Gone Fishing

Ranthambore National Park. Rajasthan, India. January. Warm sunny days, cool starlit nights. In search of the elusive Bengal tiger. Travelling with no time frame, able to stay until I fulfilled my dream.

Day ten arrived in a blaze of glory, the sun rising into a flame-coloured sky, lighting the bush with a shimmering rosy-gold glow. Sitting on the balcony of my old, battered bungalow, sipping hot, spiced tea, a warm breeze dancing softly across my skin. Watching the creatures of the day come alive, listening to the dawn chorus. Wondering if today would be the day.

It was.

Prashad, my guide, collected me shortly after daybreak in an open-top jeep that ran on a wing and a prayer rather than diesel or petrol. He told me there was fresh spoor a couple of kilometres north of us.

The sun climbed steadily higher cutting a bright white arc across an unclouded, brilliant blue sky, baking the earth. Leaching every bit of moisture from the air, leaving us with near unquenchable thirsts. As we drove, ochre dust swirled around our heads. The scarves wound across our faces could not stop our sporadic, uncontrollable coughing, shattering the stillness.

We tracked spoor until just after noon, weaving this way and that through the bush. Returning to my bungalow with the heat at its zenith and disappointment running through my veins. We had been close, that much we knew. But not close enough. Prashad sensed my frustration.

“I will collect you again at 8pm, Madam,” he said, with that irrepressible Indian shaking of the head. “We will travel in the night. See what we see, Madam.”

How could Madam refuse? He so wanted me to realise my dream. Despite my exhaustion, I agreed.

I turned indoors and laid on the lumpy calico mattress that was my bed and promptly fell into a deep, dreamless sleep. Only to be woken seemingly scant minutes later by rapid knocking on the front door. Prashad. I had slept the afternoon and early evening away. I dressed quickly in layers of clothing, grabbed water and insect repellent and walked out into the night.

Back into the jeep, cold, crisp air chasing all vestiges of sleep from me. The bush alive with night sounds ... insects, frogs, birds. Trees rustling. We drove for fifteen minutes, parked in a copse of trees and walked for a few minutes more deep into the moonlit darkness. Every nerve in my body alert, conscious of the potential danger we were in. I looked at Prashad. I was carrying only a flashlight. He also had a rifle. Very old. I couldn’t help but wonder if it worked.

We stopped at the edge of a body of water - too large to be a pond, too small to be a lake. Surrounded by low scrub and trees silhouetted against a sapphire-blue sky. Its surface lightly thistled by the breeze. Moonlight skipping over the ripples. Prashad led me to a small clearing at the water’s edge and motioned for me to squat.

So there we were, he and I. Together by the light of the moon in the heart of the Indian bush. In the peace that enveloped us time passed without knowing.

After a while the faintest of sounds came from the bushes to our right. At the edge of the water appeared a cat. Glowing a luminous silver. Ears pricked up, striped tail parallel to the ground. Its nose pink and wet. Twitching, scenting the air. Body quivering, aware. Totally at one with its surroundings.

Prashad slowly put his right index finger to his lips indicating the need for absolute stillness and silence. The cat, slighter than a red fox, crouched down onto its haunches, almost in the water. Into which it stared with utter intent. It slowly reached out its right foreleg, the paw lightly stroking the water’s surface. It did this with hypnotic rhythm. Back and forth, with endless patience. After a moment or two I realised what it was doing. As a fisherman tickles for trout, so this cat was luring fish.

Suddenly, in the blink of an eye, it dipped its paw into the water, flicking a small fish into the air. As it landed on the sandy soil the cat pounced, pinning the fish down until it stopped moving. And then, with the fish between its front paws, it began to eat. I was spellbound. Entranced by the extraordinariness of this special moment.

The cat resumed its fishing. Prashad and I watched a little longer before silently retreating to the jeep. We returned to my bungalow beneath a canopy of stars, so cold I was shivering.

Another day had ended without encountering a tiger. But it mattered not. I’d had, instead, a magical meeting with a cat who had gone fishing.

© Jacqueline Le Sueur Experienced in 1992; written in 2006