The pup was splashing about with Miss Dingo and Socks did not want to move yet, but suddenly the wind swung due north and another fire sprang up where a spark had lit the bush. With the wind veering in all directions, nowhere seemed very safe.
Socks, inexperienced in fire, looked around him, worried. It was a long way to the hollow tree by the Ingegoodbee. A long way, even to the pools. Somehow they had to go. The tall trees on the way could be ablaze — but they weren’t.
Socks led his little family over the top of the Cascade Spur and down through swirling, masking scrub, but no flames. Lightning kept the dingoes together, and Socks carried the youngest pup.
At the first creek they came to, under arched tea tree, they rested and drank. The dingoes soaked their coats, and Socks let his aching teeth relax. As they stood in the icy water, the pup played around his legs, and Miss Dingo lay beside him. Lightning lay beside him, too, determined to be as close to Socks as possible. Lightning was uneasy, and glad when they moved on. Thunderclouds were building up, so everything was making Lightning uneasy.
There were a couple more creeks to cross before they got into an open valley that led up to the divide above the pools of the Ingegoodbee. They were getting closer to home, but smoke was coming from near the Ingegoodbee pools.
Miss Dingo kept sniffing the air, getting more and more upset. Once, when Socks put her pup down, she sat beside it and howled. Lightning carried it for a little way, but could not take it far, so he put it down in front of Socks and looked at his old friend with pleading eyes.
Socks rubbed his head on the dear old dog and picked up the pup. Not much farther to go to the divide above the pools, but fire was licking up through the scrub. Socks tightened his grip on the pup and charged through the crackling scrub and the flames. Miss Dingo and Lightning were beside him, and the older pups close behind.
There were the pools and green grass below. Socks burst into a gallop through the little patches of fire and plunged into the water, dunking the pup, splashing Lightning and Miss Dingo.
The other dingo pups hurled themselves into the pools, and Miss Dingo rushed to each one, licking it. Socks felt sudden pride and relief as he saw them all.
They stayed in the Ingegoodbee Pools for a long time, watching the distant hills lighting up on the horizon. Then Socks slowly began to make his way down the river to find their hollow tree. His family followed. It was quite a long way to go, but he took no shortcuts, feeling that they were safest in water. At any moment the bush near the river might burst into flames. Little spot fires started and went out, but if a wind got up again, the spot fires would join together and become a vicious blaze to singe coats and blister dingoes’ paws.
So Socks kept walking in the water. At last he could see the shape of the hollow tree silhouetted against the red bushfire sky. He climbed up the bank. Miss Dingo raced ahead and looked into the hollow and came back wagging her tail. Socks followed her in and put the pup down proudly at her feet.
Miss Dingo stood up and licked his nose, and then Lightning was there too, licking him and petting his face. The other pups came in, limping with sore feet but glad to be home. A clap of distant thunder sounded, and lightning lit the distant sky. They were not far from the river if any fires were started here. Socks felt safe enough to sleep lightly — also he felt confident that Lightning would wake if anything went wrong.
So they curled up together half-sleeping, half-waking, and around them the fires in the hills began to die down as rain fell.
Nine
Legends build up in the mountains. The fires hunted the stockmen out of the ranges, and the fires fuelled the stories. Socks and Lightning had already been a legend before those fires, but now they were the ghosts that haunted the Cascades: this black brumby with four white socks carrying a dingo pup to the safety of water by the scruff of its neck.
The summer visitors at Thredbo heard the tales, and at Perisher, the red stallion who led lost skiers back through a blizzard became the kind black horse with four white socks, with his family of dingoes and the faithful kelpie.
But Socks never went near Thredbo or Perisher. He did cross the Crackenback higher up when the fires had all died away, and he led the family on through the bush till they reached Son of Storm’s secret valley. They crept through the horizontal grevillea that hid the entrance. There, beyond the grevillea, was Son of Storm, as though he were expecting them, waiting with a very friendly greeting.
He seemed to know that they intended to go on through to Thowra’s Secret Valley and just went on with them, as though it were a matter of course, but left them at the start of the steep, rocky track around the cliff.
Lightning led the way — surefooted, and with claws that clung to the slippery track. There, too, was Thowra, waiting for them, expecting them.
Lightning pressed against Socks’ foreleg and gave a bark of joy.
They had been expected, for there were four freshly-caught rabbits waiting in their cave. The hollow candlebark on the Ingegoodbee was home indeed, but here was also a safe home, and a loving welcome, as though they belonged to a larger family; the mountain streams and the mountain winds were all singing of the Silver Brumby becoming part of a snowfall, a whirling, circling whirlwind, and tales of a black brumby with white socks saving a dingo pup from drowning and then from fire. No one had ever heard such a thing. Lots of people in Jindabyne did not believe it.
Socks, standing close to Lightning as he ate some rabbit, could feel an electric current through his hair, and knew that there must be a storm coming. He saw Thowra look up at the sky once or twice, and in fact there were the first few clouds building up in the north, but there was no rain, no thunder, no lightning for several hours.
The only other sign of an electric storm coming was that, in spite of a good meal of rabbit, Lightning did not settle down to sleep, but kept getting up and disturbing them all.
Then the rain started, and sheet lightning lit the sky.
Socks got hold of Lightning’s ear and pulled him down to sleep. After a few claps of thunder that echoed round and round the cave, the family curled up and slowly slept.
Socks woke hours later as the whole valley was lit up and there, as though the scene were being re-enacted, stood Thowra and Boon Boon, silhouetted at the mouth of the cave. Both Thowra and Boon Boon bowed their heads to Socks and he slept then, in safety, with Lightning and Miss Dingo and her pups.
The rain kept on pouring down and thunder kept on rumbling and crashing. Lightning woke, disturbed, and both Thowra and Son of Storm came to the cave to check on the family, Son of Storm having made a rather perilous journey round the cliff in the streaming rain.
It was dawn when he arrived, and there was still no let up in the weather, except that the lightning had ceased. There was a rumour murmuring through the bush that there were bands of brumby hunters coming, in spite of, or because of, the rough weather. Baringa had come north-west, from his secret valley, with the news of various groups of riders coming over from Benambra. Some of them he had recognised from times before. One in particular was a noted brumby catcher, a man who boasted he would catch his thousandth brumby this summer. He had a dog who was a half-brother to Lightning — not that anyone but he knew this. The brumby catcher had heard the stories of the kelpie dog with a touch of blue heeler, and hoped his dog might track him.
That man rode on his own and was feared by any brumbies who had seen him in action. It was that man, on his own, of whom the currawongs were calling with their high, wild calls that were usually not to be heard during such a storm.
Son of Storm heard them and took heed, and came round the cliff to tell Thowra. Thowra had already heard from Benni, the kangaroo, and he warned Socks and Lightning to stay at the back of the cave. He himself, in the shape of a white hawk, went flying over the lone rider, frightening his horse, making him shy away from the cliff that bordered his Secret Valley.
Suddenly Socks and Lightning heard a bronze cuckoo calling, rather out of
season, especially for them. A warning? Perhaps simply saying, ‘stay here’, as he had at their Ingegoodbee home, and at the cave above Cascades Creek.
The bronze cuckoo call always disturbed Lightning. It seemed as if his old master were whistling to him, but he knew, now, that his old master would never call again, and somehow Socks had taken his place. Socks did not whistle; he just tugged him by the ear. Socks was the beloved protector — the one who carried a puppy away from fire. Socks was his master now.
Both Socks and Lightning were wondering if this general feeling of unrest in the mountain forest and streams was explained by the presence of the lone hunter.
Far away, a dog barked. Socks listened, and looked at Lightning, and Lightning was really there, but that had sounded like his bark. Further away, it sounded again, and suddenly the white hawk flew over and then vanished. Socks and Lightning both got up ready to go — they must go and find the dog with a bark like Lightning. Socks knew there was no way out of Thowra’s Secret Valley except through Son of Storm’s hidden valley, so that was the way they went.
Suddenly the white hawk appeared again and then was gone.
They could not know that Thowra, in his guise of a white hawk, was scaring the wits out of the thousandth brumby man’s horse, and that for the first time ever that extremely good horseman was going to find his horse uncontrollable, terrified by white wings flapping across his eyes.
So Socks and Lightning arrived in time to see the man they knew as a wonderful horseman fighting to stop his bolting horse, but they did not see the dog, nor would Lightning have recognised a half-brother. To Lightning, a bolting horse just needed one thing — a jolly good nip to encourage it, and a snarling nip at that.
He did not reckon on the other dog, who suddenly rushed out of the prosanthera scrub and took to Lightning, so there was a growling, snarling mass of dog making the horse even more frightened, as did the man’s voice cursing the dog.
Then Socks charged in to kick and bite and strike, so the melee was fearsome. The noise was also fearsome, and then when the flapping wings of the white hawk vanished and a ghostly silver stallion appeared instead, the man gave a yell as he got his lasso ready.
‘I’ll have you, you bugger!’ but somehow Thowra vanished and was not going to be the thousandth! The man called his dog off, and himself vanished into a beating rainstorm, and some sheet lightning.
Ten
The stories related in the Jindabyne pub had become so many times told and retold (losing nothing in the telling), that both walkers and horsemen came into the mountains in greater numbers. They were all hoping to see for themselves the ghost of the Silver Brumby, or the black brumby with four white socks. No one really knew whether the silver horse or the black one was a ghost or not, the stories varied so much.
Stories of the silver ghost had been about for years; stories of his sons and grandsons had been told round campfires ever since the men who had chased the Silver Brumby swore that he jumped to his death. Now the men who were at the Cascades hut during the bushfire swore that they had seen this other ghost — the black brumby with four white socks carrying the dingo pup in his teeth, a ghost for sure. There one minute and vanished the next.
Lightning was very interested, very curious, about the dog whom he did not realise was so like himself, and whose bark was so similar.
Thowra was curious, too, though in fact he knew the dog’s owner — the cleverest of brumby catchers — by sight, and by his horse’s hoof marks. In fact, Thowra was anxious that the ‘thousandth-brumby hunter’ man should not know where his secret valley was. He realised that the thousandth-brumby hunter, lone worker as he was, did have a dog related to Lightning.
It was Socks who thought that his beloved Lightning might be a danger to Thowra, and Socks who led his family back to the Ingegoodbee.
On the way south they came on tracks that showed them the way in which the men from Gippsland came into the Snowy Mountains.
And there, on the track, riding away from them, was the thousandth-brumby hunter.
Socks bent down quickly, tugged Lightning by his ear, and melted backwards into the trees and bushes, followed silently by Miss Dingo and her pups. If the brumby catcher’s dog was with him, he must get neither scent nor sound of them.
There was no bark. Socks and his party had not been seen nor smelt. They were behind that one man and his dog, and what wind there was blew from the south, bringing scent and sound back to Socks — and to Lightning.
Lightning barked.
Socks could peer through the bush, and he saw the man rein in his horse, turn in the saddle and stare around, but mainly towards where Socks and the family were hidden.
They stayed very quiet, but soon staying so still was more than Lightning could bear, and, just when the man’s horse started to canter, he gave a low ‘keep away’ growl.
The man on ahead looked back and swung his horse around, his right hand grasping at the coils of his lasso. As he caught sight of Socks and his family, he pushed his horse into a gallop.
Socks melted backwards into the bush, but Lightning — recognising the man’s horse as the one whom the white hawk’s flapping wings had scared — knew he was the sort of horse who could be frightened.
Lightning would do his best to frighten the wits out of him. He raced in to nip its heels, then danced in front of him, nipped and danced, and all the time barked and growled.
Socks then raced in, teeth bared and giving great stallion screams. Panic was setting in. Just then the dingoes joined in, howling weirdly.
Galloping over one of the clear Beloka hills came another man to join in the scrum. Miss Dingo began to howl. The man uncoiled his lasso, just as the dingo pup raced towards the man’s horse.
‘We’ll have a pup if no other, and the family might come back for him,’ the man yelled as he cast his lasso.
It flew through the air and over the dingo’s head.
Socks heard him cry and then seem to choke as the rope tightened round his throat. Sudden fury seized Socks as he heard Miss Dingo howling as she had howled for his help once before, when the pup was drowning, but he was already galloping. The man’s voice rang out, ‘Don’t want to throttle him,’ and he sprang off his horse to loosen the lasso.
Another yell! The pup, no longer choking, had bitten the man’s hand. There was another man there, throwing his shirt over the dingo’s head.
Then Socks was there, striking and biting between open-mouthed screams.
The man was back on his horse. ‘I’ll take the dingo,’ he yelled. ‘You try and catch the brumby.’
The air was full of dingo howls and Socks’ stallion screams. Miss Dingo howled as the pup sat and refused to move and then was dragged along. Socks raced up to the second man and leapt at him, striking and biting. Lightning was rolling the other dog down the grassy hill, then left him and tackled the heels of the horse whose rider was dragging the pup.
The horse did not like it, and was dancing and bucking, trying to bolt. It didn’t like the dingo pup, either.
The struggle went on and on. Socks was discovering that he loved dingo pup dearly.
Lightning got more and more desperate. What was worse, his coat was tingling as thunderclouds gathered over the Beloka valley. He looked up once and saw a great rock peak with a shaft of lightning above it. At that moment the horse bolted in earnest, and the man vanished into the grassy hills.
The dingo pup with the rope around its neck was left behind.
Then, crack!, the lightning struck MacFarlane’s Lookout. A great wedge of rock peeled off it, lightning ran jagged from it, and fire ran along the grass like a whip cracking — or a snake!
Socks saw the lightning starting. There was a tremendous crash! and another lightning strike in a great, jagged flame right onto MacFarlane’s Lookout. Socks stopped still with horror and then hastened to where the pup, with the lasso still tight round his neck, sat whimpering breathlessly on the faint track.
Socks was there
in a moment, trying to loosen the rope with his teeth, Then Miss Dingo arrived, too, and started chewing at the lasso, both of them loosening it. It was undone just as the third lightning strike split the sky and the rocky lookout and a great piece of rock peeled off.
Don’t try and capture any more of us, Socks thought, and he picked up the exhausted dingo pup, carrying him over the gently rolling, grassy hills till they reached some scrubby cover. Lightning was there beside them, and Miss Dingo.
The only thing in Socks’ mind was to get back to the Ingegoodbee, however far it was to go. It was a long way from Beloka, home of the brumby hunters. Even the man who had nearly caught one thousand brumbies was not coming back for a while.
Socks looked back once before he went into the trees. He saw the quiet rolling hills and MacFarlane’s Lookout, and put the pup down gently. Lightning stood beside him and softly licked the pup, then put up a paw and touched Socks’ nose.
When the pup recovered they went on into the night.
Socks and Lightning and the family travelled through the night, resting in thick scrub by a little creek when the moon came up.
There were mauve euphrasia flowering by the quietly singing water. The pup slept badly and Miss Dingo comforted him when bad dreams woke him, howling with fear. Lightning curled up between Miss Dingo and Socks — the two he loved most in his mountain world.
We must sleep now, Socks thought to himself. In his mind, he knew it would be a long day, the next journey.
The pup slept without bad dreams, at last, there by the Buonbar Creek, the song of the little creek bringing him relief from fear of that rope tightening round his neck and fear of thundering hooves. If he woke at all there were Socks’ enfolding legs and his mother’s tongue, as quick to lick as Lightning’s.
Socks’ sleep was not quite so peaceful as it might have been, because the face of the thousandth brumby hunter kept floating into his sleeping vision, and the picture of the stampeding mob below MacFarlane’s Lookout, and his dreams would be disturbed by the thought that his presence in the Secret Valley could bring danger to Thowra and Boon Boon. Lightning’s bark might call up the brumby hunter’s dog, even give away the location of the Secret Valley, but he deeply wanted to get there. Anyway, they would not start till the next day.