The Farthing Wood Collection 1 Page 10

  In the daylight Long-Whiskers licked her chops as she rested again out of sight. She had a full stomach and already she felt stronger.

  Under cover of darkness Stout Fox paddled across the stream and skirted the remaining grassland. He knew the otters would have first crossed the grassland to escape the angry foxes’ pursuit. The building works loomed ominously in the distance. All was quiet, but the fox smelt human smells and the unfamiliar odours of their machines and materials hanging on the air. Above all there was the stench of mud. He saw a rabbit skip across the fringe of the muddy area and then disappear underground. He was surprised by just how close the rabbits’ burrows were to the human presence. The grassland had been inhabited by rabbits and hares for as long as any animal in Farthing Wood could remember. Now some of that area had been destroyed and they had had to move their homes into the Wood. Thus they were more vulnerable to marauding foxes, stoats and weasels.

  Stout Fox steered clear of the parts changed by the humans. He discovered that this area extended farther than he and probably any other creature had realized. No animal, save the rabbits, had ventured anywhere near it. He thought it his duty to describe to those who would listen what he had seen.

  ‘But that must come later,’ he told himself. ‘First I have to sniff out the hiding-place of those clever otters.’

  The hares and most of the rabbits had indeed migrated into Farthing Wood itself. But, in addition to the added danger of their being within easier reach of their habitual predators, there was pressure for space. A single warren remained in use outside the Wood. It was one of the rabbits from here that Stout Fox had noticed. There were many young – some still suckling – living in the network of tunnels. The rabbits, though fearful of the human din, had almost grown used to the noise and alarms created every day by the builders and their machines. By day they cowered quietly in their burrows. None went above ground until each last sound made by the humans had died away. And even then they waited and waited, finally peeping out to see if it was safe to browse. Usually one of them gave the all-clear signal and then the adults and adolescents would gladly run free and begin to feed.

  A period of rain followed Stout Fox’s departure. The area around the warren became increasingly muddy. The burrow entrances and the tunnels seeped with mud and the rabbits were very miserable. They wished they had been able to move home. But the babies couldn’t yet be moved.

  The rain didn’t, of course, prevent the humans from proceeding with their affairs. And, to the unfortunate rabbits, it seemed as though the noise and bustle was coming perilously close. They squatted in their slimy tunnels and passages, ears pricked and noses permanently a-quiver. Outside a bulldozer roared and slithered, teetering on one side, then the other, as its angle was dictated by the unstable mud. All at once daylight flooded into the warren. The bulldozer had carved out a huge mass of soil, ripping into one edge of the warren itself. The rabbits fled into the deeper heart of the system. But they were not safe. The bulldozer, having dumped its latest load, reversed and trundled forward again like a juggernaut. Nothing could divert it. Its course was set. The warren was in its path.

  As if opening its jaws for another mighty bite, the machine ploughed into the centre of the warren, tearing up the entire labyrinth of runs, nesting burrows with its nursing mothers, babies, and most of the other fugitive rabbits. The load was hoisted high. Rabbits leapt or fell to the ground in terror. Others dangled from the mud, half in and half out of a mangled run. The bulldozer swung round, tipping more animals out as it turned, then depositing the remainder in a pile of soil and sludge where they squirmed like so many worms. They were trapped by the impacted mud and couldn’t wriggle clear.

  By this time cries from other workers on the site had alerted the earth-mover’s driver to what had happened. He quickly turned off his engine as he saw the rabbits struggling and thrashing in the morass, while others twitched helplessly on the ground where they had been flung or had fallen. Only a few animals managed to escape unharmed. A look of consternation passed across the face of the driver who had quite unwittingly caused the destruction of the warren. He jumped from his cab. Other men squelched through the mud to try to free the half-buried animals. When they found the babies, some still beneath their mothers’ bodies, they called out to each other in mutual pity and compassion. The driver looked particularly upset. The men did what they could for the animals who had survived, clumsily trying to clean them up and then setting them free. The few rabbits who were unhurt bounded into the Wood.

  There was now a kind of bank of mud and grass remaining where the greedy jaws of the earth-mover hadn’t yet reached. Inside this bank the last remnants of the rabbits from the warren hid in the few vestiges of holes and passages the machine had missed. They waited, passive victims, for the monster to gobble them up. They were exposed; cut off from any further retreat. There was nowhere to run. Yet somehow they seemed to be forgotten. They didn’t hear the roar of the machine that they expected to hear. And they were left, to their amazement, undisturbed. The humans, strangely affected by what had recently happened, left that part of the site alone for the rest of the day and began working elsewhere.

  Rain continued to fall. The treacherous mud absorbed more and more water until it was saturated. Puddles formed on its surface. The bank, too, was saturated through and gouts of mud broke away from it and slid down its side. The ground there was very unstable. Cold, wet and frightened, the rabbits inside the bank shivered through the day in a huddle. When darkness brought a cessation of human activity, one danger was replaced by another. The exposed holes in the bank were an open invitation to any hunter who picked up the rabbits’ scent.

  The foxes, of course, did so. There were more rabbits in the Wood, trying to enter other families’ burrows and dens after fleeing the humans. Some were accepted, but in other places there was overcrowding already. The foxes went on a killing spree. Stoats and weasels joined in. A number of rabbits, driven from one side to the other in their efforts to escape, even began to run back to the muddy building site which had recently been their home. A few predators pursued them. Amongst these were Lean Fox and Lean Vixen.

  ‘The cubs must do without their mother for a while,’ the vixen had told her mate. ‘I shall eat rabbit tonight, and I don’t mean to be left out of the chase.’

  Lean Fox knew better than to gainsay her. The two ran together. They started an adult rabbit on the fringe of the Wood and raced in pursuit. Another rabbit ran from their approach. Lean Fox chose this one, the vixen the other. It was soon apparent that these rabbits had no bolt-holes. They dashed out of the Wood and on to the top of the bank.

  ‘Catch it, catch it,’ Lean Vixen called to her mate as she hurtled after her own quarry.

  The rabbits hesitated. The foxes’ hot breath ruffled their fur. They leapt and landed in the sticky morass of mud where so many of their own kind had already met their fate. Lean Fox had no time to draw back. He crashed after them, the weight of his body embedding him in the ooze. He saw Lean Vixen falter on the brink.

  ‘Don’t jump!’ he cried. ‘It’s a trap!’

  Lean Vixen watched her mate thrashing about in his attempts to free himself from the quagmire. She saw the rabbits – their prey – beginning to pull their lighter bodies out of the mud. The rain beat down on them all mercilessly.

  ‘They’re getting away!’ Lean Vixen shrilled, her one concern above all else being the loss of her prize. Lean Fox struggled harder, but the cloying mud seemed to engulf his body. Lean Vixen teetered indecisively. Suddenly beneath her feet she spied another rabbit trembling in its inadequate hole. Instinctively she began to dig, more and more furiously as the urge to kill enveloped her. The hole gaped and crumbled and, as she lunged, the entire bank collapsed, burying her mate and the fleeing rabbits, while she was brought crashing down with it. Where the bank broke, a rush of water from the swollen stream flooded through the breach, and Lean Vixen was swamped by more mud, carried by the spate. The water poured
over her head and the few rabbits who had been sheltering in the unstable bank were drowned with her. Some small trees, whose roots were ripped out of the soil by the subsidence, fell on their sides. The breach, blocked by tree-trunks, vegetation and gathering silt, was sealed. But a new muddy pond had formed on the edge of the building site. On its surface two dead foxes and a number of rabbits floated: a testimony to the human menace. The first animals had been killed, the first trees had been felled. Moreover a small, but ominous, gap had appeared like an open wound in Farthing Wood.

  Beyond this place of drama Long-Whiskers was ready to continue her return journey. It was dark. The rain beat against the hedgerow with a relentless rhythm. She shook her coat vigorously and set off. Recognizable features that she passed on her way cheered her and strengthened her determination. Traffic noise reminded her of the road she must cross eventually. ‘It won’t be so formidable now I’m alone,’ she said to herself, thinking of Lame Otter’s vulnerability. But at once her thoughts were full of her own solitariness and she felt forlorn.

  ‘You are my companions,’ she whispered to her unborn cubs. ‘Though I travel alone, we travel together.’

  She stopped just short of the road, hiding in a leafy garden. Her sores were healing and she was almost able to put them out of her mind.

  From the opposite direction Stout Fox set his face against the lash of the rain. The taint of otter tracks was still strong enough for his sensitive nose to detect. He was pleased with his progress. His ailing vixen was constantly on his mind. He knew time was not on her side. He pictured her, head on paws, lying morosely in their den.

  ‘I must save her. I will save her.’ Stout Fox kept up this chant as he went, urging himself on to a greater effort and pace. ‘The otters have the secret, and I have their scent.’

  In the morning Nervous Squirrel saw the devastation. ‘A hole! A hole in Farthing Wood!’

  And Jay screamed, ‘Dead foxes! Dead rabbits! Who’s next? Who’s next?’

  The deaths of Lean Fox and Lean Vixen, as well as the way Farthing Wood had been penetrated, soon became common knowledge. While the humans busied themselves with cleaning up operations, news of their advance, slight though it was, spread through the Wood like a flame.

  ‘I told you, I warned you,’ Sage Hedgehog cried bitterly to anyone who would listen. And now most did. ‘They intend to destroy us. Little by little, Farthing Wood will fall. We’re in their grasp and they won’t let go. Only the otters held the key to our preservation. And where are they now?’

  ‘Stout Fox is searching for them,’ Sly Stoat said. ‘Oh, how I regret I didn’t go with him!’

  ‘It’s never too late,’ Kindly Badger said. ‘He needs help. He asked for it and was rejected. And the Wood is at the mercy of the humans if he fails. We have a duty to go. We can’t depend on one creature alone for our salvation.’

  ‘Were I young I’d be with the fox now,’ Sage Hedgehog said sadly. ‘But, as I’m constantly reminded, I’m old and forgetful of the ways of the young.’

  ‘You have more than played your part already,’ Kindly Badger assured him. ‘If we had listened more to you at the beginning, things might have been very different.’ He turned to Sly Stoat. ‘There’s no time left for talking. We should bring all the animals together who want to help save Farthing Wood, and leave this very night. If the otters are still around, one of us should be able to discover them.’

  There was quite a gathering that crept carefully from the Wood in the dead of night and dispersed beyond the humans’ workings in the all-important search. Stout Vixen had tottered to the earth entrance to watch the departure. It was impossible for her not to know what was afoot. Murmurs, rumours and chatter had been audible above ground for hours. She wondered how far her mate had travelled and whether he had met with any success. She was battling to fight off the sinister clutches of the disease – forcing herself to eat, lapping at raindrops, and determined to ‘hold on’ for Stout Fox’s return as she had promised him.

  Long-Whiskers awoke in the garden. A loud clatter outside the house disturbed her. At once she tensed, her muscles taut and ready to power her into flight. There was nothing to be seen, but she sensed a presence. Whatever it was, it wasn’t human and she relaxed a fraction. A feeling of weariness overcame her. She had over-exerted herself the previous night and was reminded now of her weak state. She must lie low and conserve her strength for a while. She thought of her abandoned holt. How long ago it seemed when she and the other otters had played so freely and carelessly in the snow! And how ill-deserved was their fate at the hands of the foxes. She thought of them with hatred. The misery she and the others had suffered, the futility of their escape from Farthing Wood, the accidents, the deaths – all as a result of the foxes’ jealousy and persecution.

  Long-Whiskers lay down again amongst the drenched plants in the garden. She didn’t feel ready to eat yet and wanted only to rest. Then all at once she saw the creature who had caused the clatter. It was a fox.

  The fox was a well-built animal. It had smelt meat outside the house and had overturned a dustbin to get at it. It was making a meal from human left-overs. Long-Whiskers’ heart beat fast. She recognized the animal at once as Stout Fox, the most powerful of the foxes from Farthing Wood. She shrank back, unsure whether to remain or run. What was the fox doing there? Why had it left the Wood? The conclusion she reached was one that made her shudder. It was hunting for her!

  Naturally Long-Whiskers knew nothing of the change of heart regarding the otters in Farthing Wood. She remembered only the animosity and the savagery of the foxes. She believed now that Stout Fox had come to seek out every otter; to ensure that the last of them was killed so that there could never be any recurrence of the rivalry over food. And she suspected also that there were others of his kind around, bent on the same task. She was in terrible danger. She thought of her cubs. She must preserve their chance of survival at all costs. She knew all about the foxes’ powerful senses of smell and hearing. She didn’t think she could avoid discovery in the garden.

  Slowly, painfully slowly, Long-Whiskers pulled herself from the vegetation and began to move off. A flicker of movement might have given her away, but the fox’s head was turned towards the house. Long-Whiskers increased her speed. Now the rustle of her body made Stout Fox look round. He sniffed the air. He saw where the plants waved and parted. He ran forward. Long-Whiskers could think only of escape. She broke into a run and headed for the road. It was not late and there was traffic passing at intervals. With the fox behind her, the otter had to gamble. To be caught by the fox she believed would mean certain death. As for the human machines, there was just a possibility she could dodge them.

  Stout Fox saw her intention. ‘Don’t run from me!’ he barked. ‘You don’t understand: I haven’t come to harm you. I’ve come for your help.’

  Long-Whiskers was oblivious to his cries. She was concentrating as hard as she could on choosing her moment. She saw that the swift machines had separate movements. There were spaces between their passing. But she had no idea of their speed. To an animal it was unimaginable.

  ‘Stop!’ the fox barked. He could see her desperation. ‘You’ll be killed! The machines. They –’ His last bark was muffled by the roar of a huge lorry. When it had passed Long-Whiskers had disappeared. She was neither on his side of the road, nor across on the other. He sniffed the air for her scent. It was there. He looked down the road. And then he saw her. One of the giant wheels of the lorry had struck Long-Whiskers a glancing blow, sending her spinning through the air. She had landed some metres away, farther up the road, and was trying to drag herself from its surface.

  ‘She’s injured,’ Stout Fox muttered. ‘Her legs are crushed. I must try to pull her free.’

  Traffic continued to pass. No vehicle stopped, but each one went around the struggling otter. Stout Fox trotted forward. Selfishly, he had no thought at that moment of the otter’s vital importance to Farthing Wood. His one idea was to obtain the inform
ation he needed for his vixen’s survival. As soon as it was safe, he crossed the road.

  Long-Whiskers saw him approaching. She knew she had no defences. ‘So you’ve come to finish me off?’ she gasped. The fox ignored her. He grasped her by the nape of the neck and lifted her in his jaws. She was heavy. He laid her in soft grass in the nearest field. She stared up at him with glassy eyes.

  ‘The machine has done the job you came to do,’ she panted.

  Stout Fox blinked uncomprehendingly. ‘Where are the others?’ he asked.

  Long-Whiskers sighed a long sigh. ‘There are no others. I’m the last. And in me die the last of the Farthing Wood otters.’

  ‘But you mustn’t die. Not yet,’ Stout Fox pleaded. ‘You saved yourself from the sickness. Give me the knowledge, I beg you, to save my mate.’

  A realization seemed to dawn in Long-Whiskers’ eyes. ‘So that’s why you came?’ she whispered.

  Much distressed, Stout Fox recalled his other motivation. ‘No, not that alone. I came to find you and to bring you home. Our home. The home we all share.’

  ‘Ha! There’ll be no home for me,’ Long-Whiskers answered him with bitterness. ‘And neither for my cubs.’

  ‘You have cubs?’ Stout Fox exclaimed. ‘Then you’re not the last.’