A Year on Ladybug Farm #1 (17 page)

“Whatever it is,” Lindsay said, “it’s more than we can afford.”

They were silent for a while, rocking, listening to the crickets.

“I guess,” Bridget said in a moment, “this is the best part about not being twenty anymore. We know that plans hardly ever work out the way you planned them.”

Lindsay raised her glass in the dark. “Here’s to not looking back.”

Cici rocked forward and raised her glass as well. “Here’s to Hugh Grant,” she said.

“And here’s to catching the hedgerow garden thief and prosecuting his sorry ass to within an inch of his life,” added Lindsay.

Bridget raised her glass as well. “I’ll drink to that.”

They drank, and sat back and listened to the crickets until it was time for bed.

Lindsay came downstairs a little after seven, as she always did, yawning and belting her short pink terry robe around her waist as she made her way to the kitchen. She stepped over tools and neat piles of materials, as she always did, and said, “Morning, Sam. Morning, Deke. Morning, Farley” as she always did, and made her way to the coffeepot, as she always did. “Morning, Bridge.”

The kitchen was redolent of cinnamon and butter, with warm base notes of fresh ground coffee, as it always was. Privately, Lindsay thought Bridget was spoiling the workmen by providing them with coffee and sticky buns each morning—and no doubt prolonging their stay—but being Bridget, she could hardly be expected to do anything less. Besides, Lindsay enjoyed the sticky buns as much as the men did.

A chorus of “Morning, Miss Lindsay,” “Morning, ma’am,” and “Good morning, Linds” greeted her, just as it always did. She poured her coffee, added cold milk, drank a generous portion, and noticed for the first time that everyone was standing at the window in the breakfast room that overlooked the front porch, staring out. She said, coming over to them, “What are you looking at?”

No one answered. They just kept looking. And that was her first hint that this was not a morning just like any other.

“Oh my God,” she said, staring through the window. “Cici’s going to have a fit.”

Just then Cici entered the kitchen in her robe and slippers. “Morning, Bridge. Morning Lindsay,” she said.

Neither woman could quite tear their eyes from the window. “Good morning, Cici.”

“Morning, Farley. Morning—” And she stopped, staring as they stared. “Oh my God. What is that?”

“They’re sheep, ma’am,” replied Sam politely.

“But—they’re on my porch!”

“Yes’m,” he agreed with a thoughtful nod of his head. “They surely do appear to be.”

“But I just painted that porch! Look what they’re doing! They’ve ruined the paint! There’s mud everywhere! They’re eating the wicker! Oh, my God, there are a hundred of them!”

“Twenty-five,” corrected Farley, but Cici was already gone.

She flew out of the kitchen and into the front room, banging her ankle against a pile of two-by-fours and half hopping, half limping to the bank of windows that overlooked the freshly painted front porch. The flow of sheep covered the wraparound porch, from breakfast area to rocking chairs, and spilled down the steps into the front lawn, a big, muddy, ragged, wooly mass of grumbling, shifting,
baaing
life. They seemed to be wedged between the rail and the wall, as though, having made their way up there, they couldn’t figure out how to get off.

“Shoo!” Cici cried, banging on the windowpane. “Get out of here!”

Not a single sheep even looked up.

“Problem is,” Farley explained mildly, following her, “sheep don’t know how to back up.”

Cici tossed him a half-frantic, half-incredulous look, and flung open the door. “Get!” she demanded to the sheep, clapping her hands. “Go on, get out of here! Scat!”

Lindsay and Bridget crowded around her at the door. Sam and Deke followed with slightly less enthusiasm, coffee cups in one hand and sticky buns in the other.

“Reckon we could get a rope around the neck of the lead sheep,” suggested Sam. “Pull him over the rail. The others might follow.”

Deke shook his head. “Gonna have to take the railing off.”

Farley said, “I could go home and get a dog.”

Cici looked from one of them to the other with an expression that was, for the moment, completely unreadable. Then she turned and plunged into the fray. Grabbing a handful of wool, she jerked and hauled and tugged and pulled, crying, “Scat! Go! Scoot!” until the shifting mass of dirty sheep fur began to rumble with agitation, swaying from side to side, plunging and bleating. Lindsay and Bridget set aside their coffee cups, and, with an exchanged looked of resignation, waded into the sea of sheep. Following Cici’s lead, they each grabbed a sheep and began to tug and shout until suddenly one of the sheep broke free and sprang, as though on steel coils, up and over the railing. A mass riot followed. Bridget lost her balance and sat down hard on the floor, hands over her head, squealing incoherently. Lindsay yelped as she took a hard hit in the shin. Cici stumbled backward, gasping, as sheep began to jump over the railing, spindly black-stocking legs flailing, just like in a cartoon.

“Jesus!” exclaimed Lindsay, rubbing her shin as she limped inside the doorway. “I thought sheep were supposed to be peaceful!”

“They’re killers!” screeched Bridget, hands over head. “They’re killer sheep!”

Sheep continued to pour over the railing, splintering boards, leaping over each other, landing splay-legged on the lawn and trotting off,
baahing
hysterically, in sundry directions.

“Stupid critters,” acknowledged Sam, sagely.

Deke said, “What’re you going to do with them now?”

Cici looked in dismay at the ruined porch, and the shaggy muddy creatures who were now making ruin of their lawn. “The garden,” she managed.

“Oh my God, the garden!” Bridget struggled to her feet. “We’ve got to keep them out of the garden!”

“What you need is a dog,” volunteered Farley.

Lindsay caught Bridget’s hand and pulled her down the steps toward the garden. “Get the dog!” she cried.

For the next twenty minutes the women formed a human fence in front of the vegetable garden, shouting and flapping towels at the sheep who ventured too close while Sam and Deke, catching on to the urgency of the situation, eventually put down their coffee cups and stood ready to haul the particularly obstinate sheep to the back of the flock. By the time Farley roared up with a bedraggled, dirty, black-patched dog balancing in the back of his pickup truck, they were filthy, sweaty, and hoarse with shouting, and the sea of sheep was still surging.

Farley slammed the door of the truck and unlatched the back gate. He said, “Ya’ll better stand back.”

The three women looked at each other dubiously. Then they looked at the tomato plants, spilling over their cages with fat red and yellow fruit, the thick coils of bean vines splayed along long wires, the dark green corn stalks towering over their heads, bright yellow squash ready to be plucked. They said as one, “No!”

The word was barely spoken before the dog slunk out of the truck and, with belly close to the ground and eyes locked on the flock, he froze in place. In the blink of an eye he darted to the left, and the sheep shuffled and bunched. He flowed to the right, and the flock swayed. The women watched, almost as mesmerized as the sheep, as the dog crouched, head down and eyes fixed on the sheep. He took one step forward. And another. And suddenly all hell broke loose.

The flock charged. Hooves and muddy wool and divets of earth flew everywhere. Bridget screamed and ducked as a sheep flew over her head. Lindsay ended up sprawled on her back. Cici dove for cover between two rows of corn. She could hear Sam and Deke yelling their astonishment and cheering the dog on. And as suddenly as it had begun, it was over.

The ladies got slowly to their feet, brushing mud off their knees and rubbing bruises, looking cautiously around. The sheep were miraculously on the other side of the hedgerow, behind the fence, munching grass as though nothing had ever happened. The dog had retreated to the shadow of Farley’s truck, where he sat at attention, his gaze fixed upon the sheep. Sam returned from his examination of the hedgerow and pronounced, “Right here’s your problem. Hole in the fence.”

Farley said, “I’ll fix it for you. Ten dollar.”

Cici’s voice was filled with wonder. “How in the world did you train that dog to do that? You didn’t even give him a command.”

Farley just looked at her, expressionless. “Didn’t train ’im. He just knows.”

Bridget said, “Do sheep eat radishes? And tomato and cucumber plants?”

The three men just stared at her.

Lindsay said, rubbing a bruised hip, “Whose sheep are they, anyway?”

Farley replied, “Yourn.”

It was several beats before Cici could manage,
“What?”

And Bridget parrotted, “Ours?”

“Came with the farm,” confirmed Farley. “I been keeping an eye on ’em, over the winter you know. Put out some hay. Won’t charge you none. They ain’t much trouble. Need shearin’.”

“So that’s what that clause in the sales contract about ‘outbuildings and livestock’ meant,” mused Lindsay.

“Sheep?” Cici’s voice was close to a screech. “How in the world are we supposed to take care of sheep?”

“Sheep!” cried Bridget, delighted. “We have sheep!”

Farley said thoughtfully, “You can have the dog.”

Bridget whirled from her enraptured survey of the sheep in the meadow, her eyes growing even wider. “Are you serious? You’d really let us have that incredible dog?”

“Ten dollar,” said Farley.

“Oh good God,” said Lindsay, sotto voce, “she’s out of control.”

Cici said, “Bridget, I think we should talk about this.”

“You can’t have sheep without a sheepdog” was Bridget’s reply. And to Farley, “What’s his name?”

Farley thought about that for a moment. “Dog,” he decided.

Bridget blinked, but her smile didn’t waver. “Well, we’ll worry about a name later.” She approached the dog, hand extended. “Come here, you sweet thing. You want to live here? Are you going to be my sweet dog?”

Cici said, “Bridget, be careful.”

And Lindsay, “I wouldn’t—”

There was a ferocious sound, a blur of fur, and Bridget jumped back with a cry, cradling her bleeding hand.

Farley said, “He don’t much like people.”

Cici said, “I’ll get the first-aid kit.”

Lindsay rushed to Bridget, giving the dog wide berth. “Are you okay?”

Farley repeated firmly, “Ten dollar.”

And Bridget said, “I’ll get my purse.”

 

 

The good news was that the dog did not have rabies. The bad news was, at least as far as Cici and Lindsay were concerned, that he did not run away. Every morning the dog would spring over the fence as though his paws were filled with helium, herd the sheep into a tight little bunch and move them, with his spooky eyes and creeping gait, from one side of the meadow to the other. He would then retire to a place under the front porch, where the wary passerby might or might not be warned by a rumbling growl before he sprang from the shadows to rip at cuffs and sneakers. Shortly before sundown he would sally forth once again, sail over the fence, and repeat the exercise, moving the sheep to a part of the meadow that he had apparently predetermined after twelve long hours of precise mathematical calculations. It was, they all had to admit, amazing to watch.

On the other hand, no one had counted on sheep, much less a psychopathic sheepdog, when they signed on the dotted line.

“It’s a
farm
,” Bridget insisted joyfully, “and what’s a farm without livestock? This makes us real farmers!”

Lindsay said in a tone that brooked no argument, “Maybe it makes you a farmer. I’m an artist. I don’t do sheep.”

“Sheep,” repeated Cici with a small shake of her head, still not quite believing it. “How could that possibly have slipped by me?”

“Isn’t it like real property?” offered Bridget hopefully. “You know, attached to the premises?”

Cici returned a look that said,
Nice try
. Out loud she said, “Windows are attached to the premises. Rosebushes, maybe. But sheep? I think that’s pushing it.” At Bridget’s crestfallen look, she added, “For heaven’s sake, Bridge, we don’t know anything about sheep! We’re city girls, and this is a huge responsibility.”

“I saw a movie one time about a sheep station in Australia,” Lindsay added thoughtfully. “The sheep would swell up like ticks from bloat and the farmer would have to go around puncturing their stomachs with this huge needle to keep them from exploding.”

Bridget’s eyes went wide, and Cici stared at Lindsay.

“What I’m saying,” Cici said, when she could tear her eyes away from Lindsay, “is that sheep can be delicate, and a lot of work. Don’t we have our hands full just trying to put this house back together? Are you sure you want to take on more?”

Bridget raised her chin. “I’ll take care of them,” she promised. “And the dog, too. They’ll be my responsibility. You two will never even know they’re here.”

Lindsay looked at Cici. Cici looked at Bridget. “Sheep,” she said, shaking her head again.

And Lindsay repeated, her tone heavy with resignation, “Sheep.”

 

 

Bridget immediately checked out every book on sheep and sheepdogs the library had to offer, and over the next several days was rarely seen without a text in her hand. Occasionally she would glance up to offer such arcane wisdom as “April is the best month for lambing in this region” and “A good sheepdog can work a 2,500-acre ranch all by himself.” But for the most part she spent her time completely immersed in the written world of animal husbandry.

It was therefore no surprise for Cici to come into the kitchen for lunch and find Bridget sitting at the island, hair pulled back against the heat, reading glasses on, lost in a book. Fresh-picked tomatoes were scattered across the island around her, and something wonderful was simmering on the stove.