Before the foal was exhausted, Dandaloo walked into the centre of the ring to join him, as though she knew he was really tired, and she lay down there. When Choopa’s weird, strange legs folded beneath him, he collapsed beside her and was immediately asleep.
Even though he slept, the spell which his dance had woven within the circle of watching eyes stayed with him. From henceforth, the odd dwarf foal, the magic dancer, was, to all the young animals of the bush, a spellmaker — one who could tether you to a star with a glittering cobweb thread.
An unusual sort of pride throbbed through the bones and veins of the old mother, but she knew that the time had not come yet to take him into the herd.
The Enchanted Circle
Dandaloo, with Choopa knee-high beside her, stood on a hillside above a flat near the bend of the Limestone Creek. They were well hidden inside the forest, and could see a small herd of mares and foals with a young stallion.
Choopa watched intently.
He could see that there were two or three very young foals, perhaps not much older than himself, even though they were bigger. They were all playing together. He stared and wondered. Those foals never fell as they galloped and played. Perhaps their legs were straighter than his, or the knees less bumbly. They seemed to trot, canter and gallop to a music which he could barely hear.
He tried a few cantering steps, but his rhythm was different, kept breaking. Two young echidnas came hurtling along near him. This time when they stopped and tucked their heads under they began to dig, just there, on the spot, and disappeared underground quite rapidly.
A born mimic, Choopa tried again to copy them and tuck his head under, but this time he tried to dig, too — and fell over. Then he realised that the echidnas had dug with their hind feet. He tried this — and finished up almost turning a somersault. He picked himself up, shook the twigs and leaves out of his coat, then started dancing, because it had all been rather a joke.
His mother thought that his fall and his quick recovery had all looked as if his joints were unusually flexible. Something at the back of her mind had been worrying her for a while … she remembered a foal her mother had had, full brother to herself, who seemed to be crippled. He used to amble, like Choopa ambled. This brother had not survived his second winter. The memory sent a creeping shiver along her back, making the blue-roan hairs stand up. But Choopa had some gift which her brother had not had. Also, their mother had died in a severe, week-long blizzard, and she was not there to care for her young. Dandaloo would stand by Choopa forever … somehow. Again she felt that overpowering love for the dwarf with the rough blotches of white around the eyes. Those eyes were beginning to look out at his world with a sort of joy. Or perhaps he found everything funny!
He would have to grow bigger before she could take him to join their herd though. Day after day went by but he never seemed to grow like her other foals had grown. He romped, he reared and bucked and he could now follow her quite fast on those wide-swinging legs. But he still stumbled and sometimes fell. Even though he was still barely knee-high to his mother, he had become very strong.
Often other young animals joined in his games, dodging in among the dark black sallee trees, springing onto rocks, splashing in pools together. He soon learnt that they all enjoyed his dance, so he danced for them. He never fell when he was dancing, only when he was trying to gallop. He had also learnt that if he tucked his head under as he stumbled and fell, he could do a quarter roll and pick himself up in a second with no difficulty at all. This was something else. The kookaburras would laugh on a branch above as he did his crazy somersault.
Choopa enjoyed this feeling of strength and achievement. Other foals, whom he had watched from a distance, only occasionally took a fall during a mock fight. He realised that his ability to turn a bad fall into a perfect roll-over somersault was something unique to himself.
Since the herds of red and white cattle were no longer permitted to graze the Snowy Mountains in summertime the Park Rangers often stopped men coming in from the south hunting brumbies. But they still came, these men, perhaps several at a time, perhaps just one on his own with a lasso coiled and hanging from his saddle and riding a very fast horse. Anyone who came from the south, going towards Quambat Flat, passed over a shoulder of the rough and rocky Cobberas. Dandaloo knew the track that was used and she and Choopa were well to the west of it.
Summer was the time when the brumby hunters came. It was already summer and very hot — much too hot for as early in summer as this.
The strong scent of the eucalyptus leaves at evening, after the hot sun had beat on them all day, made Dandaloo feel restless. In truth there was a restlessness in all the animals. Only Choopa seemed calm. Yet one evening she saw him and all his young friends forming into their circle again, led by Choopa, dancing the spell-weaving pattern as if they were evoking something. Protection … safe passage …?
Dandaloo lay down nearby, and when the dance was over Choopa collapsed beside her. She cradled the blue, dwarf foal with her legs, and he fell asleep immediately, but she — she half sleeping, half waking — was invaded by fears. Her legs closed around her foal a little more firmly.
Men might come hunting. The Cobberas stallion might come, and he might think that the dwarf foal should not be allowed to live. All her muscles twitched as she dreamt of herself fighting for his life.
At last she slept deeply and when she woke the fears had altered to an urge to wander, or perhaps a profound need to find safe places.
When first light came the next day, she stirred Choopa to have a feed and then led him off through the forest in the general direction in which the Limestone Creek ran — not higher country, but somehow fulfilling her longing to wander.
In truth, Dandaloo was longing to go up higher into the mountains, but in this heat she knew that she should stay low, where the creeks flowed deeper and water was more easily found. Also it was no good dreaming that Choopa, her strong little lizard, could climb the high mountains yet. She had stopped expecting to find that he had grown suddenly in the dark of the night.
They kept moving along all day, Choopa often looking behind to see if any of his young companions were following. The possums had stayed in their trees, but, hopping through the messmates and the slim, white and towering ribbon gums, were the mysterious shadows of kangaroos and wallabies, seen one minute and invisible the next — those who had already left their mother’s pouches. Even an echidna came, trotting along rather slowly.
That night, before the stars showed bright in the sky, these young animals formed their ring around Choopa and Dandaloo. Each one was too tired to dance, but they were there, still within the spell which Choopa had created and in some way making sure that the spell was not broken.
Night fell and the sky was brilliantly lit by the stars. The circle of eyes was still visible around Choopa and Dandaloo when there came from high above them, sounding from the tallest of ribbon gums, ‘Quark! Quark! Quark!’, in quick, staccato barks, not the long drawn-out ‘Qua–a–rk’ of the bushy-tailed possum which they knew so well.
Dandaloo understood what it was, and knew to look up high in a ribbon gum. Choopa looked where his mother was looking, and he saw, far up on the white trunk, just visible against the star-bright sky, a black shape. There came another series of sharp barks, and the black shape took off, spread what seemed like big black wings and went gliding through the darkness on a long, long glide to the almost invisible forest floor.
Choopa sprang up, but his mother did not bother. She had seen a giant glider appear to fly down off a ribbon gum before, and had never caught up with one. By the time she had reached the place it had landed, it had climbed up the next tree. But Choopa found the place this one had touched down — found it empty, of course — but he did a twirling, whirling dance and knew the giant glider was watching him; for there it was, high up near the branches of another ribbon gum. And there it clung and watched, while a spell was woven below, by a little dancing dwarf.
/> When the giant glider took off again, it was full of tales to tell to anyone it met in its aerial journeying through forest and sky.
Choopa went back to Dandaloo, unaware that word of the dancing dwarf foal would be spread by all the animals of the night. Eventually tales would reach Quambat Flat. Though Quambat Flat filled a lot of Dandaloo’s thoughts and wishes, because one day soon she would have to take Choopa there, Choopa had no picture in his mind of the grassy flat below the Cobberas mountains, where some of his half-brothers and half-sisters played.
Mother and foal, they slowly wandered their way along to where the Limestone was joined by the creek that flowed down from Quambat Flat. An uncertain feeling stopped her leading Choopa up on to the grassy flat where her herd grazed. Perhaps she should still wait till Choopa had grown a little bigger … but because she really had been lonely, she kept edging through the forest that was all around Quambat Flat.
Each day had been getting hotter and hotter, too hot for early summer, but even so, Dandaloo was surprised to find that the herd tended to be sheltering in the edge of the forest. She did wonder if there had been some other danger, as she led Choopa a little further into the trees. As usual his little band of young kangaroos and wallabies were close by, following him, invisible in the bush, but coming for a game whenever the mare and foal stopped to rest.
Then quite suddenly they were not there — not moving invisibly through the bitter pea bushes, not appearing from the blanketwood thickets to romp with Choopa. It was queer that Choopa realised almost sooner than Dandaloo that there was danger coming, feeling it close by, but with no idea what it was.
Dandaloo stood still, one leg raised, listening. There seemed to be no unusual sound. Then she heard faint, stealthy movements. They ceased: everything was eerily silent, then they started again — animals creeping … escaping? But from what?
Men hunting brumbies usually made some sound, usually had barking dogs. Dandaloo didn’t even imagine brumby hunters … suddenly, before Dandaloo even knew he was anywhere near, there was a man riding along silently.
Choopa had not seen him but understood there was danger as Dandaloo pushed him into a big mass of digger’s speedwell, in amongst the flowers as blue as the sky. She herself walked away, feigning a limp. She was too old to interest any brumby hunter, and Choopa was too small. A dog might hurt him, but there was no dog, only a man with a gentle voice saying:
‘Don’t worry old girl. I know you’ve got a foal planted somewhere, and you’re pretending you’re lame, like a mother duck,’ and he rode away, lasso in his hand.
Choopa watched the man through a curtain of sky-blue flowers and, because Dandaloo had put him there, there he stayed. After a while, some of the herd galloped out on to the part of the flat that was in his line of vision. The man on his horse came within sight, too, and the man was edging a fine-looking colt out of the small mob. He did not seem to be trying to catch any other, just that one handsome colt.
Choopa was not close enough to see the rope fly through the air, but he could see that something seemed to bring the man and his horse closer and closer to the colt. Then all three were out of his sight, but Choopa had a cold feeling down his back, making his hair stand up with fear. He pressed himself further into the digger’s speedwell, and it closed around him, as though he were part of it.
Presently Dandaloo came back, blew a soft greeting through trembling nostrils, and lay down beside the bushes.
It was dark when the little kangaroos and wallabies appeared. Choopa scrambled his way out of his hiding place, blue flowers, pale in the half light, clinging to his shaggy tufts of forelock and mane.
Because he was very pleased to see them, Choopa did a dance in the only clear space, but Dandaloo wanted water and she led them all off to a spring at the head of a little creek, where snowgrass encircled the bubbling water. As the old mare drank, her dwarf foal danced and the other young animals sat around — all of them calling on something that travelled on the eucalypt-scented south wind, calling for some strength and wonder that they knew was just beyond reach, yet there, close to them, and woven into the spell of the dance.
Darkness fell and this time they all slept just where they sat, enfolded in a pattern of some mystery.
Stars began to glitter above Quambat Flat and over the restless herd that had lost one young colt. Choopa had learnt that the pattern of a dance could make a spell to combat danger, but yet, when he woke at midnight, his skin was creeping with an unknown fear.
Her Foal Just Did Not Grow
A brumby hunter was yet another reason for not going back to the herd, but Dandaloo was longing for the feeling of being with the other mares, and the two year olds, the yearlings, and the foals — perhaps it was the feeling of being protected by numbers, and by Son of Storm if he was there. She had felt a sudden happiness when she had reached Quambat Flat.
If only that man had not come and lassoed the colt. So she kept Choopa in the forest country, occasionally in sight of the herd and Choopa and the little kangaroos and wallabies romped. Often they were joined by echidnas and wombats, and soon a family of dingoes came along too.
Choopa simply did not grow. All the other young animals grew and the kangaroos, in particular, began to be higher than his withers, but Choopa was getting very strong. Sometimes he found that he could do a new trick when dancing with his young mates. He might jump about on his hind legs, bow down and then leap up. Then, he would spring in the air and twirl around, and it would seem as if he were hearing music.
Dandaloo watched and enjoyed it all, but she was beginning to long more and more for the company of the herd … and yet Choopa did not grow. Perhaps all his wonderful tricks would do instead of size … but the very thought of a bigger horse kicking at him, biting, or throwing him, increased her whole aching love for him.
The kangaroos and wallabies were getting taller, larger — and the collection of young animals that was always close by seemed to multiply, too, for, wherever Dandaloo went seeking fresh grass and cool, clear water, young animals were woven into Choopa’s spell-like dance; woven into the dream. Always, as night crept through the bush, all the animals gathered together, and starlight shone in the ring of shining eyes. As the moon rose and Choopa got up from his sleep to dance again, the weaving of his dancing legs — through dark and light, dark and light — seemed to repeat the spell, so that even a mopoke in a branch above watched and wondered.
So they stayed in the forest country, finding fresh green grass near the deep pools that still existed in creeks in spite of the very hot, dry summer. Wherever they went, other little animals would come to the enchanted circle for a night or so, some of them joining in Choopa’s ritual pattern.
The watchers often stayed for hours, even while the dancer and Dandaloo slept within the circle.
It was the third or fourth full moon since Choopa’s birth and he had barely grown at all, but he was well muscled, and very strong. Dandaloo had almost ceased to notice that he was so small. But every time her longing for company drove her to move closer to the herd, she would feel a sudden twinge of fear for what might happen to Choopa, and also what might happen to his tribe of little friends, if she did introduce him to the herd.
She was pulled two ways — the natural wish for company on one side, and the fear of what the herd might do to her unnaturally small foal with his oddly flying legs on the other. But she often edged a little closer to the clear country of Quambat Flat, and the herd’s grazing ground.
It was from Limestone Creek at the lower end of the flat that the next lot of brumby hunters came. Dandaloo heard the sound of horses moving carelessly through the bush, long before the other animals did.
A wind had been blowing all day, making her nervous, so that she listened more intently than ever. She saw Choopa asleep under a black sallee. He seemed so very small and vulnerable, and for a moment she became one vast wish for the strength to protect him. The intensity of her feeling was conveyed to him by some current,
so that he was charged with the power of it. He got up to rub against her, but just as their heads touched he saw — like a shadow in among the shadows of tree trunks — a tall horse and its long-legged rider. They were gone almost before he had seen them.
Dandaloo’s hair was tingling. She knew that the horse and man had been there, behind three huge candlebarks.
Choopa and Dandaloo, noses just touching, were as though frozen — still as granite rocks, still as the ice that would come in winter. There were only the faintest sounds, now, and the sounds seemed to be getting further away.
Dandaloo did not think that the man on the tall horse had seen them, but somehow they still could not move.
They waited and listened: the sounds seemed to be moving in the direction of Quambat Flat — slight movement among low branches, of hanging fronds of stringy barks, leaves and buds, brushed by some passing body … There were stealthy footfalls.
Even little wrens were hopping furtively. A small ground dove emerged from under a fallen branch and vanished into a thicket, but no birds sang. The bush was silent. Then softly, softly, there were more sounds, and Dandaloo and Choopa both realised that the two of them were in a direct line between these new sounds and the sounds that were going towards the flat. Then there did come a bush warning. A thrush chattered angrily — its ‘keep away, you’ve no business here’ sound.
The stealthy, creeping sounds were slowly getting closer. Choopa’s hair was rising. He was cold, and then he was hot. Sweat broke behind his ears. Dandaloo saw fear in Choopa’s eyes and she wondered, desperately, where they could go. Perhaps they could creep silently out towards the Quambat Ridge.