another clan's language and ways.

As long as they spared his dogs.

He strode down the hill, keeping away from the river, where men might be silently fishing or women catching birds. He didn't stop to drink. The dogs did — there was no way he could stop them and he couldn't risk calling them. But finally the river was behind them. The world was silent, dawn's bird chorus done for the day. Only one more lake through the grasslands …

The birds that had flown away the day before weren't there today. Maybe a crocodile had scared them —

He saw her then. But realised she'd seen him first. She stood immobile: she was long-limbed, her skin as dark as the water, her eyes wide and scared. She was a little younger than he was, perhaps. He saw when she saw the dogs too, her eyes widening as she wondered whether to run from the strange man and the strange beasts, or if running would just make them chase her.

‘Sit,' he whispered to the dogs. Little Boy and Little Girl sat obediently. The dog glanced at her puppies, then at Loa, then at the girl. Finally she decided to sit too, scratching her ear with her hind leg.

The girl stared at Loa and at the dogs. She looked scared, but curious too.

Loa tried a smile. ‘Hello.'

The girl said something he didn't understand.

Loa put his spear down, then lifted his hands to show he held no weapons. He reached down and
scratched Little Boy behind the ears. The dog grinned. Little Girl rolled over to let him scratch her tummy.

The dog gazed at the girl. The girl gazed back, then at Loa, fascination battling with fear.

How could he say, ‘Don't be scared of us'? How could he show her he wasn't going to try to capture her, or hurt her, and that the dogs wouldn't hurt her either?

Suddenly Little Girl stood up. Before he could stop her she padded over to the girl. She sniffed the girl's legs, curiously, then snuffled at a woven bag lying in the grass. She sat at the girl's feet, looking up hopefully. Loa wondered if the bag held mussels or maybe wood grubs. He didn't know how to ask.

The girl looked at Loa, looked at Little Boy and the dog, then at Little Girl, still sitting at her feet, mouth open in a doggy grin. Slowly, very slowly, the girl reached out and touched Little Girl's head, then darted her fingers away, as though she was scared she'd be bitten.

‘Grrf,' said Little Girl, drooling at the scent of whatever was in the basket.

Loa reached down and scratched Little Boy's ears again. The girl gave a delighted giggle as she bent down and scratched Little Girl the same way. The young dog shut her eyes in pleasure.

The girl looked at Loa, a true smile on her face now as she scratched Little Girl just the way he was scratching Little Boy. He smiled back at her, admiring her courage. She must have seen Little Girl's sharp teeth. Any of the girls back home would have run
away screaming. But this girl touched a strong and frightening animal. This girl smiled at a stranger.

The dog gazed at them, wary.

He wanted to stay with the girl. Learn how to talk to her, ask her to take him to her family. But he had to think about the dogs too.

Suddenly Loa knew what to do.

He held up his hand and pointed towards his far-off camp. He gestured at himself, then at the dogs, then at the camp again. Then he pointed towards the girl's camp, made a beckoning gesture, then pointed to his camp again. The signals were the only way he knew how to say, ‘I'm taking the dogs back to my camp. Tell your people to come to my camp too.'

The girl stared at him. Did she understand?

Someone called from back towards the river. The girl called something in return.

He had to go. Now. Fast, before a hunter could find them and cast a spear: at the dogs for food; at him in case he was attacking or stealing the girl. He had to hope she'd tell them he wasn't an enemy, that his dogs were strange, but not dangerous or for eating.

He smiled at her one last time. She smiled back, her face like the sun edging above the mountains, like the moon lifting out of the seas.

He began to jog into the grasslands. The dogs pranced after him.

He glanced back. The girl watched him. He wondered what she saw, then looked at her face and knew.

She saw a hunter. A man, his muscles stronger from the last hard year of work, not the boy he'd been such
a short time earlier. A man who could survive alone, who could make a camp from nothing. A warrior who commanded animals.

That's me, he thought. That's who I am now.

The voices were closer now. He began to run through the grass, the dogs trotting on either side. But his mind's eye still saw the girl.

Dusk crept across the world as he drew near to his own camp. The coals of his fire were still glowing. He threw more wood on, knowing it was too dark for the strangers to see his smoke tonight. He wanted the girl's clan to find him, but not for a few days yet.

He speared a fish at first light, taking the time to feed it bit at a time to the dogs, making sure that Little Girl and Little Boy sat and rolled over obediently every time he gave the word.

The dog looked bored, as though it was her right to share the fish without all the sitting and rolling. He agreed with her, but worry tugged at him. If only there was some way to tell her that she would be safer if she was tamer.

But he knew her as well as she knew him. She did what she wanted.

He headed back to his camp and began to dig a pit, glad the soil wasn't yet the hard almost-rock of the Dry. It was hard work, loosening the soil with a stick, scraping it out with a giant bailer shell carried here by a tide at the height of the Rain.

It took a day to make the pit big enough. He ate turtle eggs because he didn't want to spare time to hunt, but he still made sure that Little Girl and Little Boy sat and rolled over each time before they ate. He gathered rocks, flinging them into the pit, then firewood, as dry as he could find.

At night he dreamed of the girl.

Now it was time to hunt.

‘Dog!'

He never knew if she'd come when he called or not. But today her golden shape appeared on the path, the younger dogs behind her.

He lifted his hunting spear. ‘Hunt,' he said. ‘Hunt, girl.'

He didn't know if the dog understood his words. But she knew what it meant when he lifted his spear and gazed at the hoppers then at her.

She gave a doggy grin, her tongue lolling, then slunk off into the still-long grass. The younger dogs followed her.

Loa waited for them to drive the hoppers towards him, his spear in his hands.

The dogs howled that night, the first time since he'd seen the strangers' campfire smoke. It was almost as though they knew that it was time to call them.

The girl's father, brothers, uncles and grandfathers would never have heard a dog's howl before: they'd come to investigate.

He hoped they'd come as friends, not enemies. Had the girl explained? Had she understood?

He thought of her smile, the way she'd giggled when she touched Little Girl. If anyone could understand it would be her.

He put green wood on the fire the next morning, to make the most smoke to show the girl's clan exactly where his camp was. They'd know that much smoke must be a signal, a way of saying, ‘Here I am.' It could be an invitation — or a threat. In the fire pit the two hoppers lay cooking, hot and moist and tasty under the layer of wet leaves and soil, away from flies. Food in a fire pit kept good for days.

He put on his necklaces of fish vertebrae and hopper teeth. He sat on the ledge by his campfire and rubbed hopper fat into his spears so they gleamed,
their shafts thick and straight; they were obviously made by a hunter who knew what he was doing. His obsidian knife hung by the cord about his waist. Little Boy and Little Girl slept beside him. The dog was off somewhere, hunting perhaps, tired of eating eggs.

Suddenly the young dogs' ears pricked. Little Girl sat up, glancing across at Loa as though to say, ‘Can't you hear them too?'

At first all he could see was grass moving, as though a giant snake was coming towards them. The ripple grew nearer. It was made by people.

The whole clan had come, not just the hunters, men who might attack a stranger. The girl had convinced her clan that he wasn't luring them to battle. They had understood each other well that day. He could see a couple of grandmothers, some grandfathers, white hair and long white beards, women with babies slung on their backs, keeping their hands free to carry bags filled with fruits and tubers they had gathered on the way.

Two of the hunters had long-necked birds slung over their shoulders. Loa would have grinned if he hadn't been so nervous. The hunters didn't know a feast waited for them.

The girl walked behind the others. He'd hoped she'd be in the front, as eager to see him again as he was to see her, but of course the hunters would lead the clan. Then he saw that she too wore necklaces — shells and bright red seeds.

She wore them for him.

He stood up so she could see him, so they could all see him. He wanted to smile at the girl, but her uncles
might resent a stranger smiling so openly before he'd proved his worth. Little Girl and Little Boy stood too, yawning.

Suddenly one of the hunters raised his spear. He aimed at Little Girl …

‘Down!' But even as Loa gave the order the girl ran forwards and grabbed the man's spear arm. She spoke to him urgently. The hunter lowered his spear. The man stared as Little Girl and Little Boy sat at Loa's feet, just as he'd planned, then rolled onto their backs.

But where is the dog? thought Loa frantically. He needed her to be here too, so everyone would see he had three tame dogs, not just two. He bent slowly, and scratched the dogs' tummies, listening to the mutters of wonder from the strangers.

All at once a grandma pointed.

The dog stood on the rock above them. It's almost as though she's inviting a spear, thought Loa desperately.

‘Dog!' he called, hoping she'd come. Hoping they'd realise that if she did come running down it was because he'd ordered her to, not because she was attacking. He remembered how he'd thrown stones at the rubbish dogs, before he'd known that a human and an animal could be friends and partners.

The dog vanished off the rock. Suddenly she appeared on the path, running towards them, a bird dangling from her mouth.

The hunter raised his spear again. Loa could almost hear the man think, I'll be the first to kill the new beast. The girl said something, quickly and firmly. But the hunter shrugged her off. This was men's business.

The spear was long and well made, its point sharp. At this range the hunter wouldn't miss.

‘Dog!' he cried desperately.

The dog glanced at him as she ran down the path towards him. There was something in her look that said she knew exactly what was happening, and what she was doing now.

She looked almost amused as she ran up to Loa. She dropped the bird at his feet and glanced up at him again, as if to say, ‘I'm doing this for you.' Then rolled over, her legs in the air.

It was as though she shouted to every human here: ‘Look! This man is my master! I catch food for him. We dogs are useful. Let us live.'

The hunter put down his spear. Someone laughed. All at once they were all laughing — the grandmothers, the hunters, the girl, even the toddlers on the women's backs. They pointed at the dogs and at Loa.

Loa laughed too. He bent down to scratch the dogs' tummies so the strangers wouldn't see his tears.

A shadow crossed his. It was the girl. She bent down beside him, then, cautiously at first, began to scratch Little Girl's tummy too.

Soon, he thought, when I can breathe again, I'll show them all the fire pit and the feast I prepared. Show the girl's uncles that he was a hunter to be respected and a spear maker, as well as the man who'd tamed the dogs. He'd show the girl too.

He smiled, and met her eyes.

‘Arrunna,' she said.

He didn't know if that was her name, or ‘hello' in her language, or maybe a word for ‘strange animal that likes to be scratched'.

It didn't matter. They understood each other in all the ways that mattered now. There would be long happy years to find out more. Somehow he knew that from now on things would be good, for him and for the dogs too. His dogs. His friends.

‘Loa,' he said, and reached over to scratch the dog, his hand next to the girl's.

The Dog

The Thunder Season

It was hot. The ground breathed dryness into the air. Soon the winds would bring the rains again, but today the soil was too warm under her paws.

The dog was tired. Today's hunt had been short. Many dogs had flushed out the mob of big hoppers for the men to spear. Two of the men carried the great beasts back to the camp.

But she was old. Too weary to walk any more just now. She lay on the grass, panting, then put her head on her paws.

Bony Boy looked down at her. He was tall and muscular, not bony at all, but the dog still thought of him as she had when they first met. ‘You tired, old dog?'

The dog whined softly.

Bony Boy grinned. He kneeled in the grass and lifted her expertly, so she lay across his shoulders, front and back paws dangling each side of his neck. He strode through the grass after the other hunters, bearing her on his shoulders, his big hands gently holding her paws.

There was no need to walk when she was tired now, not with Bony Boy to carry her.

Tonight there'd be a feast around the fire. There'd be bones to chew, for her and the other dogs, her puppies and her children's children too. But Bony Boy would make sure she had the best bits of all, the squishy parts she loved most. Perhaps tonight she'd hear howls from the darkness, where her wild children and their pups hunted for themselves.

The dog let herself enjoy the rocking motion as Bony Boy walked, the smell of fresh meat, the warmth of the sun.

It was a good day to be a dingo.