Terroir by Graham Mort Page B

left the house she pulled on her father’s cap and tucked in her hair. Dragging the door to, she noticed stands of snowdrops beside the path. The moon was hidden now and she made her way through the churchyard limping slightly, the cold metal of the gun against her thigh. At the road she turned right and down the hill to the river meadows. There were cattle gathered there where the farmer had put down beet or swedes the day before. There was a chance the fodder would bring out hungry hares and rabbits.
    In the field she could hear the river singing beyond the broken willows that lined the bank. In summer it was a good spot to see kingfishers, their blue lightning blinding the eye with speed, as if they were never real. She pulled out the gun and assembled it, fumbling in the dim light, working by touch. She loaded it with ball and a measure of powder, then tamped in the wadding, then primed the pan, pulling back the oiled hammer. Then she crouched behind an iron roller that had been dragged and left there. The moon peeped and glimmered and disappeared again, showing the gnawed swedes scattered on the grass like golden skulls. There were beasts gathered in the far corner of the field, a mass of shadow. She could hear them, not see them. Their guttural breath shunting the air, their heavy tread, a hoarse cough, sometimes a lowing moan. They moved at the edge of her vision like the beast in her dream. Ellen slipped her hand under the shirt to feel the small swelling in her belly above her pubic hair. She moved her hand lower, shivering with pleasure and with cold. She remembered Michael’s breath on her neck, his tongue at her breasts, then the heavy sigh as he came into her. She rested the barrel of the gun on the roller and waited.
    The hare appeared at last from the dark end of the field, coming through the scattered cattle towards her. They ignored it as it slunk and hopped, pausing to lower its ears then raise them again. The breeze was blowing away from her, carrying her scent back to the village. The moon glowered through a gap in the clouds and the hare came on, bounding easily over the cropped grass. It stopped to sniff at a swede and then another. It seemed to disdain them or perhaps had already eaten its fill. The hare came within ten yards of her and sat with its ears pointed and swivelling. She could see the dark marking on its face, the gleam of its whiskers. Its eyes were treacle. The gun was already balanced. All she had to do was slowly swing it around so that the hare was in her sights. She squinted down the barrel, remembering all her father had said. How she must squeeze, not pull, how to keep her elbows close to her body. The rifle cracked and the hare’s face lit up in the spurt of flame. There was a smell of black powder. A drift of smoke obscured things for a moment and she thought she must have missed when the hare took off. It ran for twenty yards and then collapsed onto one side and lay still.
    Ellen hid the gun under the roller. Her father had taught her never to take it to the kill. A dead hare was one thing to be found with, but a hare and a gun couldn’t be explained away. The ball had gone through the hare’s chest and out through its shoulder. Its fur was dark with blood and its face was resting on the grass. She could see a tiny white moon reflected in its eye and was glad when the clouds gathered to hide that. She took up the long body and wiped its face gently with her hand. Then she put it inside her shirt, around her waist, and buttoned it there, feeling its heat next to her own, next to the child inside her.
    Ellen walked home awkwardly with the dismantled gun and the dead hare lolloping inside her clothing. She could feel it oozing against her ribs and caught the thick scent of its blood. She clicked the catch of the cottage door quietly and dropped the hare into the stone sink where it could drain. Taking off the smeared shirt, she shivered with her feet on the