Nocturnal Cervidae

[rejectomorph]

The deer came back. I was on the porch shortly after midnight when I heard the soft click of hooves on the street. The moon was high in the southeast, and the pavement was swept with swaths of pale light, but I had not noticed the deer as it passed. I stepped from the shadows to peer around the bush which had blocked my view, but the deer had already found its own patch of shadow. Then I heard another deer following the first. Crouching in the shade, so as not to startle the beast, I watched the ghostly gray form of a doe pass. She was cautious, pausing to look about, then taking a few steps, the sound of her hooves clear in the deep quiet of night.

Then, with a final dart, she too passed out of the moonlight and joined her companion in the shadows. They must have cut across the dark lawn of the house on the corner, because I no longer heard their footfalls, but they must not have gone too near that house, or else the motion sensing lights there would have been triggered. They had vanished from both sight and hearing. I waited to see if more deer were following, but none came. I have seen herds of as many as five traveling together. But I was lucky that these two visited the street while the moon is still fairly bright. Maybe they'll be back tomorrow night.

In the meantime, there are deer at wikipedia.