IT WAS DANNY WHO FIRST saw them this time, whispering to us that they were there and slowing his pace until all of us were standing bone-still in the middle of the road.
For they’d come back, all of them (and then some), and the road was blocked just as it had been before. Unlike before, the road was blocked in the direction from which we’d come as well.
“Easy does it,” Danny whispered. “Just ... don’t make any sudden moves. We’ll head into the trees ... and climb them.”
But when we moved toward the trees the deer were there also.
Which left only the trees on the other side of the road, which, not surprisingly, were devoid of any animals—all of us, I think, knew why. And then the animals were running—bounding—toward us, both the ones nearby and the ones father down the road, and we wer
