At a point between two black moments in “Her Holiday Fling”, when Angelique fears Vincent is becoming engaged to someone else, they are on his Harley, riding from Sydney to his aunt’s home in the Blue Mountains. Along the way, they encounter the calls of local birdlife. Here’s a brief excerpt:
“I’m going to turn off the noise canceling. You’ll hear whip birds and bellbirds.”
She concentrated, listening past the rush of wind on her helmet. Amongst the noises came the mid-pitch sound of Eeeee-whip! Eeeee-whip! like a whistle being sucked into a mouth or a whip being cracked.
“That’s the whip bird,” he said into her ear. “You won’t find them. They’re shy and keep to themselves.”
Following the highway higher up the mountains, Angelique noticed several shrill sounds, as though one of the shock absorbers on the bike objected to being bounced. “Have we got a squeak? Do we need to stop and check?” she called.
“Listen,” he said. “Can you hear more of them?”
She tilted her helmet onto his back. “Are you sure we don’t need to stop?” she asked.
“Nah,” he said, “They’re the bellbirds.”
You can experience a little of what they heard here. You’ll mostly identify the bellbirds. There’s a whip bird at about the four-second mark.
“Her Holiday Fling” is available in ebook (https://books2read.com/her-holiday-fling) with the paperback option coming soon.
Merry Christmas, Liebchen was first published in “All wrapped Up: A Christmas Anthology” two years ago. That’s no longer available. But Karl and Jolene want their story back out there so I’ve given their novella a life of its own.
Caenys Kerr, Author 