Last evening while dusk was falling and Mr Dusty was dutifully patrolling the grounds of Chickie Village he saw that the front door of Miss Ashanthi's cottage was wide open. After much knockings and calling out he ventured inside to make sure all was well only to find the cottage totally empty. The cottage sits next to a fence which borders a lane way, which borders the next estate in which there happened to be a workman quite nearby stacking timber. Mr Dusty called out to the workman asking him if he had per chance seen a beautiful black chicken in the area. The workman replied that he had not, but would keep an eye open and let him know if a beautiful black chicken happened to pass by. Mr Dusty thanked him very much and continued the search. Darkness was rapidly enveloping our little village and being very concerned at this stage for Miss Ashanthi's safety, Mr Dusty ran to the cottage belonging to Annie with Spade and Peter with Toolbox and raised the alarm.

Peter with Toolbox assured Mr Dusty that she would be found and not to distress himself, he felt that Mr Dusty was afraid he would once again be in question regarding his security maintaining capabilities. With lanterns held high the three made a thorough search of the neighbourhood knocking on doors and asking everyone if she had been seen. Still no trace of her could be found, Mr Peter found this to be strange indeed as he had spent the whole day with the help of a workman renovating the Village. Extra security measures had been installed, new tall fencing had been erected and the wire mesh dug deep into the ground. It was felt that even though Fox and relatives had been banished to a far away island it would be a good idea to ensure that Chickie Village be made totally fox proof as one never really knew what the future might hold. The Gentleman at the big house had told Mr Peter that no expense is to be spared, as there were still a few, very frightened chickens.  

Mrs Annie was getting very worried at this stage. "What on earth could have happened to her?" she asked Mr Peter.

"Well, since we have moved into our cottage here there have not been any dramas whatsoever", replied Mr Peter " there has got to be a logical explanation to this, she must be somewhere in the neighbourhood."
Mrs Annie decided to look into No2 again and check under the bed, you just never know, maybe those Blackbird boys have been up to mischief again. Nothing under the bed or in the wardrobe, or in any of the spare rooms. Annie sighed heavily and went to the window, opening it wide she took a deep breath of fresh air. A beam of light from the lantern she was holding picked out an irregular shape in amonst the branches,
"But what is this I see, there she is up in the tree tops fast asleep".gasped Annie in amazement
 Annie immediately called out to the others " she is fast asleep in the treetops, on a  branch in the Cypress ".
They both bolted up the stairs to see, and yes indeed there she was totally oblivious to all of the commotion she had stirred, fast asleep deep into her chickie land dreams.
"Well I have never seen anything like this before "declared Mr Peter " a chicken asleep in the treetops, does she fancy herself to be a bird I wonder?".
Mrs Annie could not help herself and retorted "Chickens are birds, Ha Ha Ha."
Mr Peter chuckled and replied "Well you know what I mean".
They decided to leave her be as no one could reach her anyway and they didn't think she would be in any danger being so high up in amongst the branches, well so they all hoped.  Mr Dusty accompanied Mrs Annie and Mr Peter back to their cottage for a drink of hot milk with honey, and a good calm down, his poor nerves were a bit frazzled. Mrs Annie offered to make up a bed for Mr Dusty by the warm fire as they planned to be up nice and early in order to confront Miss Ashanthi and ask her to explain herself.

Over breakfast the next morning the three of them tried to figure out what to do about this situation. Mrs McKluckity popped her head in the door wanting to know what had happened. After hearing about all the goings on of the previous night she told them of Miss Ashanthi's strange behaviour at the luncheon at Mumma Bunny's home the other day." She was very irritable indeed," she said" and not at all her usual happy self, she didn't join in any of the conversations and was at times, even quite rude to Mumma Bunny, on our way home she complained that amongst all the food on the dining table there was not a curry to be seen. She had felt herself to be quite neglected. "

Little Primrose who boards with Mrs Annie, tut tutted and declared she was very pleased with herself having been born a cat and not a temperamental chicken.
Mrs Annie reprimanded Little Primrose with a  "That will do Primrose, go and do something useful, as a matter of fact a basket full of parsley and carrots would very be useful indeed".
Mr Peter who had just this minute returned from a quick visit to the big house, to inform the Lady at the big house what had taken place, asked us all to sit down as he had something to tell us.
The Lady Maree who is holidaying at her home town in the land far far away and over the big waters is apparently not coming back. She has decided to spend the rest of her days there with her dear sisters. So Miss Ashanthi has been abandoned to us and Chickie Village is to be her forever home.
It was Mrs McKluckity's turn to tut tut." What a goings on indeed", she said " the poor dear is grieving for her home. She did tell me you know that back home the chickens love to roost in the tree tops. They have been intermarrying with wild fowl for many years, and tree top habitation is quite natural to them, they consider themselves to be free spirits and don't like confined spaces."
Mr Peter was not impressed with this free spirit business. "Free spirits indeed, she won't be much of a free spirit lying on her back with her neck broken." he said. " there has to be a solution to this problem".

To Be Continued

Brought to you by Jovie Woofley