| *
Sandra opened her eyes to the cold morning. She felt a violent shooting pain in her shoulder as she tried to rise, causing her to lie back on the floor. Moving her head to the left she noticed a mound covered with a sheet. There was blood on the floor, all over the floor! �Terry!� she called, �Rob? Are you there?� There was no answer. The pain caused her to wince again and her head seemed set to �Spin�. In the back of her mind though, she knew what had happened. The sheepdog, thank god, was dead and maybe Rob too. She should never have left him with that very large carving knife. It had made a wide deep furrow in her shoulder. She should have known he was too overcome by fear to think straight. She hoped he wasn�t dead, hoped he was just unable to respond. Terry was obviously gone to� * Just then Terry arrived in the doorway of the cottage, the police and ambulance in tow. Sergeant Albert Ramson was the man in charge and he didn�t look too happy at having to face this mess first thing in the morning, especially after being at the Phillips farm. Terry had stumbled into the station earlier that morning talking about killer dogs and dying girls. Albert hadn�t believed a word of it until they got to the Phillips�. After examining the bodies inside, Albert got Terry to recount word for word what had happened to them in the cottage. �Are you sure he�s dead?� asked Sergeant Ramson, �absolutely positive?� he asked examining Terry face for any signs of guilt. �Yeah, totally!� The dog tore his neck out like the people in there!� Terry said motioning to the Farmhouse. �Good,� said Ramson, �because those folk in there are dead!� he raised his voice. �Dead and not a torn neck amongst them!� Sergeant Ramson watched Terry�s expression change from confused to disbelief, innocent. �What happened then?� Terry asked, he was afraid of the details but was also confused. �How did they die?� �They were stabbed� said the sergeant, �with a large knife, a very large knife.� * In the cottage Rob�s dead body and Sandra�s injured one had been cleared out. Lucky lay alone on the frozen floor. No one came to pick him up. No one dug him a grave. No one cared that he�d hunted all night with his life�s blood pouring out. He was just a dead dog. And a dead dog was a useless dog and Lucky the sheepdog was no more use to anyone. |
| Sheepdog - 3 |
| (c) Eanna Cullen |