Then, as they stood among the sleeping mares and foals, through the quiet night there came the heavy wingbeat and occasional honking call of black swans rising out of the Moyangul River, flying from the deep valley over the ranges to the Indi River, whose waters would be calmer now that the main flood had gone.
Coolawyn looked up at the sky. There they were, long necks stretched out, long necks and heavy bodies floating between her and the moon. Their call came again, and from the hillside nearby, a dingo howled eerily in answer.
Who would know the truth of some of the weird legends that were weaving through the bush? Those swans who had taken off with heavy wingbeat, thrashing the river, their red feet running on the surface of the water, or wide-travelling dingo? Coolawyn looked at Burra where he lay, not even stirring as the swans flew over in the night. He was exhausted, so he must have gone far and fast in that mysterious valley of the pines. Perhaps all he had seen or heard — or had not seen — had exhausted him.
From some waterhole, far off down the ridge, the harsh cry of a bittern came. This time Burra stirred and Coolawyn saw him put up his head to listen. There was nothing except the usual repeated noise of crickets. Dawn would come. The moon would become a white disc in the west, and mysteries would fade away.
Burra had had enough of the Moyangul River valley and its dark pines. He would take his herd back to the Ingegoodbee, or further to where the rivers flowed to the west, and there might be no more sounds of galloping hooves in the night. But from where had they come, and where would they go?
Were there two herds of horses of the night? Did some live in among the dark pines of the Moyangul, and the others lower down on those west-flowing rivers? Was that really a red eye which Burra had seen through the bushes, or was it a star? Surely, way, way down the Indi was the night gallopers’ bimble?
The following evening, the herd was happily grazing, spread out along the gentle Ingegoodbee. The grass was sweet, the candlebarks and snow gums created their own well-known landscape, magpies and currawongs called, even the wild cries of the black cockatoos who flew towards the west did not seem to give any warning.
The foals were chasing each other through the trees, Yarra waiting till the last oblique rays of the sun had gone. None of the foals noticed that he did not stumble over fallen branches once the bright light had gone, and that he went fast then, and with confidence. Yarra felt happy. For the first time he was going faster than the others. In fact, in the half-light, one of them fell over a log.
There was a half-sister of Coolawyn’s — much younger — grazing far out on her own. Yarra started to go towards her through the dim light. Night seemed to rise from the ground and slide out of the trees. He went under a spreading snow gum, still watching her through the leathery leaves.
Even when he saw the shapes of three horses creeping round her he was not worried. Then he saw them close in. They were urging her away from the herd. He realised that they were strangers, but there was nothing menacing about them until she tried to turn back to join her usual mates.
Yarra gave a snort of wild fear and raced away, back to Coolawyn. Coolawyn was safety and warmth, and love. What if strangers tried to steal her?
No other foal or mare seemed to have noticed anything, until the scent of strange horses drifted on the night breeze. Burra picked up the trace of unusual scent first. He gave an angry squeal, and followed the scent for quite a distance, picking up that of the two-year-old filly too.
Coolawyn had walked up close to him. She saw the sweat break out behind his ears. He turned to touch her with his nose, giving her his trust and affection, and to make sure she was really there. The filly’s scent was rather similar to Coolawyn’s, but he knew that Coolawyn would be difficult to steal, having a much stronger nature than her half-sister. He had recognised that strength when she was only a foal with her mother — a mare whom he, himself, had stolen.
Burra went trotting on, following the strange scent and that of the filly, and Coolawyn and Yarra followed him, going through the dense shadow of trees in the darkness. Coolawyn stopped when Yarra seemed to tire, and when it was obvious from the tracks that the horses ahead had begun to go faster, driving the filly in front of them.
Burra quickened his pace, too, but as the darkness became denser, he found it difficult to keep going so fast.
Coolawyn waited. She had known that Brinda, her half-sister, would go to another herd sometime, but it was as though these horses had been sent to capture someone — an unusual sort of theft fulfilling the old legend that those horses who galloped by night always took a filly, or mare, away with them.
There were ducks flying across in the night sky, and she saw them drop low, as though they were watching something. Coolawyn wondered what Burra would do. After all, Brinda was his daughter and she had not wanted to go.
By this time, other mares and foals had joined Coolawyn. Burra had been missed, and the touch of unreality that had beset them in the area of the Moyangul Valley returned so strongly that it was like a whisper going through the mob … ‘They’ve come. They’ve taken one of us.’
Coolawyn shivered. She had a strong feeling that it was really herself whom the three horses had been sent to capture. Her mind went racing, swirling with a mixture of something that was half memory and wild excitement; something which seemed to mix in her mind with the roar of flood and wind.
Burra did not return till morning, his legs all bruised and bleeding where he had hit logs and branches as he followed those horses through the dark night.
He returned alone.
Coolawyn made sure that she stayed near him, in the centre of the herd.
A Whirlwind of Rage
Fillies always left their sire’s herds, went off in groups of young ones, or were taken by a young stallion. This had been different, and not only Coolawyn thought the young horses had been told to get Coolawyn herself. Burra, too, was afraid that the big, white stallion meant to steal her away.
Burra took his herd along the old cattle track from the head of the Ingegoodbee, through Pack Saddle Gap, then along above the immensely tall alpine ash that grew high over the fall into the Indi River. From there he took them further north into the valley of the Cascades.
The Cascades is a wide open valley, an unlikely place for marauders to come, unless Brinda followed Burra’s herd and her captors followed her. At least, for a day or so, Burra and his herd could graze there and watch to see if any other horses came.
Every rise, every hollow, every small creek had its own history. Sometimes there seemed to be a great silver stallion high up on one of the surrounding hilltops. Sometimes, a big, fierce, grey stallion was a furious ghost trumpeting anger, for there had been that silver horse who defeated that grey to become king. Coolawyn was enfolded in stories, stories of the Snowy Mountains and of the strong and wonderful brumbies — so strong that they and their actions lived on in the place for ever, this place where they had lived and loved.
Coolawyn woke one night seeing a silver foal in front of her. At first she thought it must be Yarra, but Yarra was sleeping by her side, and the dream — if it were a dream — faded and she was left in the mist of ancient tales that clung for ever to the Cascade valley.
There was one story — or ballad — that the Cascade Creek rarely sang, for it was a ballad of hoofbeats made by horses who did not belong there. Coolawyn and Burra, grazing day after day in the lovely spring sunshine, could almost forget the fear that the flood had brought.
Brinda did not come looking for her own herd, but who would know if she had gone happily or in fear? When Coolawyn wondered about her, she felt deeply that those horses who galloped in the dark really did exist and had mistakenly taken her half-sister. Who was that half-dreamt white horse in the secret hollow? Then it was a cold fear that Coolawyn felt, as though a thick frost descended over her back. Maybe they would still come for her — surely they would if they had taken Brinda by mistake. She felt cold as if it were mid-winter … frost thic
k on her back … Why was she thinking of that magic hollow where she and Yarra had rested after escaping from the flood, where the wings of the black-shouldered kite had wafted the scent of spring all around her? Why was there something unexplained about that hollow … about Yarra’s strange behaviour at the little, still pool?
They grazed peacefully in the Cascades. Burra was not really bothered about losing Brinda. There had not been a young stallion for her to go with, or she would have gone earlier. He was much more worried about the safety of his herd, particularly Coolawyn. The wild, night gallopers must have, undoubtedly, been the ones who took Brinda. Was that not the tale told, the tale whispered in the wind? All he could do was keep a watch over Coolawyn and all his mares. Why had he felt uneasy about that white foal, Yarra, ever since she appeared with him? He was so strangely the odd one in his herd. Anyway, here, in the Cascade Valley, he would see any unknown horses — unless they crept in by night.
It was in the dark of the moon that something happened. Yarra knew it was going to happen. The robin redbreast, who had lived for years nearby the empty slab-and-shingle cattlemen’s hut, knew also, and sounded a warning.
The frail songs of robins had been heard from Baringa’s Canyon, near to the Tin Mine falls, and were carried on by other robins, through the snow gums that overlooked the silent pools where the Ingegoodbee headed. Frail robin songs took up the word in every tea tree-filled creek above the Indi River — and these almost inaudible robin songs sounded all night long.
Yarra knew without being told that he was, once more, going to see that other white foal, and knew he was the one for whom he had been searching ever since the flood.
Yarra had become more and more adventurous since they had gone down into that pine-filled valley — and climbed safely out of it.
Coolawyn did not worry at first when, one night, he walked off towards the black sallee tree, near the empty hut. This was the robin’s tree, from where the robin usually sang. Coolawyn did realise that, on this night, there was something urgent in the robin’s song. She, too, began to move in the direction of the black sallee tree.
Yarra stood intently watching the snow gums up the slope behind the hut. He was waiting for something that he seemed simply to know was going to happen. Then, out of the trees stepped that other foal, just a blur of white, as Yarra himself was a blur of white in the darkness. The other foal stood there like a statue, too, but both foals had more confidence now. After a few moments had passed, they began to walk slowly towards each other, two white wisps of mist.
This time neither Coolawyn nor the shadow mare in the snow gums made a sound to bring the foals back.
Here was that which had to happen.
The frost was laying cold fingers on Coolawyn’s back again, because somehow she knew that these foals had some connection with those horses who galloped by night. She could not force her legs to move. She simply stood, shaking all over as she saw the two foals get closer, then close enough to let their noses move gently together, then over each other’s faces.
Even in the dark, Coolawyn could see, or half-imagine their absolute sameness. Surely their scent must be different. Yarra must have her scent, at least while he still drank her milk? She remembered her milk spurting all over his face as she had pushed him — wet from the floodwater — to suck and be warmed. It was true from that moment that she would know this foal, whom the flood had given her, for ever and for ever.
She began to move slowly towards the foals, and the other mare came out of the snow gums and walked towards them, too.
Winter’s frost seemed to coat Coolawyn all over. Nothing must take Yarra from her: nothing.
The strange mare looked back at the thick and twisted snow gums. Coolawyn was sure that she was listening to something moving in the trees. All of a sudden, and for the second time in several days, Coolawyn felt panic.
It was too dark to see who, or what, was coming through the snow gums behind the strange mare. Coolawyn called Yarra, commanding urgently. The other mare called her foal, and the desperation in her call seemed to strike a chord of memory within Yarra, because he stopped, and looked back.
Coolawyn called again to make Yarra understand that, without doubt, she meant him to come. She had intended to take him back to the herd, now, but there, on the fringe of snow gums, she caught a glimpse of movement and the scent of those three who had stolen Brinda.
If she turned to gallop away, they would catch her, and catch Yarra, too. She suddenly felt herself shaken with fury, and she felt the same strength that possessed her when she pulled Yarra back from the flood.
She turned and took Yarra back far enough for him to learn that he had to stay where she put him, then she galloped madly at the three shapes emerging from the trees and which were quite nebulous in the faint light of the night. If they were the ones who had taken Brinda, they were three large, young horses. She became a whirlwind of rage. There was less than even faint starlight now, but she could see the three colts galloping out to meet her.
Coolawyn had no time to be thankful that they had come out into the open, that they had left the protective tangle of snow-gum boughs and trunks, the trees that would have been disastrously difficult for her. Yet, there she was, fighting in the open, determined that neither she nor Yarra would be caught, and hoping that her screams of rage would bring Burra.
She dashed at these robber horses, kicked and bit, dodged and struck, and kept up a constant screaming. Coolawyn had never fought before, but she knew instinctively how to cause fear in these big, immature colts. She must be quick, nimble and desperately ferocious — a ferocious quicksilver being.
Even to eyes that could see well in darkness, she was just a smudge of grey, here and then gone, dealing out sharp bites and very strong kicks.
When the colts had got over their first shock at her wild attack, they began to try to drive her into the snow gums. Coolawyn felt herself going quite mad with fury, leaping at them, mouth open, screaming, teeth bared, ears back, and screaming. She had to be crazy: she had to frighten them right away, so that their memory of abject fear would go with them, back to their own herd. These night gallopers must learn that they could not come again.
She spun round and round, never staying still, never being in the same place twice. Somehow she had realised that the colts seemed to be able to see her more than she could see them. She strained her eyes even harder. She saw a colt’s head, clearly, and struck at it, felt her hoof making solid contact, but she herself was pushed off-balance by another of the colts …
Their scent rose strongly around her.
At last she heard Burra thundering towards them. A neigh from some distance off apparently called the young horses, and suddenly they were leaving. A call hung in the air, and only a faint scent remained.
Coolawyn stood poised to leap, but there was only emptiness at which to leap. The young horses had gone.
Burra followed them, nose to ground. Another neigh sounded in the darkness. Coolawyn stood gazing into the night. A flash of lightning momentarily lit the sky, and thunder rolled some distance away. Then a scent came on the breeze, and a memory …
Coolawyn found Yarra standing beside her. Together they walked to the robin’s tree, and stood under its thick branches, for rain might come, and part of that memory was rain, and flood, and alpine ash.
White Statue Horses in the Bush
Yarra stood dreaming.
Thunder rolled, far away, over in the direction in which those colts had gone. Then sheet lightning lit up a vast arc of sky, and threw a white light over miles of bushland.
Yarra was dreaming the sort of dreams that an older horse who had experienced many seasons would dream; dreams containing a mixture of memories and longing for something which he did not understand.
Out of the depth of his mind came pictures which made him begin to move restlessly. Coolawyn watched him, knowing he was in some other place. Half-sleeping, he cried out as lightning illuminated the bush. There was
an answering cry — a foal’s cry — and Yarra became fully awake and threw up his head.
Real, or unreal: there were the mare and the white foal, who could be Yarra, standing among some snow gums, not very far away, having remained, half-afraid, hidden in thick scrub. The snow gums that surrounded them should block them from view, yet both Coolawyn and Yarra saw them. Some strong magnetism drew Yarra. He began moving very slowly, towards that insubstantial dream, and Coolawyn went too — one leg after another, barely moving.
The sheet lightning had faded. They picked their way carefully through twisted snow-gum trunks and a puzzle of fallen logs, until they found themselves on the old cattle track. Thunder rumbled ahead. Lightning constantly lit up the half-overgrown track. They saw an illusive white mare and the faint shape of a foal, standing still as statues, in the lightning, and then walking on, barely visible in the dark. They seemed to be able to thread their way through clumps of dark wattle, or over and around fallen logs, with complete certainty.
Coolawyn and Yarra followed. It was as though something impelled them to go forward. Coolawyn knew that they were being called, though there was no sound. She stumbled occasionally over a rock which she had not seen in the dark, or a rotten log …
The track had turned down. They just went on and on, steeply downwards, lower and lower, going down through the night. The track had been made by thousands of hooves of cattle as they were driven up or down, to and from the high country. The lower they got, the louder and closer became the sound of falling water.
Yarra obviously heard it and was afraid, but he went on, still looking ahead for the occasional glimpse of the wraith-like white foal.
Coolawyn knew that there was an unusual excitement about Yarra. Might he be nearing the discovery of whatever it was that he had sought so desperately from the time she had struggled to pull him out of the raging river. His most agonised searching had been the time when he went to drink at the little, still pool in the secret hollow. Only his own face had looked back at him out of that pool.