Pig's crackling

There’s talk of a monster of a bat roosting in the pump house. It’s been spotted in the lank junipers that lean over with disease. A monster bat, that carries off canaries and spits their bones over the pot-holed knackers yard. It’s said it makes its nest from umber passages of the old testament, and the grounds keeper’s children facing supperless penance for shirking their prayer, look up to the black rafters of the pump house to finger the blame. The lonely rocker, that rests, for the most part, still among grass and holiday creosote slats, knocks its cricket stump feet against the decking in the gale, and the farrier’s spaniel, tired of hunting truffles, is picking out earth worms in the paddock, and pauses suddenly, its nostrils flaring and then flips over onto its back like a fish. Bait in its mouth, white belly in the air, a rare and timid deep sea delicacy just hauled onto a lucky deck. It lays there frozen, and half an earthworm dribbles out between its jaws and buries itself in the straw and mud manure, a moment passes, the old rocker knocks and little bones begin falling over the yard, sinking into puddles and ringing off of the slate roofs like waves of hail.