The dog with golden eyes watched the woman with the stick picking her way across the church yard. Somehow she needed him to watch her find this place and he was not moving from this spot at all. Each time the woman stopped at another grave, she nodded at the stone, reading the words, trying to find a story behind the chiselled summaries of finished lives. Her head bent lower as she read.
Now there was another woman on the path, a woman who could walk quickly, carrying a flowered crimson bag, stuffed full with bread sticks and wine. If the dog had been a Christian he would have raised an eyebrow at this autumn picnic amongst the gravestones, but he believed in nature instead and so saw the second figure encircle her left arm around the waist of the older woman guiding her on, through St Thomas’s long dead to a bench built for the third daughter of the village doctor.
Cheese for madame. Not a question at all and so the dog watched on, waiting for nature to take her course. For nature would, she needed these human beings to risk a day again.
In the reflection of the dog with the golden eyes, Katherine’s soft mouth took in the white pieces of cheese. Crumbs fell onto her coat and were brushed lightly away like snow. Red wine to her lips and more cheese, and a piece of apple fed slowly by a mittened hand who seemed to have all the time in the world.
Is it dawn yet? Should we stay here for a while?
