This particular day started out like any other.
After an early breakfast, Hepsta saw the folks off to work and enjoyed a mad dash around the garden, checking to see who’d visited during the night. As usual, Miss Kali observed from the deck, offering the occasional unhelpful suggestion.
It was a completely unremarkable morning.
But trouble was brewing in this small town, as The Hepsta was soon to discover. She had her first inkling at the beach, where she and a group of friends met most mornings. They had heard rumours and were keen to share.
Birds had been disappearing from the pontoon.
Now, that in itself wasn’t particularly strange. It was a meeting point for the whole south coast. Travellers and transients would often rest there a couple of days on their way to somewhere else.
But this was different. Several of the locals had vanished and one of them, Madge, had been there for donkeys years.
After a decent gallop the length of the beach and back with the gang, Hepsta went in search of more information.
She spied the young black kelpie, Bodie, hanging about the break water and headed his way. Predictably, Bodie wasn’t keen to get involved. No doubt he was already in another sort of trouble anyway. Hepsta decided to go straight to the source of the rumours.
The pontoon and boat ramp were deserted. All the holiday makers had returned home the previous week, and the locals were either at work or tucked up inside preparing for the cold change forecast for that evening.
A couple of silver gulls lurked around the fish cleaning station, pecking at scraps revealed by the low tide. One of them nodded at Hepsta and squawked a greeting. The gulls were notoriously keen on gossip, but when Hepsta went straight to the point and asked about the vanishings, the friendly gull got fidgety. She looked around nervously. Hepsta was pretty sure her tongue was about to get the better of her, when the water behind her stirred and a smooth head appeared.
Hepsta watched the gull skedaddle and stared sternly at the seal. A group of them had moved into the area from the Island recently and become quite the troublemakers. The seal grinned back at her, showing all of its stained teeth. It had no intention of helping anyone.
Where next?
The gull had told Hepsta to follow her nose. At the moment all she could smell was the seal’s rancid fishy breath and mud.
Mud, hmm… The Wetlands was only a short canter away. Although there weren’t too many birds there this time of year, Hepsta knew someone who might have information. It was a risky business, but Hepsta was now committed to solving the mystery.
As it turned out, the red-belly black snake knew nothing. She was focused on ridding her home of ants driven there by recent rains. Speaking of ants, some had got into Hepsta’s fur while she sat with the snake. Hepsta rolled aound on the grass and had a good scratch while she thought about her next move.
Baggy Bill usually hung out down by the boardwalk.
It meant retracing her steps, but Hepsta was a fit young Koolie and had all the day at her disposal. She trotted back past the pontoon, ignoring the seal smirking at her from behind a rock, and went in search of the pelican.
Luckily the old bird was in his usual spot, accompanied by some poor youngster he had convinced to hold his beak up while he swam after minnows. He had one disturbing piece of information.
Hepsta thought hard. Something dangerous was going down in her peaceful town. Who else could possibly know more about the direful doings of that dark underworld?
The answer hit her like a pawful of claws. She raced through the reserve and up the hill back to her own house. Miss Kali was skulking around in the bushes at the foot of the garden with pollen in her ears.
There was no point pushing the cat. If Miss Kali knew something, she’d be only too keen to tease Hepsta with it.
Hepsta headed back to the beach, where she did her best running and thinking. And there she ran until the sand stung her paws and her mouth was dry. Then she sat and sniffed the air. A strange smell came from a clump of seaweed drying out at the high tide mark. She explored it carefully with her nose and scratched at the weed.
A sad clue indeed. It must have come in with the tide last night.
Hepsta dug a hole in the pretty samphire beyond the dunes and laid the wing to rest. Following a respectful silence, she turned to the horizon and raised her nose. The fresh sea-breeze had swung to the East. Hepsta sniffed and sniffed and suddenly…
The gull had been right. Her nose had the answer. It was all there on the breeze.
The Koolie charged back along the beach, past the pontoon again, and along the boardwalk to the tiny harbour at its end. She was pretty sure the fishing boat Talisman would be setting out any moment.
As she ran, Hepsta could smell the diesel from idling engines and hear the chug that signalled an imminent departure. Nobody noticed her clear the gunwale with one smooth leap and disappear beneath a tarp near the stern.
Luckily, it was a smooth passage through the Bar and out to sea. After a while, when the crew were occupied at the Helm, Hepsta crept out and placed herself where she could see.
The sea around the North end of the Island was sparkling in the bright Wintery sun when they arrived. Hepsta made it onto the ricketty jetty without being seen and snuffled around for the smell she had caught on the beach
Her main suspect was enjoying himself on the other side of the Island, swimming circles around a tired looking tern, and lunging at the young penguins hiding among the rocks. Hepsta drew a deep breath and shouted at the water…
In answer, the seal barged into the tern and sent it tumbling head over heels, squawking and fluttering in fear.
Now Hepsta was a gentle dog, with a kind and good heart. But when she saw the terror on the tern’s face, something began to build up inside her. She put on her sternest face and barked commandingly at the seal.
The seal was unimpressed and scrambled onto a convenient rock.
Hepsta stared helplessly at him. She had tried her best and failed. All around, she could smell the birds watching hopefully from their various hidey holes.
The seal snorted rudely and prepared to leap back into the water.
And then it happened. Triggered by her distress, a small genetic coil hidden deep inside Hepsta’s DNA began to unravel and as it did, she felt a powerful wave of strength and confidence wash through her. The strange feeling began at her nose and spread through every whisker and hair until they were all standing on end.
When the change was complete, the Were-Koolie gathered herself and, encouraged by the sudden look of fear on her adversary’s face, launched herself one more time.
It worked. The King Seal was more bluster and blubber than true courage, and the young Koolie had him bluffed.
Hepsta woowoo-ed her victory and called to the birds. By then her fur had flattened back into its usual postion, and she looked quite normal except for a faint spark in her eyes that warned the seal he’d better behave.
Slowly, one by one, the birds assembled around her. All of them were impaired in some way. They relied on scraps from the fishermen as they came in to clean their catches at the pontoon. It seemed the seals had gotten sick of sharing the fish with the invalid birds and decided to exile them to the Island.
It was a tale of greed and treachery unfamiliar to the small Koolie. She felt sad to think such things could happen in her lovely neighbourhood.
It wasn’t easy but Hepsta managed to herd the group onto the boat without too much trouble. Luckily the fishermen had caught many fish that day and were laughing and chatting amongst themselves up the front. None of them would miss a few of the smaller fish, Hepsta decided, as she teased them free of the tubs and tucked them under the tarp with her new friends.
The only trouble on the way back was from Madge. The matronly cormorant with a crooked wing was highly vocal in her fury, and Hepsta had to keep stuffing flathead tails into her beak to keep her quiet.
Hepsta glanced back at the Island occasionally as they headed to the mainland. She’d have loved some more time to explore the coves and rockpools. Perhaps another time…
Hepsta sighed and rested her nose on her paws, suddenly weary but satisfied with the day’s events. She couldn’t wait to get home and tell Miss Kali all about her adventure.
She might leave out the bit about the Were-Koolie though. Hepsta wasn’t sure anyone, not even Miss Kali who had a bit of a dark side herself, was ready for that.
THE END