Nora brought them out before they began chewing the woody remains. She gave the lane a number, checked the animals for scratches, and moved the fence to the next marked section. The work felt slower because each move required thought, but the ledger showed something the first paddock had hidden: the goats were consuming more useful browse in fewer hours, and Nora was spending less time repairing damage.
At the end of the first week, Tess calculated progress against the October deadline. The distance remained intimidating. Yet the lanes now advanced rather than merely widening, and the wire Nora recovered before grazing went into a pile instead of into the goats' feet. By the second week, she had also learned how quickly fresh leaves returned to a stripped cane after warm rain.
"We're going to have to visit these more than once," Nora said, studying the returning green tips.
"Which means your schedule needs to show a second pass," Tess answered.
"And maybe a third."
Tess wrote both in pencil. Neither of them knew yet that the second pass would uncover the first important thing the land had been hiding.
The first green column appeared in the fourth section of the red-ribbon lane, although Nora did not think of it as a column until much later. At the time it looked like nothing more than a tall knot of greenbrier climbing through privet. Three goats abandoned the softer leaves around them and stood upright beside it, stretching their necks toward a patch of young growth higher than Nora's shoulders. They moved together, rising, pulling, dropping onto their front feet, and rising again.
"There's enough down here, girls," Nora told them, though she had no expectation of being obeyed. Hazel reached higher than the others and caught a vine in her teeth. The vine bowed but did not break. Nora noticed that several long canes were suspended above the surrounding brush, as though tied to an unseen post.
Rook, her brown-and-black farm dog, came trotting down the lane from the gate. He had been with Nora for seven years and understood the routines of goats better than some human helpers. He did not herd them unless asked. Usually he inspected the margins, sniffed every change in the ground, then found a patch of shade where he could keep watch without becoming part of the work.
Now he circled the base of the vine column twice. His nose moved over the wet leaves. He stopped beside a tangle of roots, sniffed again, and followed Nora when she called him away. She assumed he had found a rabbit trail. The property seemed full of small animals delighted to have human beings and goats disturb its long neglect.
In the yellow-ribbon lane, the same behavior repeated. Three goats stood upright beneath another tall mass of greenbrier while the rest worked close to the ground. Rook visited the base, lingered, and moved on. Nora stepped inside the fence and examined the shape more carefully. The vertical vines were too straight to be holding themselves up, but she could not see what supported them.