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JENNIFER

It’s always the same here on Christmas Eve. One mad rush to get things done in time for the Day. Extra hay to be brought in to save doing it then. The trailers are loaded up with several days supply for the outlying stock and there is an air of hustle and excitement about the place. Indoors it’s even more of a bustle. The table is covered with last minute cooking, Christmas cards and paper and string.

When I walked into the kitchen about midday that Christmas Eve my wife rubbed the flour from her hands and said, “Have you seen Jennifer lately?” I thought for a moment. “Well, I saw her in the yard when I was milking. In fact I shouted at her. She’d got between the trailer and the wall and I thought she was going to get jammed.” I went back out into the yard but there was no sign of her. I walked all around the buildings, calling as I went but got no answer.

This was not the first time she’d gone missing but I wished she’d left it for another day, I had enough to do and so had everyone else. The wind was keen because the low cloud hid the sun and I remember thinking that wherever she was, at least she had a thick coat on. The last time we’d missed her had been back in the spring but it was warm then with a smell of growth in the air and the birds singing in the hedges. We’d not worried too much that day and she came home again, up across Little Cowleaze, skipping her way through the daisies and early celandines. She’d always been an independent one. I made my way down over the field to see if, by some remote chance she had gone that way again.

That was the way she had first come to us. She was born down at Watley at the bottom of the hill but from the moment she could walk she would come up across Little Cowleaze to play with our young ones. Eventually my neighbour said, “Huh, you’d just as well keep her as far as I can see. She’s never happy at home.” She’s grown up into an attractive creature too! Skin like silk and those eyes! More than one of my neighbours, after she’d given them a look, has wanted to ‘take her on’ but she’d never say anything. Just turn her head and walk away. What she thought had been said with her eyes! I thought of all this as I walked back to the house. After lunch I sent one of the boys up on to Eggardon to see if she’d gone up there. Up there you can see over the whole farm and I thought he might see her walking across one of the fields in the bottom. She might even have gone as far as the Common. If she got lost in there we’d not find her before nightfall. The whole family was out looking now. Properly upset our Christmas she had with her wilful ways. It might be that young Reuben from Marsh. After all, she was a pretty creature and looking back I could remember them calling to each other over the hedge some long time back. But that was when the weather was kind and the sap was rising. All young things have a right to call to each other in those circumstances. No, it was too cold today for the behaviour of spring.

The afternoon drew on and I returned to the yard to get on with the milking and other chores. It was getting dark now and the searchers returned without success and set about their various tasks. We always decorate the house on Christmas Eve but the enthusiasm had gone after hours of tramping the fields in the cold wind. There was little we could do now until next day. I should have to get more help and organise a proper search. At half past ten I went on my usual rounds of the stock in the yard. I could hear the sound of the Church bells coming up through the clear night air. Inside the stall it was warm and placid with a steady sound of cudding. Outside again I shivered and wondered where Jennifer could be. The dog scented a rat and took off after it. He chased it into the back of the shed where we’d parked the loaded trailer. I dashed after him, torch in one hand and a piece of stick in the other. I had a job to squeeze between the bales on the trailer and the wall. Several bales had come off the trailer and fallen onto the ground behind it. I shone the torch about and there, in a nest of hay was Jennifer. Her blue eyes reflected the light and she came over and rubbed her head in my coat. There, in the hay beside her was a tiny little calf, almost buried in the hay. I put my hand down to it. The bells had stopped and the only sound was Jennifer gently mooing to her baby. I squeezed my way out again just as the bells restarted. I stood there for a moment, thinking of that other Birth so long ago.