River Adventure (A Keltie Wood story)

by Katie McKintie



  River Adventure

  (A Keltie Wood story)

  by

  Katie McKintie

  Copyright 2004 Katie McKintie

  The warm morning sun streamed through the peepholes bored through the tree trunk and onto Polly Hedgehog’s bed. She stirred and opened her eyes a crack.

  “Wake up lazy hog!” cried a voice and she felt two small prickly bodies bouncing on her dandelion-fluff stuffed quilt. She grunted and sat up. Her younger brother and sister, twins Pepper and Fred were jumping up and down on her bed.

  “Get up, get up, get up!” Pepper cried and tugged at her big sister’s arm.

  “What’s the hurry?” Polly groaned, lying back down again and tugging her quilt back over her head.

  “Have you forgotten?” Fred said crossly. “Mummy said if it was a nice day we could all go on a picnic!”

  “And it is. So we can! Get UP Polly!” Pepper pleaded.

  “Cool!” Polly yawned, stretched and jumped out of bed.

  Polly, Pepper and Fred shared the top bedroom in the big oak tree at the southern-most end of Keltie Wood. There were four rooms in the tree; a large combined living room and kitchen took up all the base of the tree, which led to the outside world by a tiny concealed door among the roots that no nosy Big People could find. A spiral ramp for access ran round and up the inner wall of the trunk to the upper rooms, with doors leading off to a neat bathroom, Mum and Dad’s bedroom and then the children’s room at the top. Each room had tiny holes drilled right through the tree so that the hedgehogs could see out, but were almost invisible from the outside.

  The three young hedgehogs curled themselves into balls and rolled all the way down the ramp to the very bottom of the tree, ending up in a giggling pile in the middle of the living room.

  Mum had already made up their picnic, which was packed into three small backpacks, one for each of them.

  “But you must have some breakfast first,” she told them firmly, as she placed three large bowls of porridge on the wooden table, drizzling honey generously over each bowl. Their neighbours in the next tree were bees so they always had plenty of honey to eat.

  After breakfast Mum gave them each their backpacks and sent them out into the sunshine.

  “Make sure you’re back in time for tea!” she called after them. They waved and quickly ran off down the sun-speckled path through the trees, laughing and chattering excitedly.

  They hadn’t gone far when a grinning shadow stepped out from behind a beech tree in front of them. The three hedgehogs piled to a stop. Frightened, Pepper and Fred moved behind their big sister. It was Walter Weasel, the biggest bully in the wood.

  “Where are you three off to?” he asked, showing his teeth in what might have been a smile.

  “We’re going for a picnic,” Pepper piped up, from behind Polly. Polly nudged her to be quiet.

  “A picnic, eh?” Walter grinned. “Why don’t you come with me, I can show you some nice picnicking spots.”

  “No thank you,” said Polly politely. When she had been younger, Walter and some friends of his had taken her exploring once, deliberately got her lost and then left her, scared and alone, to find her own way back. Wiser from the experience, she had learned to stay well clear of Walter and his friends.

  “Well, why don’t you let me come with you?” Walter tried again.

  “I don’t think so, thank you all the same. We’d really rather be on our own.” Polly smiled coldly at him, held Pepper and Fred’s paws in hers and ushered them away.

  “Why wouldn’t you let him come?” Fred complained. “He was trying to be nice. Maybe he wants to be friends!”

  “People like Walter don’t change,” Polly replied grimly. “We’re better off without him. Anyway,” she said, her face lighting up with a sudden idea, “we don’t need him. I know where we can go.” She took off running. “Come on!” she shouted over her shoulder. Pepper and Fred ran after her, trying to keep up.

  “Polly! Polly, wait for us!” they called. Polly ignored them, running up a hillside. She stood at the top and shouted down at them.

  “Come and look – you can see the whole world!” she exclaimed.

  Pepper and Fred panted up the hill and finally reached Polly who stood facing the gentle breeze, her eyes shining. They looked down the other side of the hill. The whole countryside spread out in front of them. They could see houses and farms where the Big People lived, fields full of corn, cows and horses grazing in meadows and, not too far away, something shiny snaking across the land and glinting in the sunshine.

  “What’s that?” Fred said, pointing to it.

  “That’s a river,” Polly told them.

  “What’s a river?” Pepper asked. They had never been this far away from their tree before.

  “Do you remember last year when Father brought us some fish for our tea?” Polly asked. Pepper and Fred nodded. They had never had fish before but Father had been out all day and had come home with a bag full of silvery slippery things. Mother had cooked them and they had tasted wonderful. “Well, that’s where he got them – the river. It’s like lots of water pouring across the grass. He brought me up here one day and showed me.”

  “Doesn’t it soak in?” Pepper asked, puzzled. When it rained and the water puddled outside their tree, it always soaked into the ground and was gone the next morning.

  “No, it’s going so fast it doesn’t have time to soak in,” Polly told her.

  “Where is it going to?” Fred wanted to know. Polly didn’t know. She had never actually been down to the river; Father had only taken her to the top of the hill to show her the view. He had promised to take her to the river one day and show her how to catch fish when she was older. However he hadn’t actually said she wasn’t allowed to go by herself.

  “Never mind that,” Polly said. “Let’s go there and bring back some fish for tea!” Pepper and Fred looked worried.

  “It looks a long way,” Fred said.

  “It’s not that far,” Polly said confidently. “Father was there and back in a day! Come on!” The three hedgehogs curled into balls and rolled down the other side of the hill, laughing and screaming. At the bottom, they paused for a few minutes to pick the leaves and grass out of each other’s spines.

  They never noticed the slim shape that was slinking through the grass a short way behind them.

  They reached the river just as the sun was hitting the highest point of the sky.

  “OK,” said Polly, putting down her backpack in a shady spot. “I think it’s lunchtime!”

  Polly’s pack contained a blanket as well as her share of the food and she spread it out on the grass. They all opened their packs and laid out the food Mum had packed for them. There were wormburger sandwiches, honey snails baked in their shells, early fruit and berries, even some acorns from their tree, still in the little cups they grew in. Mother had also packed several small flasks full of nectar as a special treat, and a full comb of honey. The three hoglets had worked up a good appetite after their morning’s hike and they quickly tucked in. After their meal, they took their acorn cups down to the river and washed it all down with cold clear river water.

  As they were drying their cups on dock leaves, Fred noticed something bobbing at the side of the river.

  “What’s that?” he said, pointing. The three hedgehogs clustered round the strange object. It seemed to be a collection of straight, smooth twigs fastened together and floating on the river. It was roughly square and each side was at least four times as long as Polly.

  “Why doesn’t it float away?” asked Pepper.

 
“Look at this,” Polly said, pointing to a piece of thin rope fastened to the side of the object. She followed the rope through the grass. “It’s tied to this post!” she said, resting her paw on a stout stick that had been pounded into the ground.

  “Look at me!” shouted Fred. Polly turned. Fred had clambered onto the structure and was bobbing up and down as the river surged beneath him.

  “Frederick Hedgehog, you get off there right now!” Polly called, using the same tone she had heard their mother using. Fred stuck out his tongue at her.

  “Don’t have to!” he retorted. “Anyway, it’s fun! Try it!” Pepper grinned with delight and began to climb on after her brother.

  “You might fall off – and then what would I tell mother?” Polly protested.

  “Don’t be such a bore!” Fred told her. “It’s perfectly safe! Hey – I can see fish! Maybe we can catch some from here.” Polly gave up and climbed onto the raft after them. It was rather fun, she admitted to herself, bobbing up and down like a leaf on the autumn winds. She looked down into the clear river water. There were fish, slipping through the water just below the surface.

  “How do you catch fish?” Pepper asked, looking at her big sister. Polly didn’t know, but she wasn’t about to admit it.

  “You have to lie down like this,” she lay on her tummy at the edge of the raft, her feet pointing toward the middle, “and you dangle your paw in the water like this,” she dropped her paw over the side into the cool water, “and then when a fish comes along you just grab it, like this!” She lunged for a fish but it swam past her grasping paw with a flick of its tail and continued unconcernedly on its way. Pepper and Fred giggled. “Well, maybe it takes a bit of practice,” she muttered, wiping her wet paw on the raft. “Come on then, let’s see you do better!” she challenged the twins. They obediently lay down on the raft next to Polly and dangled their paws in the water, giggling.