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Two years ago I chucked in my job, said good riddance to my husband, abandoned Auckland and came to live in this ramshackle country cottage that I bought over the internet one sleepless night.
My friends thought I was having a breakdown but actually I was coming to my senses. After 15 years as a policewoman with the Auckland Highway Patrol, I yearned for a better, healthier life-style, away from the concrete jungle and people with rocks in their head.
I took up writing. My computer and I created a new world of fictional people that I could change or eliminate with one stroke of a finger. Back space or delete key, my choice.
My first novel was a blockbuster.
"Come back to Auckland," screeched my publisher down the phone. "You're wasting your life in the middle of nowhere! Auckland's the go!"
Like a blithering idiot, I agreed to return.
And if it hadn't been for Agatha, I would've gone.
I first met Agatha when I was walking my dog one morning, the frost still white on the ground, the air heavy with farmyard smells. I'd had a sleepless night. Too many city memories keeping me awake. Luckily, I had a mad Jack Russell to keep me sane.
I came round a bend and there she was, shuffling towards me: a tall, thin woman in an old fur coat, leading a small barrel of a dog, which looked like it had once been a chihuahua. Our two animals rushed to sniff each other's bums.
"Good morning," I breezed to the woman.
She peeped down at me from under bushy grey eyebrows. Her face was full and chubby, but open and expressive, like a child's. Her eyes showed both curiosity and timidity.
"Good job people don't greet each other like that," I joked, as the dogs began a pissing contest.
"Tee hee hee. Tee hee hee," she giggled. "They like each other."
Her voice had a lilting, child-like quality.
"Do you live round here?" I asked.
"Yeah."
"What's your dog called?"
"Patch. What's yours?"
"Rupert," I confessed.
She laughed.
"Bye, Rupert," she giggled, as she toddled off. "Patch, say bye bye to Rupert and the nice lady! Bye bye, nice lady!"
I watched her as she plodded on, the muffled thud of her footsteps in strange contrast to her voice rising and falling in a sing song tone, as she chatted to Patch.
Later that day, I was at a meeting of local go-getters discussing the pressing issue of the old church. Apparently it had some historical significance. The congregation was long gone and the building was falling apart, but some developer from the city wanted to turn it into a ghastly Bed & Breakfast. The shocked community called a meeting in the hall and I got roped into attending.
After the meeting, which was a complete waste of time, they opened the sliding door into the kitchen. Three women were there, one to serve coffee, another to pour tea, and the third was Agatha, holding out a plate of scones, laden with raspberry jam and whipped cream. She was gazing downwards, peeping up shyly from time to time. But her eyes brightened as she recognized me.
"Where's Rupert?" she chirped.
"Rupert? He's at home watching TV," I replied. "Where's Patch?"
"Home looking after the pussies."
"How many pussies do you have?"
"Oh, dunno, seven, twelve, thirteen."
"So you're a bit short of pussies, then?"
"Yeah. Tee hee hee." She carried on serving.
Agatha and I chanced to meet up most days on our walks. We always stopped so Rupert and Patch could have a chat and sniff each other's backsides. And Agatha and I would talk.
She was the only person I really got to know during my first few months in the district.
Her routine didn't vary from day to day. She rose at dawn, took Patch for a walk and returned home for breakfast.
Then the pair set off to the shop, where she'd buy a loaf of yesterday's bread and a kilo of mince.
First she'd go to feed the ducks on the old mill pond, then backtrack and head inland to the ravine, where she fed Ernie, the duck who lived alone in a swampy ditch, could barely walk and couldn't fly, because he'd been hurt by a naughty cat.
In the afternoon, Agatha would trek to the forest on the hill with mince for the wild cats. Along the way she scattered crumbs for the sparrows, and chatted to a retired racehorse with white socks living alone in a field. She picked long grass for him. He'd nudge her with his muzzle and snort his thanks.
Further on, there was a fat pig called Garth who ran squealing to the fence when he saw Agatha ambling along. She didn't feed Garth, because she thought he was already fat enough, but always stopped awhile, because Garth and Patch were great mates.
Agatha wouldn't join any of the local women's groups, because she wasn't a 'group person.' But whenever an event was held, she was asked to help in the kitchen. She loved baking scones, piling on jam and whipped cream, and handing them out.
She lived in a cottage up a long driveway overgrown with bush. Every morning she put out syrup for the bellbirds, whose singing was heard for miles around.
Of her earlier life she never spoke and I never enquired. If she had any thoughts about the future she didn't mention them to me. She lived in the present tense. Not once did she speak of any family.
One day she told me she was a believer.
"In what?" I teased.
She stared at me. "In the Lord, of course! I read the Bible every night before I go to bed."
"Do you go to Church?"
"Nah. I just read the Bible. Not keen on churches. They tell lies."
After deciding to move back to Auckland, I went up there for a week to check out the housing market, then returned south to prepare my cottage for sale. When I arrived, I learned that Agatha had died of a stroke. The local community had organized everything, including a vet to put Patch to sleep.
I heard there was a big turnout at Agatha's funeral. Even the minister had shed tears.
That evening I sat for a long time in my garden on a rickety cane seat under an apple tree.
I sighed a little, thinking of Agatha and Patch, and cried.
I saw, above the dark hills, the afterglow of sunset. One streak of crimson was all that was left of the day. Darkness was swallowing the world of nature around me. A night bird cried out. Cows mooed in the distance. A hedgehog rustled through my cabbage patch.
I began to slumber. A siren woke me. Was I dreaming? I sat bolt upright, clutching my chest. Another highway truck crash? I could imagine the screams, the flashing lights, the stink of diesel and the taste of burning flesh. My stomach heaved and I began to vomit.
As I trudged along the path back to the cottage, Rupert at my feet, a soft flower on a long stalk touched my forehead, like a child, or an angel, wanting to attract my attention.
The next day, Rupert and I rose at dawn and went for a walk. After breakfast, we called at the shop, bought a loaf of yesterday's bread and a kilo of mince and set off.
Tagged in Bruce Costello