Disaster at Sea

About a month ago, our British friends, brought us a bucket of goldfish. My husband wanted to put them back in the mill pond, but I thought I would enjoy watching them more if they were in our ornamental pond near our terrace.

For a few days, Sirk, the cat, was very interested in them. But I never saw any evidence that he ate any of the fish.

Indeed, the goldfish seemed to be thriving in the pond along with all their new friends, the tadpoles. (We are being overrun by frogs at the moment, but that’s another story.)

Attila uses the pond to drink out of but had never seemed to be interested in the fish. And the his pond drinking was a great set-up for me because I didn’t have to worry about filling up a water bowl each day.

Last night, I returned from a magnificent cello concert, held in a church down the road. I had intended to write about that today, but the incident with the pond has taken precedence. My friend Evelyn had invited me over for a late supper after the early concert, so I dropped her off at her house and then returned home to quickly check on the dog, and change my clothes.

I parked the car in the barn, and when I was closing the barn door, I was delighted that the muddy Attila jumped all over me, making it unnecessary for me to take the time to change out of my dry-clean-only clothes in order to try and squeeze another wearing out of them.

Attila had his missing dental bone with him. I gave it to him a few days ago and he promptly “lost” it. Since it was covered with dirt, I assumed he had buried it.

I grabbed some cheese and saucisson and headed over to Evelyn’s. Her husband joined us and we had a pleasant time talking about the concert, local gossip, and the very low prices paid to the producers of grapes. Roger came over to bring back Attila who had shown up on his terrace, standing up on his hind legs, peering in Roger’s kitchen window.

Attila and I walked home in the dark around midnight. Roger had loaned me his flashlight.

Just now, I went out to water the flowers. When perform my watering duties, I turn on the fountain in the ornamental pond to replace the water that I remove with my watering can . . . that way, Attila, the fish and tadpoles get fresh water daily.

To my shock and horror, the pond is empty, it’s bottom is covered with a thin layer of sludge, three dead fish (out of 8), and some flopping tadpoles. From all the evidence I can gather, Attila fell in the pond last night, in all likelihood to eat some fish, he knocked over a rock and inverted pot that were holding a pipe in place, thus exposing the primitive drain of the man-made pond.

Needless to say, I’m shocked and horrified. I will miss the fish, and I will begrudge having to admit to my husband that we should have put the fish back in the mill pond.