On Beulah Height

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The day they drowned Dendale I were seven years old.

I'd been three when government said they could do it, and four when Inquiry came out in favor of Water Board, so I remember nowt of that.

I do remember something that can't have been long after, but. I remember climbing up ladder to our barn loft and my dad catching me there.

"What're you doing up here?" he said. "Tha knows it's no place for thee."

I said I were looking for Bonnie, which were a mistake. Dad had no time for animals that didn't earn their keep. Cat's job was keeping rats and mice down, and all that Bonnie ever caught was a few spiders.

"Yon useless object should've been drowned with rest," he said. "You come up here again after it and I'll get shut of it, nine lives or not."

Before I could start mizzling, sound of a machine starting up came through the morning air, not a farm machine but something a lot bigger down at Dale End. I knew there were men working down there, but I didn't understand yet what they were doing.

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